DON’T LEAVE THE CIRCLE

Emma managed to cancel a wedding while her lunch was in the microwave.

The bride was still there. So was the groom. Only the date, the venue and the two-thousand-pound deposit had vanished from the booking, while a reassuring green message in the middle of the screen informed her that her changes had been saved successfully.

She put down her fork and took a screenshot.

‘Ben.’

A hand appeared above the next monitor, one finger raised. Ben had his headset on. He’d spent the past ten minutes assuring someone they could have it ready by Friday.

Emma opened the booking again. Still no wedding.

She sent him a message: Don’t promise Friday.

Ben read it, then looked at her.

‘I’ll call you back.’

She rolled her chair aside to make room for him at her desk. Outside, two workmen were trying to cover a stretch of dug-up pavement with a tarpaulin. The rain was getting underneath it faster than they could pull it straight.

‘What did you do?’

‘Changed the bride’s phone number.’

‘And?’

‘Clicked Save.’

‘And?’

‘Ben, I’d love there to be more to this too.’

He leaned towards the monitor. Emma rewound the screen recording. The phone-number field, a changed digit, a click. In the second tab, the booking page still held the old details. She switched to it, corrected the surname and saved again.

Ben straightened.

‘You’ve got two tabs open.’

‘Yes.’

‘You edited the same booking in two tabs.’

‘The bride’s on the phone to the manager. He opens her booking. Meanwhile, the groom’s at home and notices someone’s spelt his surname wrong. There you go. Two tabs. Two different computers, even.’

‘We agreed we were testing the normal booking process today.’

Emma pushed the mouse towards him.

‘Fine. Give them their wedding back the normal way.’

He perched on the edge of the spare chair.

The microwave pinged in the kitchen. Emma remembered that she’d brought her fork back to her desk and left her lunch heating up. By the time she reached the kitchen, someone had put her container on the counter and replaced it with fish.

‘This yours?’ Priya asked from beside the kettle.

‘Depends. Is it still hot?’

Priya nodded at the container.

‘Has your mum sent enough for the whole department again?’

‘She thinks that’s one portion.’

‘I like your mum.’

Emma divided the bake with her fork.

‘Get a plate.’

Priya didn’t need asking twice. They ate standing by the window; someone had covered the only table with printouts and left a sign saying DO NOT TOUCH. They could see Ben from there. He was properly in the chair now, on the phone with one hand pressed to his forehead.

‘Bad?’ Priya asked.

‘Don’t know yet. It’s in the test environment. No actual weddings harmed.’

‘Still time to get to mine, then.’

‘You’ve been engaged three weeks.’

‘That’s why I’m asking now.’

Emma laughed and nearly inhaled a crumb. Priya thumped her between the shoulder blades, a little harder than necessary, then helped herself to the last piece with the crispy top.

Emma’s phone vibrated in her pocket.

Mum.

She showed Priya the screen. Priya raised her plate as if she meant to thank her personally, but Emma was already heading into the corridor.

‘Hi. I’m eating.’

‘I haven’t asked you anything yet.’

‘Getting ahead of you.’

‘Are you coming on Saturday?’

‘Yes.’

‘Your dad says you’re busy.’

‘Dad wants me to bring a filter for the coffee machine. He’s preparing himself for disappointment.’

Something rustled at the other end. In the background, her father announced that he’d already ordered a filter.

‘No need for me to come, then,’ Emma said.

‘Don’t be silly. What time shall we expect you?’

They settled on two. Then one, because Dad wanted to watch the match at two. Then two again, when he called out that the match was on Sunday.

Emma leaned against the wall. On the meeting-room glass opposite, someone had drawn six rectangles connected by arrows. The last arrow ran straight into the edge of the pane.

‘And wear something warm,’ Mum said. ‘Is it raining there too?’

‘No, just over your house.’

‘Emma.’

‘I’ve got a jacket.’

It was hanging over the back of her chair. Thin, no hood. That morning she’d calculated three minutes to the bus stop and another two from the bus to the office. The weather hadn’t cooperated.

‘A proper one?’

‘Mum, I survived being out in the cold without a coat as a baby. I think I can make it home from work.’

The line went quiet.

Emma closed her eyes.

She shouldn’t have said that.

Usually, the family story of how she’d been found ended with Dad saying that even then, she hadn’t been prepared to wait indoors. Sometimes Mum laughed. But not always, and Emma still hadn’t learnt to judge when it was safe.

‘You were lucky,’ Mum said.

‘I know.’

‘That man could have gone another way.’

‘I know. Sorry.’

Emma remembered nothing of the man who’d found her beside a footpath, or the blanket, or the cold. Those things belonged to other people’s accounts and a thin folder her parents had shown her once she was old enough to ask. The doctors’ surprise was in there too: she was alive, and in far better condition than they’d expected.

At sixteen, she’d read every page. At twenty-three, she’d tried to find out more. Nothing new had turned up, and each time Mum asked whether anyone had got back to her, the question grew a little more careful.

‘I’ll get a taxi if it’s pouring,’ Emma said.

‘Oh, don’t waste your money. The bus stop’s right there.’

Emma smiled.

‘All right. Bus it is.’

‘And bring that container back. I haven’t got any big ones left.’

She stayed in the corridor for another minute after the call. Then she set herself a reminder for Saturday: CONTAINERS.

After a moment, she added: WASH THEM.

By half past five, the wedding had finally stopped disappearing.

Emma tested the fix, rejected it, received a message from Ben consisting of a single full stop, tested the next fix and this time couldn’t find anything wrong with it. The date stayed put. So did the deposit. Old data no longer overwrote new.

She closed the ticket and stretched. Something clicked beneath her shoulder blade.

The office was almost empty. Priya had left an earring on her desk, and a red light was blinking on the printer. Ben brought Emma a cup of tea in a mug bearing the logo of the hotel they were building the system for.

‘No sugar,’ he said.

‘Thanks.’

He stayed where he was.

‘What?’

‘Nothing. Just… good thing you caught it.’

‘I know.’

‘You could say “you’re welcome”.’

‘You’re welcome.’

He nodded at her screen.

‘Don’t open anything else today.’

She was about to answer, but caught sight of the time. Her boots. She was meant to be collecting them from the repair shop. For the third day running.

Her phone was at seventeen per cent. The charging cable was plugged into her laptop. Its other end lay neatly beside the phone.

Emma looked at it, then at the ceiling.

‘What now?’ Ben asked warily.

‘Nothing. Normal procedure.’

She took a few more mouthfuls of tea, packed her lunch container and laptop, and checked for her keys. Went back for her phone. By the lift she remembered her umbrella, but the bus was due in seven minutes. She’d manage.

Outside, the rain had stopped. The wind had picked up instead.

The first gust caught her jacket and blew her hair into her face. She trapped it beneath her collar, stepped round a puddle and tried to open a message from her father as she walked.

The photograph showed the underside of the coffee machine. His thumb covered the model number.

Need this sort of filter. Ordered the wrong one.

A second message arrived while she was still looking at the first.

Don’t tell your mum.

Emma stopped beneath a shop awning and typed: Move your thumb.

He sent back a question mark.

She enlarged the photo, circled his thumb in red and sent it back.

She wasn’t going to make the bus now. The next one was in twenty minutes—time to collect her boots and buy some bread.

Bread first. At home she had two eggs, half a jar of olives and something in foil she hadn’t dared unwrap that morning. After Mum’s lunch, she didn’t want much dinner, but there would be another morning tomorrow. It would be nice to have something ready for it.

The man ahead of her in the queue had a bouquet. He kept moving the flowers from one hand to the other, trying to get at his wallet. A card slipped out from between the stems.

Emma picked it up without reading it and handed it back.

‘Thanks,’ he said. ‘I’m a bit…’

He gestured at the flowers, as though that explained everything.

‘You’ve still got the price on.’

‘Shit.’

They both tried to find the edge of the sticker. The cashier silently produced a pair of scissors.

Back outside, Emma checked her phone. Dad had sent another picture of the coffee machine, this time without his thumb. It was out of focus. She’d deal with it when she got home.

The repair shop was two streets away. She could still make it if she took the shortcut past the old library.

At the crossing, she paused to let a cyclist pass. The bag of bread was slipping off her wrist; she hitched it higher. Her shoulder ached under the weight of her work bag. She should have left the laptop at the office. She wasn’t going to test anything else tonight anyway.

Someone called softly behind her.

Emma turned.

A woman wearing headphones sat in the bus shelter. Further along, a man was stacking chairs outside a café. No one was looking at her.

She walked on, then stopped a few paces later.

What had she heard?

Not her name. A short word, almost lost in the traffic. Answer? No. It hadn’t sounded like that. She remembered what it meant, but couldn’t have repeated it.

She took out her phone. No incoming call. No video playing either.

Twelve per cent.

‘Brilliant.’

She put it away.

The lane beside the library smelled of wet leaves. It was quieter here. At the far end, the repair shop’s OPEN sign was still lit.

Emma quickened her pace.

Her toe caught on a raised edge.

She managed to brace a hand against the wall. The bag struck her knee; she heard the bread crunch inside it. Swearing, she looked down.

The pavement was flat.

She scraped the sole of her shoe across it. Nothing. Not even an uneven join.

A man’s voice came from round the corner, sharp and commanding. This time she caught several words. None she knew. She pulled her hand off the wall and turned towards the entrance to the lane.

She could have sworn someone had said, ‘Don’t leave.’

The lock clicked at the repair shop. Emma’s hand went up automatically. Wait, I’m here. Her boots had been behind that door for a week, and there was more rain forecast tomorrow.

The cobbler didn’t see her. He began to lower the blind.

Emma stepped forward.

Her foot came down on warm, dry stone.

She froze, her hand still raised. The shop was there, its yellow window, the strip of light across the wet pavement. But beside her shoe lay a broad white slab marked with a dark, crooked symbol.

She blinked.

Rainwater. A cigarette butt between the paving stones. Her own foot.

She backed slowly towards the wall and took out her phone.

Mum answered on the second ring.

‘Forgotten something?’

‘No. Can you talk to me for a bit?’

‘What’s happened?’

Emma pressed her palm against the cold brick. She was here. By the library. There were cars just round the corner, her laptop was in her bag, and Mum was waiting for an answer.

‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘I feel…’

The same unfamiliar word sounded very close.

This time there was no mistaking it. It was calling her.

‘Emma?’ Mum said.

The brick beneath her hand vanished.