Chapter 4

“Truth is, Buck, that little tart who is trussed up next to you is a liar. Always has been; she’s smart in a calculating way, has a reputation as a bully and for telling lies. What you need to know is she lied to you over exactly what she and I were doing.”

“You were having sex. Of a kind,” frowned Amy.

“How very modern of you,” smirked Charlotte Barker.

A cold chill went through Amy: this wasn’t something that someone would say in 1961. It was more the sort of statement from her former time, as an adult before ReVerse. “Who are you?” She asked, her heart beating hard. She wished she hadn’t done as the teacher wanted and willingly cuffed her own hands behind her back. If nothing else, being semi-helpless was cutting down her options.

Barker snorted. “Oh, come on! You’re a smart girl, Amy. No, make that experienced. So, let’s say it’s because you are much, much older than you look.”

Next to Amy the bound and gagged Pauline Gibbs made a small ‘mmphing’ noise into her gag. She could sense the elevated tension in the car even if her taped up and packed ears wouldn’t let her hear what was being said.

“I don’t understand,” continued Amy, though her throat was dry.

“Yes, you do,” said Barker with a sigh. “You know but you can’t say it. Took me a while after seeing you to work out how you got in that room after poor little Pauline here. Then it was obvious. It’s because you weren’t there when she went in. You arrived afterwards.”

“That isn’t possible. I was hiding,” said Amy. “I’m good at hiding.”

“No, you came into existence—phased in, they call it—after she was there. She never saw you materialise. One moment you weren’t there, the next you were.”

Amy looked at Gibbsy who was staring wildly as if she was trapped in a nightmare: bound in a silent world, and inhabited by people who were insane. Amy looked back at Charlotte Barker and spoke quietly: there were some things Pauline shouldn’t hear, ears packed or not, but for now it mattered that Amy should keep up the pretence of innocence. She wanted to gulp but kept her throat still. Then she said: “I don’t think that’s possible. How can that happen?”

“Because, Miss Buck, I am exactly like you.”

“You’re not anything like—”

“ReVerse,” interrupted Barker. “You’re not the only one to come back and try and sort out a mess from the past. Now I suggest we have a session of complete honesty while we can.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Then let me enlighten you, lady. We can for now. It might come as shock to you, but you and me aren’t alone. There are others coming back, but with a different agenda.”

“What? How?”

Barker grimaced. “Time isn’t on our side. There are others from what is our future, people who don’t want us to be here. They call themselves the Guardians. They are coming after us. When they catch us, it won’t be a pair of handcuffs either of us have to worry about.”

“Fuck,” said Amy.

“Yeah, fuck indeed,” sighed Barker.

Connie Buck had more than once wondered why she had married Ronald. He wasn’t the sort of man she liked, if she was honest. He was sly, and no doubt had more affairs than just with that Edwina woman. She was sure half of his ‘business trips’ were merely opportunities to get to be with some other woman for a few days.

On the other hand, if she was honest with herself, it suited her this way. First, the man tended to be less interested in sex with her, so she could concentrate on what she most liked, which was other women who were like herself. Second, it was a relief to just do things her way around the house without him trying to, always complaining she ‘was doing it wrong,’ when he did little to help. The man, for all his faults, was generous with his allowance and the family—her and Amy at least—didn’t need for much.

Finding a woman to love though was hard for Connie. It wasn’t that there weren’t women who weren’t lesbian or inclined to intimacy with another female; it was more that they were often married and their men were possessive. Most of these husbands didn’t like ‘the little woman’ having time to herself and pursuing other interests outside the home. That was the pleasure of knowing Viv: the woman could get out in the day as she looked after her mother (who was mostly bed-ridden) though evenings were difficult. Once they became friends and realised they both had the same sexual attitudes, it was a joy for Connie. The only barrier was she and Viv for a variety of reasons had never got into bed. Kissing and fondling and fingering each other was pretty much it, but at least it was better than nothing. One day, Connie promised herself, she would get one of those dildo things she had heard about and fuck Viv in bed, and Viv would do the same to her. One day.

Now Ronald was home and he wanted to know where Amy was. When Connie told him she had gone out with a friend, the man grinned. “Perfect,” he said. “I have got you a present. I want you to try it on now.”

Being a salesman, the man always carried a small case with him. He opened it up and Connie expected to see some item of women’s underwear. Probably something Edwina didn’t want to wear, maybe even a pair of that woman’s knickers. A sort of humiliation. She started to say there wasn’t time to dress and go to bed as Amy would be home soon, but what the man produced was the like of which she had never seen before. A gleaming metal belt with a curved piece between front and back descending in a U-shape. Unlike a normal belt though there was no buckle at the front. Just a padlock.

“What on earth is that?” The woman wanted to know. The thing looked almost obscene.

“This, my dear, is what you will be wearing while I am away on business. Actually, you’ll be wearing it all the time, even when I am home.” Ronald was chuckling at first, but then he grew serious. “I have suspected you’ve been playing around, behind my back,” he said. “This is an old-fashioned but eminently ideal remedy to keep you inline. It’s a chastity belt and it will put a stop to any playing around when I am not here.”

Anger flared in Connie. “Me? It’s your woman who needs to wear that! You’re the one who plays around. Put that thing on yourself or her!”

“Don’t be ridiculous!” The man snarled. “What I do away from this house is my business. A business I would remind you that keeps you and the girl in comfort. But this is about you as my wife. I hear from people you’ve been going out and seeing someone ... a woman, in fact.”