THE WRONG TURN

Marcus Johnson was driving home after another boring, frustrating day, resentful of the way he was treated by his boss, of his position in the world, of the way his life had turned out. When he was young, the world had seemed full of opportunities, the future had seemed so bright. What had happened to him? Why had everything gone wrong? As he drove, he pondered over the missed opportunities, his regrets for the decisions he’d taken, that had ended up with him being where he was – a lowly architectural draftsman, unqualified, badly paid, doing the fussy detail work the architects couldn’t be bothered with. Divorced, no kids, no real friends. The more he thought about it the more he found to regret. Why had he made the choices he had? Every choice he’d made had seemed to turn out wrong.

He remembered when he was at school, he’d been bright, intelligent, capable. Even the subjects he didn’t like – physics, chemistry, mathematics – he’d done well in, when he could be bothered to work at them. And those he enjoyed – English, French, German, History, Art, Music – he’d aced. And he remembered he’d wanted to be a marine archaeologist, diving on wrecks, adding to the sum total of human understanding.

So why, when he’d graduated and gone to University, had he chosen to study engineering, of all things? Yes, his father had been an engineer, but he hadn’t pushed his son into following his profession. It had been his own decision. He could have enrolled in an Arts degree, but he had looked ahead and thought the only thing that would have got him would be a teaching job, and he just couldn’t see himself as a teacher – he had no skills that way. So he’d studied engineering and hated it. Failed his first year, but by a piece of very fast talking had persuaded the Dean to give him another chance, allow him to repeat the year. And he had failed the mid-year examinations. That had been the end of his university career.

And he’d been in love and thrown it away. He remembered her name – her girlfriend had come up to him at the end of the school year and told him that Margaret liked him. He’d never noticed her before – she was a year younger than he was – but she was beautiful. Slim, graceful, long blonde hair, a cheeky face. He’d spent most of the following year talking to her between classes, but her girlfriend was always with her when he tried to summon up the courage to ask her out. He’d been a very shy young man, uncertain of himself, not knowing what to do. And when, toward the end of the year, she’d gone out to a party with one of his classmates, he was devastated. And he’d given up. For all he knew she’d still been interested in him, but he decided he’d failed and gave up trying.

He’d even been responsible for his dog’s death. Whiskers, the Irish terrier he’d found as a stray and brought home. The dog who had followed him everywhere, who he’d walked every day before school, who he’d fed and cleaned up after. A friend who never judged him, was always glad to see him, pined when he had to go to school and leave him behind. And he’d crossed a busy street on his brand-new bicycle. And Whiskers had followed him and been bowled over by a car. He wished he could have those moments over again, to do it differently, but it was too late. His dog was dead and it was all his fault.

He was so busy with his thoughts that instead of turning right to go home to his spartan apartment, to eat alone and kill time watching some trite, meaningless television show, he turned left along a road he’d never taken before. When he realised his mistake he thought of turning back, but there were no intersections, nowhere he could turn. He had often wondered where this road might lead to, he had nothing at home to look forward to; he decided he might as well follow it and see where it went.

It was strange – the city was large and sprawling, the suburbs spread out in all directions, but this road didn’t seem to be going through that kind of landscape at all. It was becoming narrower, beginning to wind, more like a country lane than a well-travelled road. Trees and fields either side and the occasional old house set well back from the roadway – he couldn’t reconcile this with what he knew of the surrounding suburbs at all. And then it went from a tarred road to a genuine country lane, pastoral, rural. He knew of nowhere anywhere near the city that was like this.

He came to a small village and realised he needed to go to the bathroom. He pulled up to a gas station – something right out of Norman Rockwell – and walked in. ‘Oh, hi Marcus!’ said the attendant.

This was strange. The man didn’t look familiar at all; how could he know his name? ‘I’m sorry,’ said Marcus. ‘Do I know you?’

‘Of course. I’m Chuck. I’m Margaret’s cousin.’

‘Margaret?’

‘Oh, boy,’ said Chuck. ‘You must be off with the birdies today. Margaret. Your wife.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘You’re Marcus Johnson, right?’

‘Yes.’

‘And Margaret’s your wife. You live just down the road, in the red house on the corner. What’s the matter, you been hit on the head or something? Maybe I need to call Margaret to come and get you.’

‘I’m sorry, I don’t understand all this.’

‘Yep. I’m going to call her. And he picked up the phone; ‘Margaret, it’s Chuck. Yes, I’m fine, but Marcus is here and he’s acting a bit funny. I think you ought to come and get him.’

Marcus decided it was getting too bizarre – he didn’t know what was going on, but he didn’t want to be part of it. He turned to leave, walked outside. And his car was gone. It wasn’t much of a car, old, rusty, cranky, but it was all he could afford. He walked back into the gas station, worried and angry. ‘What have you done with my car?’ he demanded. ‘What’s going on? Is this some kind of prank?’

‘No, Marcus. What are you talking about?’

‘My car’s gone. The old yellow one. It was parked next to the building.’

‘You walked here. I saw you come up the drive.’ He turned his head, a look of relief came over his face. ‘Ah, here’s Margaret. She’ll sort this all out.’

And there she was. It was Margaret, the girl he’d loved and lost all those years ago. But grown into beautiful womanhood. He stood there, unable to do anything more than gawp at her. She came up to him, put her arms around him and gave him a kiss. ‘I’ve been waiting for you, honey,’ she said. ‘Let’s go home. It’s okay, Chuck. I’ll look after it from here.’ She took his hand and led him outside. A short walk to a beautiful old house, slate roof, set in an attractive garden full of colourful flowers, tall gentle trees casting a soft shade.

‘Come inside, sweetheart. I can see you need some explanations.’

He followed her, confused. The house was a little dark after the bright sunlight outside, but comforting, welcoming. ‘Come and sit down. The kids are away at their friends’ house. We can talk.’

‘I don’t understand.’

‘Of course you don’t. I’m sure this is all a bit of a shock.’

‘What’s going on?’

‘It’s a little hard to explain. I don’t know how or why it all happens, but this is the place where the decisions you regretted in life never happened. I remember how shy you used to be with me. I was waiting and waiting for you to ask me out and you never did. We had talked and talked, and you never had to courage to make the first move. Until the party. You saw Eric ask me to go with him and you walked up and said ‘No, she’s going with me.’ We went to the party together, danced together, kissed. And it went from there. We got married when we both finished university. We’ve been together ever since.’

‘But I never finished university! I failed my first year and repeated and failed again. I know now I was never cut out to be an engineer.’

‘Engineer?’ she laughed. ‘Of course not! What an idea! You’d always wanted to be an archaeologist – you went on and on about it. So that’s what you studied and that’s what you did.’ She stopped for a moment. A look of comprehension came across her face. ‘Oh, I never knew – that’s another of those decisions. You poor darling! So what did you do after you left engineering?’

‘Not much. Bummed around. All kinds of meaningless jobs. I eventually managed to get a job as an unqualified architectural draftsman. Base rate salary, no real future. I’ve lived in a small dingy apartment by myself ever since my divorce.’

‘Divorce? Who were you married to? Would I know her?’

‘Betty Martins.’

‘That bitch! I remember her from school. What possessed you to marry her?’

‘To be honest, I really don’t know. I was lonely, I thought I had no choice, and she was available.’

‘Yes, to every boy in school.’

‘As I found out later, yes. She didn’t care about me, and she made it very clear. She went off with a stevedore, divorced me, married him, left him, married someone else. I lost track after a while.’

‘Well, that’s all over and done with. You’re here now, with me.’

‘But I don’t understand. How can this be?’

‘Like I said, I don’t understand it either. But I do remember before I came here having made my own bad decisions. I went to the party with Eric and you seemed to lose interest. I got together with him, we married. Very unsatisfactory. I was very unhappy – he treated me badly. The one day I was out driving, trying to get my head together, trying to work out what to do. And I took a wrong turn. I drove down a country lane I didn’t know existed and ended up here. And discovered that I’d never made that decision, I’d gone to the party with you, not Eric. That you and I were married, and always had been. That was yesterday. And now you’re here.’

‘How can this happen?’

‘I have no idea. But I’m not going to question it – I don’t want to do anything to spoil it. It might go away. We live here, we have for years. I loved you then, I love you now, and I had always regretted the choice I’d made to go with Eric. I saw the look on your face when you found out. I wished I’d told him I was going with you, that would have forced you to do something about it. But I got here and discovered that my bad decision had never happened. We’ve been together ever since – here. I don’t want to leave and find out this is all a dream. And strangely, my memories now are all of our life together. I’m beginning to forget the other life.’

There was a sound of barking from outside and a black, whiskery dog pushed through the door. ‘Hello, Jackson!’ said Margaret. ‘Here’s Daddy!’ The dog leaped up and put its front paws on Marcus’ knees, licking his face. ‘Whiskers’ grandson,’ she said. ‘We had Whiskers for years, until he died of old age. He was a good dog. You told me all about how you got him.’

‘But he was killed! He followed me across a busy street and a car hit him! I was so sorry – I felt so guilty – it was all my fault.’

‘Not here and now. That’s the thing. I didn’t know about that, but that’s another regretted decision that never happened. The kids will be home soon. I’ve got to finish making dinner – my turn tonight. And some news. Your new book has arrived. An advance copy from the publisher. They say the reviews are very good.’

‘A book?’

‘Yes. Marine archaeology. What did you think?’

It was going to take a lot of getting used to. But he decided he was going to enjoy it. And strangely, even the events of today, before he made that wrong turn, were beginning to fade in his mind. He gave his wife a hug and sat on the couch, waiting for the kids to get home. Marcie and John. A weight that had been pressing him down all his life began to lift. Yes, she was right. Don’t question it, just enjoy it – it was a precious thing that he didn’t want to spoil by looking at it too carefully.