Page 142 - The Midnight Library

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‘Science tells us that the “grey zone” bet ween life and death is a mysterious

place. ere is a singular point at which we are not one thing or another. Or
rather we are both. Alive and dead. And in that moment bet ween the two
binaries, sometimes, just sometimes, we turn ourselves into a Schrödinger’s
cat who may not only be alive or dead but may be ever y quantum possibility

that exists in line with the universal wave function, including the possibility
where we are chatting in a communal kitchen in Long yearbyen at one in the
morning . . .’
Nora was taking all this in. She thought of Volts, still and lifeless under

the bed and lying by the side of the road.
‘But sometimes the cat is just dead and dead.’
‘Sorr y?’
‘Nothing. It’s just . . . my cat died. And I tried another life and even in that

one he was still dead.’
‘ at’s sad. I had a similar situation with a Labrador. But the point is,
there are others like us. I have lived so many lives, I have come across a few
of them. Sometimes just to say your own truth out loud is enough to find

others like you.’
‘It’s crazy to think that there are other people who could be . . . what did
you call us?
‘Sliders?’

‘Yep. at.’
‘Well, it’s possible of course, but I think we’re rare. One thing I’ve noticed
is that the other people I’ve met – the dozen or so – have all been around
our age. All thirties or forties or fiies. One was twenty-nine, en fait. All

have had a deep desire to have done things differently. ey had regrets.
Some contemplated that they may be better off dead but also had a desire to
live as another version of themselves.’
‘Schrödinger’s life. Both dead and alive in your own mind.’

‘Exactement! And whatever those regrets did to our brain, whatever –
how would you say? – neurochemical event happened, that confused
yearning for death-and-life was somehow just enough to send us into this
state of total in-between.’

e kettle was getting noisier, the water starting to bubble like Nora’s
thoughts.