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An unknown number lit up Lin’s phone sitting in his lap. Luckily, he kept it on silent so it didn’t begin ringing loudly throughout the theater, but he still caught a few baleful stares from the people around him. He swiped down quickly to decline the call and found afterward that he was unable to concentrate on the larger screen in front of him. Normally he enjoyed a Back to the Future cinema rerun; the irony appealed to him in a painful sort of way. But now he was distracted. He couldn’t get it out of his mind that very few people had that phone number. In fact, he’d had enough years to personally make sure very little record of it existed anywhere. This was his private number, not the one he used for a Sainsbury’s membership card. So, who in Tim’s name could it be?
The phone began illuminating quietly again. It was the same number. Lin looked at it, glanced around, and then made the impulsive decision to rise to his feet and excuse himself out of the row. He tripped once over a pair of white and red trainers that belonged to a young woman in a Marty cosplay but managed to keep his phone from flying out of his hand. How he wished that more life experience had resolved his clumsiness. He shuffled quickly down the side corridor and into the light. As soon as the heavy door closed behind him, he swiped up to answer. “Hello?” He’d grown used to the croakiness of his voice, grating after long years and relatively little use. It had become hard after all this time to engage with people when they inevitably moved on.
“Hi, sorry. I got your number from the agency. They said you could help me find more information about my parents?” It was a young man, perhaps in his mid-20s judging by the timbre of his voice. Lin sighed. Nothing remarkable after all then, just a misdialed number.
“I’m sorry, you have the wrong person,” he replied, feeling a bit guilty for being the dead end to this man’s mystery. “I can’t help you. Truly sorry.”
“Wait!” The man cried before Lin could hang up. “I double and triple checked the number, I know I did. The man I met with was confident you would be able to tell me more. Look, I found out about this whole thing a year ago, and you’re the first person I’ve been able to find who might actually know something about where I’m from. Please don’t hang out. Just let me explain.” Lin sighed again, knowing full well that he was going to be no help at all. He felt a brief flash of anger towards the worker who had given this poor boy baseless hope. Seeming to take his silence as agreement, the stranger continued.
“Apparently, my parents – well, adopted parents, I guess – were having a picnic by a lake when they heard crying in the bushes by the shoreline. They followed the noise and found a baby – me – in a basket, with no sign of anyone around. They tried to find my parents for months, but there was no record of them or me. So, they adopted me. Gave me a name, a birth date, everything. And they never told me a thing about it. Then a year ago my mother – ah, adopted mother – got really sick and told me the whole story before she passed away. I’ve been trying to find them ever since, but it’s the same story as thirty-five years ago -” Lin started in surprised. The man was older than he’d thought. Normally he was quite good at guessing ages. “- until I talked to someone, a new employee at the local agency my parents first went to who interested himself in pulling the dead ends back out and trying again. He’d found your number at the bottom of the cabinet under my file and figured it must have fallen out. So, here I am. Please, can you help me?"
Oh, how Lin wished he had answers for this lost soul. But he didn’t know anything about this. He kept to himself nowadays, running an out-of-the-way herbal medicine shop to keep food on the table but mostly holding himself apart from the world’s chaos. He helped and healed in small ways, which is all he’d ever wanted to do. Nothing big could ever measure up to saving your entire nation several times over, and those efforts had been both exhausting and traumatic. Sometimes descendants would come by, curious to see if the stories were true, but it grew harder and harder to convince the newer generations, and he knew that eventually the visits would stop entirely. He had decided long ago anyway that watching his partners and children die was too much to keep experiencing. This man was almost on the opposite side of him in that respect. He was kept from his family because he never knew them. Lin was kept apart because they didn’t know him.
“Are you still there?” Lin blinked in surprise, realizing that he’d once again become too immersed in his thoughts.
“I’m here,” he replied, apologetically, “Sorry, I’m just really not sure I can help you. But… maybe the number was there because your parents were customers of mine. I run an herbal medicine shop by the Lake of Avalon. I can go through my records and see if anyone bought anything for a baby thirty-five years ago.” He paused, waiting for some kind of agreement or acknowledgment, but the man was silent. “Hello?”
“Did you - ” the man coughed, clearing his throat after briefly choking up. “Did you say your shop was by Avalon Lake?”
Lin internally berated himself for using the archaic name for it, and then he responded with a casual “Yes?”
“That’s the lake,” the stranger exclaimed, “That’s the lake where my parents found me! Maybe they did come to your shop!” Lin froze, and it felt as if the world around him slowed down too. It couldn’t be. Really? After all this time? He’d been disappointed so many times before. But with the country internally divided, extremism rising, global warming, and everything else going on, could this be Albion’s time of greatest need? Hope sparked in his heart, warming him back to movement. The world too began to turn again. Tears pricked his eyes, and now he was the one choked up.
“Excuse me,” he croaked before realizing that the man had continued to chatter and he’d just interrupted him. “Sorry. Ah, I just wanted to ask. What was your name again?” What if - ?
“Arthur,” the man said hopefully, “My name is Arthur. Does that sound familiar?” Tears of joy began streaming down Merlin’s face and gathering in his beard. It was time. It was him. Finally. He wept openly.
“Yes,” he whispered reverently after a moment, “I do believe I know you after all.”