Several months later

In the darkness of the room the stale smell of illness hung like a spectre in the air. It tainted the back of Kate's throat with every breath she took. Lying in bed with one leg hanging off its edge, the other entangled in the escaping white sheets, she managed to crack open an eyelid against the afternoon sun that was intruding through the bedroom curtains. It cast a red shimmering light through the glass of juice on her bedside table. Kate sat up and stared through the ache in her head until the two clocks by her bed came together and merged into one small, round brass antique. Its slender arms slowly moved over its faded face, pointing at black Roman numerals as they passed by. Struggling to focus, she thought she could see a faint green light evaporate from off its surface. The arms ticked backwards once, before resuming their onward march. With a finger she poked out what felt like a fist sized rock of sleep from the corner of her eye. Kate concentrated on the unusual thrum, thrum, thrum of the clock's workings. The sound soothed her aching head.

3.08pm.

Kate had slept the best part of the day away. No idea when, or if she ever wanted to get out of bed. A severe case of imminent death had really put a downer on her zest for life. For a while now she had been suffering from migraines. It seemed that she was always tired and rundown. She had never thought things would come to this. Not in her deepest, darkest, ugliest dreams.

Several months earlier she had decided to draw up her grandfather's family tree as a gift for his 75th birthday, which was still over three months away. Kate had taken Laurie on a visit to her grandfather's house, and as her daughter and grandfather played in the garden, she had taken the chance to root around in his study. She had searched his desk drawers and the files on the shelves beside the window, but found nothing of interest except for a clear plastic box with a blue clip on lid. It had been tucked down by the coffee table. The box was mostly filled with paperwork. Bills and old issues of motoring magazines he was so fond of. At its very bottom she found a small delicately carved wooden box. On its surface were what looked to be Indian men in turbans sat astride many elephants, depicted in battle with soldiers that wore large domed helmets, all armed with rifles. Victorian, she guessed. Inside, she found two old sepia photographs and a very old and worn birth certificate. One photo was a portrait of what looked to be a Victorian soldier. On the back was written the name, Humboldt Granger, 1879 Kashmir-Punjab border. The birth certificate was also for Humboldt Granger. Hidden in its folds was a gossamer thin yellowed newspaper clipping telling of the death of Humboldt in battle. The other was a photograph of a beautiful Victorian Lady in a long flowing pale dress. On the back was written, Jessica Dickenson, 1882, Borden. Kate did not find what she had been looking for. She needed her grandfather's birth certificate. It would help her search for everything she needed to know about his family and his past.

And so Kate had spent an afternoon up to her neck in the dust of old paperwork at the Borden town hall. She had searched for information on her grandfather and his predecessors in the births, deaths and marriage section in the hall of records. After hours of sifting through files upon files, Kate grew tired and short of breath. She felt as if a sack of potatoes had been placed upon her chest, pressing down, suffocating her. So, making copies of the little documentation she had found, Kate had decided to return home and rest. On the short drive through the quiet afternoon traffic she grew hot and uncomfortable. Palpitations were toying with her heart. With increasing dizziness, she had swerved across both lanes of the road. Quickly swerving back, she narrowly avoided the oncoming traffic. Disoriented and confused, she had tried to pull over. Feeling weak and drawn Kate had passed out at the wheel of her discovery. Mounting the curb, she had struck and killed several wheelie bins and doubled over a lamp post. An elderly couple out walking their dogs ran for their lives. Their poodles did not fare so well.

The ambulance had rushed her to hospital, where she had been found to be bruised and scraped and a little concussed. Her blood soaked face looked worse than it was. Just a small cut to her forehead. They had cleaned and tended her wounds and then had let the police have a few minutes with her. Having found no reasons for the accident at the scene they had interviewed her at the hospital. A drug and breathalyzer test had ruled out driving under the influence. Kate's family were called with the news of the accident.

Kate's grandfather, Stirling Granger, was in his mid-seventies. He had piercing green eyes that had been failing him of late. He was tall and thin but not lanky, and well-toned for his years. Always smartly groomed and clean shaven, his hair was full and grey. One side short, the other just long enough to hide his partially missing right ear. He had told her he had lost it in a fire when he was very young, but would talk of it no more. Kate's 6-year-old daughter, Laurie, had long blonde hair, that was always tied in bunches, and piercing emerald eyes. She could only be described as a spring of restless energy. She was Kate's reason for living.

Stirling and Laurie had rushed as fast as possible to the hospital to find Kate battered and bruised, recovering in A&E. Stirling had stood protectively by her bed whilst Laurie sobbed into her mother's arms. Afterwards, concerned at the lack of oxygen in her blood works, the doctors had run more tests and had found an anomaly in her lungs and had sent her up to the cardiac and respiratory department. After more than a week confined to bed, she had been diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis, brought on by diagnosed sarcoidosis. She had asked for it in English and found out to her utter dismay that she was suffering from the onset of respiratory failure. Kate hadn't the heart to tell Laurie the truth, not there among the machines and tubes placed into her nose and arms. A month later they had released her with an oxygen tank and a large bag of medication, along with a strict daily regimen to follow. Stirling had taken her home and put her straight into another bed. Numb with shock, Kate had sat there silently staring at the wall opposite. They had given her only eight months, twelve at best.

It seemed as if being diagnosed with sarcoidosis had made all other minor illnesses aware that she had rooms up for rent. All of a sudden she had become prey to them all. One after another, with little or no respite in-between, they invaded her body. Sickness had become a big part of her life, and would remain so until the bitter end.

Kate scraped her tongue against her upper teeth, gathering up a mouthful of foul mucus. Having nowhere to launch it except into the depths of the waste paper bin, she spat. Shame and disgust twisted her face. She felt wretched at how low she had sunk in her illness; how low the disease had forced her. She knew the disease was drowning her from the inside. Her body was betraying her. Little by little it failed her and there was nothing she could do to defend herself. Her enemy was within.

Kate lay curled on her side, drifting in and out of sleep. Her bladder called out yet again, asking her to make the seemingly impossible trek down the hallway to the bathroom. Hand over hand she pulled herself to the edge of the bed. Dragging her legs around and off the side, she let herself collapse down onto hands and knees and crawled forward. Then the long climb up the wall to her feet. Every one of her aching vertebrae creaked and cracked into something vaguely resembling a spine. She lifted up the clear oxygen mask from the tank by her bed, and inhaled deeply several times before moving further. She used the wall for support and guide, whilst keeping her eyes closed to the light of day. Eventually she slumped down onto the toilet seat. Kate urinated a stream of razor blades. The flow cut its way into a pool of stale yellow urine that had been left from the previous day.

From down the hallway, the dull clamour of the clock's alarm bounced off of the walls, alerting the world to the fact that it was 3.30pm. Soon, she knew, her grandfather would be bringing Laurie around for her daily visit. Kate had found that it was difficult enough to cope with her own problems, God knows how on earth a six-year-old would cope with watching her mother slowly being ground down and worn out until there was nothing left but a shadow of the mum she once had.

Kate had been an only child and had only her grandfather to turn to. She had no memory of her father. When she had been only two years old, he had been killed in a road traffic accident. On an early start on a winter morning, he had set off to work in his Miami blue Ford Capri. The windows already frosted over when he got in, inside and out. He had driven slowly on the ice covered roads. Making his way out of town he had seen a large truck coming towards him as he approached a bend ahead. He had lost control on black ice. His car skidded across the road and met the bread delivery truck head on. Only he had been hurt, and had died in the ambulance on the way to hospital and was pronounced, Dead on Arrival.

Laurie too, was an only child. Her father was still alive, somewhere, and was unwilling to acknowledge her existence. He had left Kate not long after she had told him the news of her pregnancy. He had said she had done it to trap him into a relationship that he had neither love, nor future for, he had quickly packed his bags and moved away, leaving no address or clues to his where about. That had been over six years ago, and they had never heard from him again. So once Kate had taken ill, she had decided it would be best if Laurie went to live with her grandfather. There, she would be able to have something resembling a normal life and would be protected from the grim realities of living with a terminally ill parent.

Finished in the bathroom Kate eventually made it back into bed and again took several deep breaths of oxygen. Exhausted and laying in cold sweat soaked sheets, she managed to inch crawl her way up the mountain of pillows. Reaching over to retrieve the day old juice, she managed to spill a little over herself and onto the stack of papers that clung to the corner of the bedside table. Shaking the papers dry, she cursed the glass.

'Oh for fuck's sake'

The accident and her illness had put many things on hold, including the family tree project. But now she had time on her hands. Eight months, possibly twelve to live life to the fullest and here she was all but bedridden. So she decided to make the most of the time she had left and had started to read through the slim file that she had brought back from the town hall. Kate also scanned through the information off of the Internet about the photographs she had taken from her grandfather's study.

The Victorian woman, Jessica Dickenson, born in 1860, had married one Henry Newhart who had been the governor of Borden prison back in 1878 to 1888. And was the mother to Jeremiah Newhart, her one and only child. Jessica's death certificate stated that she had been murdered, a victim of a brutal stabbing during a highway robbery, unusual to say the least.

The photograph of the Victorian soldier was worn, faded and very old, Captain Humboldt Granger, born in 1858. She could find nothing on the Internet of marriage, and no mention of children, just his birth and death. She found a lead on the newspaper clipping, and a photocopy of his enrolment papers. He had joined the army-in the highland regiment. He had been stationed in Egypt during the Urabi revolution, where he had been reported lost during an engagement with the enemy. His body had never been found or recovered. After the statutory time period, he had been listed as missing in action and pronounced dead as of the 12th of August 1882. The photograph was a faded and grainy sepia print of the Victorian Army Captain. He looked to be in his late twenties. He was tall and slender; his hair short and dark and he had a wide deep moustache. In the crook of his elbow he held a white domed helmet, an Imperial Pith Helmet. Two white belts ran horizontally and diagonally across his Tunic, and at his side hung a holstered gun, as well as a long thin ceremonial sword. He wore what looked like dark woollen trousers, with tall black riding boots. On the reverse of the photograph was written, 3rd June 1879, Jammu, Kashmir and Punjab border. Kate was struck by how alike the picture of Humboldt and her grandfather looked. She would have sworn the picture could have been her grandfather as a young man if the photograph had not been taken in the 19th century.

Just then the front door opened and running footsteps could be heard racing up the stairs. From the sound, the steps were taken two at a time. The bedroom door flew open and her daughter careered into the room, onto the bed and into her arms. Laurie's feet swung wildly. In her enthusiasm to hug her mother, a glancing blow knocked the antique clock from the bedside table. Quickly following behind, her grandfather rushed into the room. Bending down onto one knee and with a long thin arm and thin stick like fingers he caught the clock, all in one, smooth and fluid movement.

Kate watched him as he gently replaced the clock. She thought she had seen the clock glow faintly green as he withdrew his hand. Turning to Laurie, he scalded' you must be careful girl. Your mother is very ill. You cannot be throwing yourself on her like that. You almost broke the, CLOCK!'

Kate could see the panic recede from his flushed face. It was unlike him to be so edgy.

After they ate lunch together, Laurie helped her mother out into the garden for her first breath of fresh air in days. Kate laughed and joked with Laurie as they talked and planned their future-about what they were going to do when she got better- whilst all the time trying not to break down with the futility of it all. She tried to keep the fantasy alive, if only for one more minute before the reality of her dying lungs choked the hope from within her.

Stirling gave them their time together. He tidied around the house, picking up the scattered remnants of the dying. He emptied the gruesome content of the waste paper bin and swilled it clean. He gathered the blood stained tissues from around the bed and changed the soiled sheets.

Stirling glanced out the window. Down in the garden he could see Kate laughing as Laurie ran pell-mell around the trees chasing a butterfly up and down, and letting it fly free at the last possible moment. He walked around the bed and over to the bedside table. Sweeping up the clock he cradled it in the palms of his hands and raised it to his face. A light green glow enveloped the clock and a slight shimmer ran across its face. He caressed and stroked its burnished surface and he spoke to it lovingly as if to a lover.

'Not long now my sweet. Soon her years will be ours. She will be with the others, safe by her mother's side at last.'

With trembling fingers he replaced the clock to its place beside the bed and wiped away tears from his wet cheeks. He turned to leave, and as he walked past the window he glanced back down into the garden to see Kate's upturned face, scowling with uncertainty. He was sure she could not see him.

Kate felt a shiver of foreboding run through her as she watched the faint glow that came from her bedroom window. As the glow faded she thought she could see the outline of her grandfather pass behind the net curtains, making them sway. Tears filled her eyes as she remembered seeing a similar emerald light the day of her mother's funeral.