Page 42 of The Love of Our Lives

Light above me, faces, people asking, ‘are you OK?’ over and over, as the scent of perfume and aftershave surrounds me. And then a figure in white, Fran; Simon too, both crouching over me, and Fran is hugging me into her, and saying, ‘oh my god, oh my god, oh my god.’

My heart is racing, and yet I feel the oddest sensation coming over me again, hot and strong, as pieces fall together in my brain.

Seeing Fran and Simon talking like that, running out and on to the road, the fact I almost killed myself but then someone pulled me back – they stopped me going over into traffic.

They stopped it happening.

It’s been growing since Charlie’s accident, I realise, this dawning awareness that I could change things.

Change the outcome.

But there was something else I couldn’t put my finger on – some missing piece of the puzzle.

Then at the sight of those car lights, the life-ending metal milliseconds away from me, that beautiful lifting feeling as someone pulled me back from it, I realised what I’ve known all along.

What my brain clearly wouldn’t let me consider before: that I could accidentally kill Emily before the day of the heart transplant – which means maybe I can save her too.