Displacement

"When did they knock down the clocktower?" said the stranger to the paper seller, who dropped the book he was reading and coughed.

"Jesus... sorry sir, didn't hear you come up there..." Malcolm looked up at the stranger, a tall man in a black woolly hat, long coat wrapped around him against the wind, which was picking up and sending the papers ruffling. He had a local accent, but... "You're not from around here then?"

"I've been away for a while. You know. I'm in sales."

"Must have been a long time, they knocked that thing down in '82, '83 maybe. Yes, '83. It was falling down. Some slates nearly killed a kiddie. Never showed the right time anyway."

The stranger frowned. "Really? Hmm. Sure I was back here around then."

Malcolm opened his mouth to challenge this slur on his local memory but saw that the stranger wasn't even looking at him any more, just staring at the gap in the sky where the clocktower had been with an expression of honest confusion.

"Sure I was here then..." he muttered to himself. Malcolm shrugged and placed a half brick on top of a fluttering Guardian. Another oddball then. Hey ho. He picked up his book and thumbed through the pages, trying to find his place.

The stranger watched the sky above the Town Hall as if deep in thought for a little longer, then shook his head. "Uh, thanks anyway," he said to Malcolm, who nodded.

"No problem sir."

The stranger walked to the zebra crossing and began to cross the road towards the Town Hall, the wind whipping his coat up around his jeans awkwardly, almost tripping him. Cold already for November.

There weren't many people around this morning, and Malcolm watched the stranger absently until that short ginger fellow turned up to pick up his Mail and his twenty Lambert & Butler. When Malcolm looked across the road again the stranger had gone.

It wouldn't have been anything particularly memorable if, five minutes later, someone else hadn't come up and asked exactly the same thing. A woman in her early 30s, with short brown hair and a pair of bright blue earrings that bounced in the breeze. Some sort of hippy scarf, and what looked like a diamond in her nose, though it probably wasn't. "'Scuse me, but didn't there used to be a clocktower there?"

"Yes madam, but it was over twenty years ago. Funniest thing, though, a gentleman asked me that very same question only a few minutes ago."

"Oh yes?"

"Yes madam, and I told him exactly the same thing, that they knocked it down in '83. Forgive me for saying so but you don't sound like you're from this area."

"No, no I'm from London, but I lived in Hopedon for four years, and I'm sure I remember the clocktower."

"When would that have been?"

"I came here in 1994. I worked in the Our Price just down the road there."

"Well, I'm sorry madam, but you couldn't have possibly seen the clocktower. I remember it well. I had this very same booth when they took it down, I remember watching all the work. The men doing the work used to buy their papers and fags from me every morning. Sorry, but it definitely wasn't here in 1994."

"But I remember... I remember your stand here, definitely... and I remember that clocktower... always slow, no matter how often they fixed it... the day I started I got into trouble, I was late back from lunch, I looked at the clock because I'd left my watch in the bathroom that morning and I thought I still had fifteen minutes to spare."

"Well, yes, it was always slow, but... well, you would have been just a little girl at the time. I'm quite certain about that. My eldest was born that year, you know. He's in London himself now actually, got himself a City job now, always was a smart lad." Malcolm stopped - the woman was looking at the sky in the same way the first stranger had been. Eventually she turned around.

"Well, I guess I could be... no... but... well, I suppose I must be mistaken then. It's just, well, I can remember it all so clearly."

"You ask anyone round here, madam, they'll say the same thing. Go and ask at the Town Hall if you don't believe me, they'll know."

"No, no, I believe you, it's just..." Her voice trailed off. Malcolm coughed. "Well, er, you said someone else had been asking?"

"Yes, that's right, tall gentleman in a long coat. He said the same thing you did, that he remembered it being there, but I told him what I'm telling you now, it definitely wasn't. Maybe you two should get together."

"Uh, yes. Yes. Maybe we should." She paused. "Look, this is an odd thing to ask I know, but if you see this guy again, do you think you could give him my mobile number? Have you got a pen?" She scribbled down a number on a napkin she dug out of her beaded handbag, wrote JULIA above it, underlined the name twice, and handed the napkin to Malcolm, who took it and put it under the tray of his cashbox. "I'm Julia," she said, redundantly.

"Sure. If I see him again I'll make sure he gets it."

"Thanks, thanks a lot. Well, anyway, yes, thanks for your time. See you around, then." She walked away down the road, towards where the Our Price had been, which Malcolm did remember, although now it was a shop selling overpriced trainers.

It was only when he picked up the biro that he'd lent her that he noticed that the plastic where her fingers had been looked like it had melted slightly, and the whole end of the pen was now bent at an angle.**