He puts down his cup of tea, takes the design from my hands extremely earnestly, and studies it. The cover is very conventional—a blue door floating over a sea that turns out on closer inspection to be composed of dozens of similar doors. Covers are like faces: none ever pleases everybody, and they don’t always convey the full complexity of what’s behind them.

I wish there were a door I could walk through into a new life in which Henri and I had never met. Or else were a couple. With a little girl. And he wasn’t in a coma.

Sam says, “The cover’s for girls, whereas the story’s for boys. It sounds interesting, but the picture’s lame.”

Andrea groans, “Ouch!” Ralph says, “I told you so!,” and Poppy lays her arm around Sam’s shoulders and makes a suggestion. “Hey, Samuel, how about coming to all our cover presentations from now on? I think that having a genuine reader’s perspective would buck up our ideas. What do you say?”

He glances at her bashfully before looking her squarely in the face and whispering almost inaudibly, “Okay!” He seems ready to explode with joy.

I did say that Poppy can do anything, even turn unhappy boys into young men—and very happy men at that.

“I think it’s a great idea, Sam,” Ralph agrees, “and if you know someone else who reads speculative fiction and—”

“My friend Scott!”

Oh, I do like you, little guy, I think. Your first thought is to share your good fortune rather than keep it all for yourself. My heart goes out to him.

The boy’s eyes alight on the large clock hanging on the wall of the corner kitchenette next to the stylized Doctor Who TARDIS. “I’ve got to go,” he says cheerlessly. “The SIG’s meeting at Forbidden Planet and then later at Kister Jones’s house.”

“SIG?” I ask. We’re all familiar with Forbidden Planet, London’s largest and best bookshop for science fiction, speculative fiction, and niche literature like our own.

“Special interest group,” Poppy says quickly, then adds, to Sam: “So you’re a Mensa member? Wow. How old are you—fifteen?”

“I’m thirteen. Well, almost fourteen, actually,” he replies, drawing himself up to his full height. Another sprinkle of magic from Poppy.

“You’re going to Kister’s?” says Ralph. “Well, say hi to him and tell him he still owes me a drink and a manuscript.”

“When did we start publishing Kister Jones?” I wonder aloud. Our budget doesn’t really stretch that far.

“He lost a bet, but I’ll say no more. Gentleman’s agreement.”

“Can you at least tell me what the book’s about, or is that also under embargo until publication?”

“Oh, the working title’s Slackline. It’s about people being put into induced comas so that they can travel through time in the dreams of the dead.”