The Returned Book by Anna Kingston

 The back door burst open and the bitter East wind blew in Uncle Harry, wrapped in umpteen layers, with only his twinkly brown eyes visible over the huge pile of books he carried. He kicked the door shut with one foot, Mum wincing at the careless treatment, and let the books tumble onto the kitchen table.

“Golly, these are heavy, in more ways than one!” Uncle Harry laughed. “I’m so glad to be shut of them!”

My cousin, Thomas, was a year behind me at uni and I’d lent him some of my text books for his dissertation project, with the proviso that I needed them back for my Masters - hence Uncle Harry’s visit today. 

He and Mum sat at the table with coffee and slices of freshly baked cake, whilst I staggered upstairs under the weight of the art history books.  Took me two trips to take them to my room - Uncle Harry was stronger than he looked!

I peeled off Thomas’ sticky notes that he’d used as bookmarks and replaced the books on my bookcase. As I picked up the last few, one seemed fatter than it should, so I flicked through it wondering if Thomas had left some of his notes inside. Instead, there was another book nestled almost deliberately in the middle of my well-thumbed copy of ‘Yorkshire Art Deco Artists’. Not recognising it, I took it downstairs intending to ask Uncle Harry to return it to Thomas, but Harry had gone whilst I was sorting out my books.

“Take it back on Sunday when we go for lunch,” Mum suggested, so I sat down to have a nosey read of Thomas’ book. We used to swap books often as children, but not in the last ten years or so, and I was curious about what he read as an adult.

The book - ‘Wormhole Vectors for Astrophysics Beginners’ - was miles away from the art world that Thomas and I inhabited. A small, black, nondescript book, crammed with scientific jargon and complicated formulae and notations, it held my interest for less than the thirty seconds it took to flick through it. I chucked it onto the table a bit too hard, and it slid off and landed on the floor with a slap.

Sighing, I heaved myself up and went to find it. The book had landed splayed out flat on the floor and, as I picked it up, a photograph fluttered to the floor. Curious, I turned it over and was struck hard by the two faces that smiled out at me.

“Gotta be Photoshopped,” I thought, feeling admiration for Thomas as I looked at the photo of him and Adelaide Jebson, Huddersfield’s answer to Charles Rennie McIntosh. As Thomas’ pranks went, this was right up there - he knew of my passion for Yorkshire artists and also of my suspicion of sci-fi novels and films.  What better prank than the suggestion of time travel and meeting one of our art heroines?!

I texted Thomas, with a photo of his book and the photo, asking him how his visit with the artist had gone - I do have a sense of humour, despite his opinion that I do not - and thought no more about it. 

Over Sunday lunch, I returned the book and photo, saying how impressed I was with his digital photography skills. With an odd little smile, he asked how closely I’d looked at the photo, at the entire thing and not just the faces, and passed it back to me.

I looked again, not getting his point. There it was, him and Adelaide, around 1930 judging by her age, alone in her studio together apart from the photographer - I was still mystified.

“You still don’t see?” Thomas queried.  “The photo is a Polaroid. Even now, with all the tech we’ve got, we can’t fake a Polaroid…” and left the table, still wearing that odd little smile…

A.M. Kingston © 2021