Harri felt as though she’d been born again.
She materialized after passing through a realm beyond the physical and took a moment to get her bearings. She was in an alleyway behind some gray stone buildings. She tasted salt in the air and heard the cackle and caw of birds. There was a road to her right and she ran towards it.
A rusty old Ford Capri drove by as she emerged from the alleyway, and she heard Prince’s “Purple Rain” blaring through the open windows. She was on a provincial high street and saw an estate agency, ice-cream shop, and a pub called the Eagle and Child. A couple of puffy-faced men in shabby suits were heading for the pub, and she hurried to intercept them.
“Excuse me?” she said. “Where am I?”
They both stank of cigarettes and neglect, and looked at her with bloodshot eyes.
“Hen night?” the bald one asked.
“Something like that.”
“Barmouth, love,” he said. “You’re in Barmouth.”
Harri’s heart soared. She knew exactly where Ben would be.
“When?” she asked. “What year is this?”
“Blimey,” the gray-haired man remarked. “Must have been quite a party. It’s 1989, doll.”
“Thank you,” Harri said, and she ran south along the high street, leaving the two bemused men in her wake.
She sprinted by shops, pubs, and restaurants, dodging tourists with lollies and cones. A boy with a Walkman almost collided with her, but she danced around him and ran on, passing a newsagent with a poster of Charles and Diana in the window. She sprinted along memory lane, and the past that was now her present flew by in a blur. She raced by Margery Allen’s block and down the steps to the wooden railway bridge that crossed the estuary.
She ran through the turnstile, across the bridge, without pause. She slowed when she climbed the grassy slope that led to the clifftops on the other side. The sea wind whipped her face and the sun beat down, but nothing could temper the thrill that electrified her. She was breathless and tired, but still she pressed on, and when she rounded the curve of the cliffs, she saw the Elsewhere House, where she knew he’d be watching and waiting for her.
Elsewhere. Just like he’d said in the poem. Elsewhere.
She accelerated, and as she neared the building, the front door opened and Ben Elmys stepped out to greet her.
The sight of him stopped her in her tracks. She couldn’t believe he was real, that this was actually happening. He came to meet her, his relief visible.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you the truth. I couldn’t tell anyone. It’s been so difficult.”
Harri took his hands. “You don’t need to apologize. Do you remember what I told you that day we walked up Maer Hills? You’re not alone anymore. Neither of us are.”
Harri pulled him towards her and they kissed. When their lips touched she felt complete, and all the love she’d ever had for him came flooding back. They were bound by an experience so unique and profound, she was hardly able to fathom it. All she knew was that it had provoked a storm of swirling emotions that fell calm when she looked into his crystal-blue eyes.
“I’m the one who should apologize. I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry.”
“You have nothing to be sorry for.”
“I lied,” Harri confessed. “I lied and I sent you to prison.”
For years, she’d tried to convince herself she’d seen Ben kick Sabih off the top of the ravine, but deep down she’d known it wasn’t true. She’d lied to herself and committed perjury in court and sent an innocent man to prison because she wanted someone to suffer for her friend’s death, and she couldn’t blame herself. “You’ve been through so much, sacrificed so much, and you did it for love. You did it for your mother and father. You didn’t deserve any of this.”
“A man died,” Ben replied. “I set that in motion, and no matter what I tried, I couldn’t fix it. Even if I didn’t push him, what I started caused his death. I needed to pay a price for his life. For my own peace of mind.”
He was an honorable man. A good man.
“I still don’t understand how you can forgive me,” she said anxiously.
“Harri.” He paused and looked at her with all the love and longing she’d seen in his eyes the first time they met. “You’ve been there for me ever since I was a child. You came to help me. To find out what happened to my parents. They live in here.” He touched his chest. “That’s where my mum and dad are. They’re always with me, watching over everything I do. That’s what you told me. You tried to make me feel better, because you’re good and decent and full of love. Everything you did, you did with the best of intentions. Any wrong you did me was because I didn’t tell you the whole truth. I couldn’t. But Fate put us together, Harri, and I don’t know what I would have done if it hadn’t. You remember that day you came to Longhaven? Where do I put all the love I have for them? That’s what I asked you. I know now. I’ve known for a long time. You fill the space in my heart. You make me whole.”
Harri couldn’t stop the tears from coming, but she was beaming so brightly, she felt as though her entire face was a smile.
“I love you,” he went on. “I’ve loved you since the moment we met in the café. You were everything I’d hoped for. Everything I’d ever dreamed of. My life is fractured, distorted, broken, the pieces of my existence scattered across centuries, but one moment has kept me sane. This moment. The prospect of standing here with you in my arms. I love you, Harri. I always will.”
She cried with a sense of contentment that had eluded her for years.
“I love you too,” she said, but the words didn’t seem big enough to contain her feelings for him, so she leaned forward and kissed him, and he held her in his arms, and, for the first time in forever, everything felt right.
She wished the moment would never end, but time wound on and eventually she took a breath and wiped her eyes.
“So what happens now?” Harri asked.
Ben put his arms around her waist.
“I don’t know. My younger self never sees what happens once he leaves the cave and goes back in time. This is the first time I haven’t known what’s going to happen since I was twenty-one. I’m blind to the future. I suppose we figure it out together.”
He gestured at the cliff and the wide-open sea and big sky. “This is ours.” He turned to the Elsewhere House. “And if you like it, this is our home. Where we can really get to know each other.”
“Anyone who would do what you’ve done, sacrifice as you have, endured what you’ve endured—I already know everything I need to know about you. I loved you the moment we first met,” Harri said. “Someone once told me something beautiful: You are my star. You light up the darkest day. Now I understand what it means. You are my star and you do light up the darkest day.”
Harri pulled him in for another kiss. When they parted, they were both beaming.
They could hardly contain their happiness as they walked into the Elsewhere House together.