One

The eight-year-old girl sat patiently on a wooden chair in the centre of the room, her small hands folded neatly in her lap. She sat in a medium-sized room with high windows, frosted to keep distractions out but allowing light to filter in. The walls were plain, off-white, and a circle of chairs surrounded the girl in the centre�"set deliberately apart by a few metres. A table with a water jug, some paperwork, and a laptop sat off to the side. A discreet recording device or camera was mounted in a corner, red light blinking. The room smelled faintly of dust and old carpet.

The air felt still, expectant, too quiet. Wide-eyed but calm, the girl watched as people filtered in one by one and took their seats with the hushed reverence of a formal gathering. Her mother leaned over and kissed her gently on the cheek before taking a seat opposite and giving her a quiet thumbs-up. Julie grinned in return, her legs swinging just above the polished floorboards.

The committee arranged themselves in the wide semicircle, six figures spaced precisely three metres away from the girl. This deliberate distance was intended to create a sense of openness and avoid making her feel scrutinised or crowded. Still, their presence was imposing. I took the seat beside Julie’s mother and offered her a reassuring smile. She returned it with a small nod of gratitude.

Earlier, there had been some doubt about whether I should conduct the interview. Some members had murmured about appearances, questioning whether a middle-aged man was the right person for such a delicate conversation. But Julie’s mother had spoken up with quiet conviction.

“Julie knows Doctor Abbot,” she said. “And we trust him.”

Once everyone was settled and the preliminary murmurs had died down, the committee chair gave me a nod. I turned back to Julie, smiling.

“Well, Julie,” I said warmly, “we’re very excited to hear what you’d like to share with us.”

Julie gave a wide, toothy smile. “I’m excited too!”

“Why don’t you start from the beginning?” I suggested. “Whatever that means for you.”

She took a long, thoughtful breath and her eyes seemed to grow distant as if she were peering through layers of time.

“There was no me,” she said slowly. “Not at first. Just a ‘Yes’. Not a word, not even a thought �" just something saying 'Yes' everywhere. There weren't any feelings yet. Just... yes.”

The room fell silent. Pens were quietly set down.

“And then?” I asked gently.

“I started to appear. Like... a bubble of me inside someone else. I wasn’t alone anymore. I felt this tiny thump, like a heartbeat. Then there were other noises �" gurgling, sloshing and movement �" and eventually voices, but I didn’t understand them. I didn’t even wonder what they meant. There was no time yet. I just was.

She glanced over at her mother, who gave her a soft, supportive smile.

“How do you mean there was no time?” I asked carefully.

“I didn’t think about how long anything took. There wasn’t a ‘before’ or an ‘after’. Just now. Everything was now.”

“And then?” I prompted, my voice low and even.

Julie shifted slightly in her chair. “Then I was being pushed. I didn’t want to go. I was scared. I tried to stay, but I couldn’t.” I was small and soft, and everything was moving. I didn’t know what to do. I was helpless.”

“Did you take your first breath after that?”

Julie nodded slowly. “It was like�"like everything exploded. There was cold; so much cold. The air rushed in like a shock. I didn’t like it. It was too bright and too loud. I wanted to go back.”

“Did you feel unhappy about being born?” I asked.

“I didn’t want to leave the warm place. It was quiet and safe there. But then, suddenly, I was out and there were people, lights and strange things everywhere. I think I cried.”

Her mother chuckled softly. “You did. A lot.”

Lara Banks, my colleague on the committee, leaned forward and smiled warmly. “Thank you, Julie. That was... really fascinating.”

Chairs began to scrape gently against the floor as the other committee members stood up, murmuring their thanks and preparing to leave. But Julie’s voice stopped them in their tracks.

“Don't you want to know when I died?”

The room froze. All eyes turned back to her.

I raised my hand gently, motioning for everyone to sit down again.

“Let's all sit down again,” I said, my tone calm yet charged with sudden interest. Then I turned to Julie.

“Of course we want to hear about that,” I said gently. “It must have been awful.”

Julie shook her head slowly. “No,” she replied, her voice steady. “It was a kind of relief.”

“A relief?” I echoed, leaning forward slightly. “How should we understand that?”

She paused, as though translating something from a place just beyond reach.

“I was old,” she said. “Very old. And sad. My body hurt all the time. Breathing was difficult. I was tired... tired of trying.”

“You were old?” I asked quietly.

She nodded. “Yes, and when I died, the pain just stopped. It was like someone had turned off a noise I hadn’t even realised was there. I wasn’t scared. It felt like letting go of something I didn’t need anymore.”

There was a silence in the room that felt almost sacred. One of the committee members slowly set down their pen.

“And then?” I asked softly.

“I met people,” Julie said. “Although they weren’t really people �" not like us now.” They didn’t have bodies. More like... shadows, but warm ones. They didn’t speak, but I understood them. Or maybe I just remembered them.”

“Did you know who they were?”

“Some of them felt familiar. I think one of them was my sister once. Another might have been a man I loved. But none of us had names. Those memories had already started to fade.”

“And after that?” I asked, sensing the tension in the room intensify.

“I moved through something like a tunnel. But it wasn’t dark; it was full of colours I can’t name. Everything was very still and soft. I could feel myself melting.”

“Melting?” I asked gently.

“Not my body,” Julie said, “but the part that says “I”. The part that says 'Julie'. It just started to dissolve.” And I didn’t mind. It was like falling asleep in a warm bath.”

“What was left?” I asked.

Julie paused, and her voice dropped to a whisper.

“Just that “yes”,” she said.

The silence that followed felt as though the whole room was holding its breath.

Julie looked at us all, then at her mother. “I think I came back because I still had something to do.”

Her mother blinked rapidly and reached out to touch her daughter’s hand.

“Thank you, Julie,” I said, my voice thick with emotion. “Thank you for trusting us with that. But why didn’t you tell us about this to begin with?” I tried to keep my tone gentle and not accusatory.

Julie tilted her head slightly, her expression untroubled. “You asked about the beginning,” she said calmly. “So, I told you about the first time.”

There was a moment of silence, and then a few murmurs rippled through the committee. One member, clearly unsettled, stood up and gathered their notes, signalling that the interview was over. The others followed suit, some exchanging glances that blended awe and discomfort.

I turned to Julie one last time. “Thank you, Julie. You’ve been a great help.”

She beamed at me with a quiet pride that seemed far beyond her years. Her mother rose and crossed the room to wrap her in a tight embrace. Julie leaned into it, finally looking like the child she was.

One by one, the rest of us filed out, each of us, I suspected, with more questions than we’d had when we arrived.

I lingered for a moment outside the interview room to compose myself, then stepped into the adjoining conference chamber, where the full committee had reconvened. The wave of indignation that three of its members directed at me was immediate and startling.

“Your questions were leading!” one snapped, voice sharp.

“She was clearly primed for this,” said another, narrowing her eyes.

“You can't possibly expect us to take this at face value,” added a third, almost scoffing.

I said nothing at first. Instead, I walked calmly to my place at the long table, where my notebooks and laptop waited like silent witnesses. The air in the room crackled with unspoken judgements. The murmurs didn’t subside until we were all seated again. Finally, the chairman �" a long-faced, balding man whose glasses seemed fused to his disapproval �" folded his hands and looked at me squarely.

“Well, Doctor Abbot,” he said. “You’ve staged a spectacle. What have you got to say for yourself?”

I let out a quiet, weary chuckle. “Considering that I submitted all the interview material to this committee in advance,” I replied, “I wouldn't have expected accusations. Least of all that I’d need to defend myself after you’ve had the opportunity to review the evidence.”

An older woman �" Professor Elaine Markham, a respected cognitive psychologist with a penchant for arching her eyebrows like punctuation �" leaned forward.

“But the girl has obviously absorbed this narrative from somewhere,” she insisted. “She’s far too articulate, far too detailed for a child of her age.”

“And how exactly do you assess that?” I asked calmly. “We ended the session before she could tell us the most interesting things.”

“I’ve watched the footage you submitted,” she replied, tight-lipped. “I don’t doubt your integrity, Doctor Abbot, but what that girl says… it’s too well-formed. Too knowing.”

Next, a younger committee member, Doctor Ravi Sen �" a stylish man whose neatly arranged grey streak looked suspiciously deliberate �" spoke.

“I’ll admit, I came in sceptical,” he said, leaning back slightly. “But now you’ve got me curious. What exactly did she say in your previous interviews?”

I gave a short, demonstrative laugh. “You call yourself a scientist?” I said. “First you criticise my work, and then you ask what was in the evidence? That’s an odd way of doing things.”

The chairman raised a hand for silence. “Doctor Abbot, enough sparring. Just tell us what she said.”

I smiled thinly. “Why not simply watch the interviews?”

Markham shook her head. “It’s three hours of footage, Doctor Abbot. None of us has that kind of time today.”

Fair enough, I thought. I folded my hands.

“Julie started telling her stories as soon as she could speak,” I said.

“How young?” someone asked.

“Four,” I answered.

This prompted another round of groans and muttering.

“Come now,” said Markham. “At four, children still think the moon follows them home or believe in Santa Claus.”

“Exactly,” I replied. “And yet, unprompted and with remarkable consistency, she described sequential, self-contained narratives that were coherent across years.” The language developed, of course, but the structure didn’t change. The details remained: names, places, and even sensations of illness, grief and detachment.”

Someone whispered, “Delusions.”

“Perhaps,” I said. “Or something more. Which is, I believe, why we’re here.”

The chairman leaned back, touching the tips of his fingers together. “Doctor Abbot, let's be frank. Are you proposing this as a genuine case of remembered consciousness before birth and after death?”

I met his gaze.

“I’m not proposing anything,” I said. “I'm documenting it. Interpretation comes next.”

“What is this “something more” you are proposing?” asked Doctor Sen, arching an eyebrow and giving me a faint smirk.

I took a slow breath, feeling the weight of the room settle on my shoulders. “She said,” I began, “that she now knows why she’s come back this time.”

The reaction was immediate, as predictable as it was theatrical.

“Preposterous!” barked one.

“Outrageous,” muttered another under their breath, but loudly enough to be heard.

The chairman leaned forward, his fingers held together like a caricature of a court magistrate. “And why,” he asked with exaggerated patience, “may that be?”

“She says she’s learnt something,” I replied evenly. ‘Something important. And that she has to tell us.”

Another round of groans echoed through the room like a chorus of disapproval. One of the older members shook their head and scribbled furiously in the margin of their notebook.

Sen chuckled, folding his arms. “So, she’s come back from God, has she? Bearing tidings?”

I didn’t answer. I simply sat down slowly and let out the breath I had been holding. Any hope I had of having a sensible conversation or of the kind of open-minded enquiry that science is supposed to uphold dissolved somewhere between the laughter and the outrage.

The silence that followed wasn’t empty; it was filled with discomfort and scepticism. Underneath it all was an uneasy sense that maybe, just maybe, something had shifted.

 

When the committee filed out of the room, some scoffing openly, I gathered my things and walked towards the door, mentally preparing for a difficult debrief. Much to my surprise, I was met by Julie and her mother, who were waiting just outside.

Hazel gave a rueful smile. “It didn't go well, did it?'

I crouched down so that I was at eye level with Julie. “It's hard for them,” I said gently, “to accept that an eight-year-old might be wiser than they are.”

Julie gave a tight-lipped smile, tilted her head slightly, and said, “I did warn you.”

I chuckled. “You did. I should have listened.”

Hazel �" still composed, though clearly tired �" placed a hand lightly on her daughter’s shoulder. “Thank you,” she said. “At least someone’s listening.”

Their lives hadn’t been easy. Julie’s American father, Jack Strain, had returned to the US not long after Julie was born and never came back. Hazel still held out hope, but from what she had told me, it seemed unlikely that the man would reappear. The fact that he had named his daughter after a B-movie actress best known for her nudity suggested that he had always had different priorities.

At 30, Hazel was an attractive woman with a certain quiet resilience, but she was struggling. Julie’s unplanned arrival had turned her life upside down �" her career and finances were in disarray. Now this child, gifted or burdened or both, had introduced a different kind of chaos that she didn’t quite know how to handle.

We agreed to meet again the following week. As we stepped outside into the late-afternoon light, I hesitated for a moment, then asked gently, “Do you need some money?”

Hazel looked away quickly, her jaw tightening. “We'll manage,” she said, though the strain in her voice betrayed her pride.

Before she could say more, Julie reached out her hand with quiet certainty and said, “Yes, she does.”

I smiled and handed Julie a folded fifty-pound note. “For your time,” I said lightly.

Hazel slowly took it from Julie, her fingers brushing my shoulder as she gave a small, embarrassed nod. “Thank you,” she murmured, her eyes downcast.

It was a brief moment, but it said more than words could about pride, necessity and the quiet, complicated bond between the two of them.

I left the Department of Experimental Psychology in Cambridge and stepped out into the sharp light of the late afternoon. The building's brick facade glowed faintly; its ancient seriousness was at odds with the chaos still echoing in my mind. I made my way across the gravel path to my old but dependable car, which was parked under the shade of a sycamore whose roots cracked the pavement like a quiet rebellion.

As I drove south towards Trumpington, the city fading behind me, my thoughts returned to Julie �" eight years old and already burdened by knowledge that no one wanted to believe. “No one listens,” she said matter-of-factually. Not angry. Just resigned.

I believed her now.

Her name first came up in staff room whispers after a strange incident at her school. She’d interrupted her history teacher’s lecture on Victorian England to offer a vivid detail that he hadn’t mentioned and wasn’t prepared to hear.

“In the early days of railway travel,” she told the class, “third-class passengers had to ride in open-top goods wagons. They were just rough wooden benches with holes drilled in them so the rainwater could drain out. There weren't any proper carriages for them at all.”

Her teacher �" a blustery man known more for his volume than his accuracy �" had turned red.

“How can you possibly know that?” he had barked.

Julie’s reply was simple. Quiet. Blunt.

“I was there,” she said.

She was given detention. Not for lying, but for disrupting the class.

As I slowed at a junction and the sun fell behind the hedgerows, I wondered, as I often did these days, what kind of world punishes a child not for being wrong, but for knowing too much.

My flat was temporary and functional, but it was anything but a home. Sophie, my ex-wife, still lived in our old house. The divorce hadn’t been messy, but I’d made the decision to leave it to her �" she was the one who had made it feel like home, after all. In return, I wasn’t required to pay anything more.

It was the PhD in Psychology that started the drift, though I didn’t see it at the time. The long hours, the endless data sets and papers on memory, perception and developmental cognition consumed me. I was knee-deep in a longitudinal observational study that required frequent travel and even longer periods of mental absence. It took me away from home on the coast and, more importantly, away from Sophie.

I was so enamoured with the work and so dazzled by the promise of academic recognition that I failed to notice what was slipping through my fingers. Conversations became shorter, dinners quieter, and the warmth between us grew thinner. By the time I realised how far we had drifted, she had already found someone else.

I was shocked. Not because she’d left, but because I hadn’t seen it coming. I study behaviour for a living, yet I had missed the signs in my own home.

Nevertheless, if there was one thing my work had prepared me for, it was Julie. My background placed me in a unique position: I was trained not only to study memory, but also to pay attention to its nuances, to the strange, inconsistent and often unsettling ways in which it develops and dissipates in children. Her claims, unusual as they were, didn’t strike me as delusional. They struck me as data �" strange data, yes, but worthy of attention, nonetheless.

My colleagues, of course, were less forgiving. While most respected my credentials, a few had begun to mutter about my 'tendency towards eccentric cases'. Some even suggested, half-jokingly, that I was venturing into parapsychology.

But I’d always believed that science was not built on consensus; it was built on curiosity. Julie had mine.

 

As I stirred the pot�"an old, familiar meal from my student days, more nostalgic than nourishing�"I heard my phone buzz on the counter. I glanced over. It was a message from Hazel.

“Thank you for your generosity. I’ll have to make it up to you.”

A heart emoji followed.

I stood still for a moment, phone in hand, feeling uncertain. The message seemed very warm �" too warm? I wondered what she was thinking. Was it gratitude? A flirtation? Or something else entirely?

I typed back:

“Don't worry about that. Look after yourselves.”

Almost immediately, another heart emoji appeared on the screen.

I raised an eyebrow and turned back to my pan. I tried to ignore the implications. The smell of slightly burnt onions brought me back down to earth.

I was almost finished my plate when I heard another buzz.

“I’m sorry about the last messages. Julie wrote them.”

I let out a short laugh. “Aha,” I said aloud. “A little matchmaker as well.”

I typed back:

“No problem!”

Thankfully, there was no reply this time.