Johnny nodded.

May the twenty-first, 1941.

Not many people cared or even knew about it now. Just him, and the librarian at the public library who’d helped him find the stuff for the project, and a few old people. It was ancient history, after all. The olden days. And here he was.

And so was Paradise Street.

Until tonight.

‘Are you all right?’ said Yo-less.

He hadn’t even known about it until he’d found the old newspapers in the library. It was – it was as if it hadn’t counted. It had happened, but it wasn’t a proper part of the war. And worse things had happened in a lot of other places. Nineteen people hardly mattered.

But he’d imagined it happening in his town. It was horribly easy.

The old men would go home from their allotments. The shops would shut. There wouldn’t be many lights in any case, because of the blackout, but bit by bit the town would go to sleep.

And then, a few hours later, it’d happen.

It’d happen tonight.

Wobbler wheezed along the road. And he did wobble. It wasn’t his fault he was fat, he’d always said, it was just his genetics. He had too many of them.

He was trying to run but most of the energy was getting lost in the wobbling.

He was trying to think, too, but it wasn’t happening very clearly.

They hadn’t gone time travelling! It was just a wind-up! They were always trying to wind him up! He’d get home and have a sit down, and it’d all be all right …

And this was home.

Sort of.

Everything was … smaller, somehow. The trees in the street were the wrong size and the cars were wrong. The houses looked … newer. And this was Gregory Road. He’d been along it millions of times. You went along halfway and turned into …

… into …

A man was clipping a hedge. He wore a high collar and tie and a pullover with a zig-zag pattern. He was also smoking a pipe. When he saw Wobbler he stopped clipping and took his pipe out of his mouth.

‘Can I help you, son?’ he said.

‘I … er … I was looking for Seeley Crescent,’ whispered Wobbler.

The man smiled.

‘Well, I’m Councillor Edward Seeley,’ he said, ‘but I’ve never heard of a Seeley Crescent.’ He called over his shoulder to a woman who was weeding a flowerbed. ‘Have you heard of a Seeley Crescent, Mildred?’

‘There’s a big chestnut tree on the corner—’ Wobbler began.

‘We’ve got a chestnut tree,’ said Mr Seeley, pointing to what looked like a stick with a couple of leaves on it. He smiled. ‘It doesn’t look much at the moment, but just you come back in fifty years’ time, eh?’

Wobbler stared at it, and then at him.

It was a wide garden here, with a field beyond it. It struck him that it was quite wide enough for a road, if … one day … someone wanted to build a road …