Caroline dumped her books so loudly on the table that it caused Mike to look up momentarily from his laptop.

“Hi, Caroline, I take it the tutorial didn’t go so well?”

Caroline slumped onto the chair opposite him.

“The pompous bitch basically told me to start again.”

“Look I know nothing about art, I don’t even know what I like, but I do know that you know your stuff. Why don’t I get you a drink and we can talk about something else.”

As Mike placed the two pints of beer down on the table, Caroline glanced up and smiled.

“I’m sorry for being in a mood. How did your project meeting go anyway?”

-------

Caroline and Mike had been friends since their first week at University five years previously. They’d bumped into each other as they both attempted to buy the same Harry Potter poster to decorate the rather bleak walls of their student dorms at the Freshers Week poster sale. Mike had smiled at the rather geeky looking girl with curly red hair and asked if she was a Gryffindor or Slytherin. Caroline had blushed a red bright enough to rival her hair colour and muttered “Gryffindor.” She hadn’t told anyone that she’d a secret crush on Hermione or more precisely, the actress Emma Watson.

Mike pushed his glasses back up onto the bridge of his nose and smiled. 

“Good choice. I couldn’t imagine being friends with a Slytherin.”

And so, while Caroline struggled with the history of art and Mike delved headlong into the world of theoretical physics, the two remained close friends. Apart from one cringe-inducing night when they were both drunk on cheap cider, their friendship had been purely platonic. 

------

Several pints later, Mike realised that trying to explain string theory to a pissed Caroline was probably not the best distraction from the trials and tribulations of her Masters’ thesis.

“So you’re telling me Back to the Future is real?” Caroline raised a finger for emphasis. “No fucking way.”

“Well not real exactly,” Mike attempted to explain. “But the principle is sound. Look you know all those debates about going back and shooting Hitler and avoiding the Second World War, it’s already happened. With string theory, there are multiple universes out there where Hitler didn’t become a Nazi and cause World War II.”

Caroline raised her finger again then put it down again.

“What I mean is, if you go back in time and change something, you end up in a different future than the one you are in presently. You’re not so much time travelling as Universe jumping.”

Caroline paused, staring at him as he gave a sort of lop-sided shrug as if to say ‘it’s not that difficult to understand, really.’

The next day, Caroline was back in the library, trawling through books on Fin de Siecle art, searching for something that would give her evidence that Degas was not the sexless misogynist her tutor believed.

A grinning Mike slid into the chair opposite her and leant over to stroke her hair.

“So, how’s the head this morning?”

“If you mean, do I have a hangover, surprisingly No. However, I am getting a sore head from trying to read all this crap.”

“Come on, I’ll buy you a coffee and you can tell me all about it.”

“Baudelaire famously argued, “What is Art, prostitution.” and I’m looking at the painters of 19th Century Paris who saw prostitution as a fact of modernity.”

Mike nodded to show he was at least listening as Caroline continued.

“So while Toulouse Lautrec and Manet were painting the prostitutes and the punters, I want to know why Degas, one of the fathers of Impressionism didn’t.”

Caroline paused. She could feel herself getting more and more animated as she tried to explain the core of her thesis. “He’s portrayed as a misogynist, Van Gogh claimed he was sexless and there is evidence he even referred to the dancers he drew as ‘little monkey girls’ but I don’t think that’s true. I look at the paintings and I don’t see that. I think something happened which twisted the narrative.”

Mike took a sip of his coffee, paused and asked the same question Caroline’s supervisor had asked yesterday.

“So what do you think happened then?”

“I don’t know but I think it’s about love. I mean, you look at Toulouse-Lautrec. He painted the whores of Paris standing with their skirts up and knickers down, waiting to be inspected for venereal disease. I bet Lautrec was fucking half the whores in Paris. But Degas was drawing women practising ballet. I think he wanted to portray love, not sex."

She paused to drink some of her coffee before it went cold.

“The only problem is, I can’t find any source material to back me up. There’s nothing about Degas having a partner or mistress. Van Gogh slags him off in his letters but there’s nothing from the other side. I need evidence but In later life he became even more isolated, shunning friends, only interested in his art and was often described as curmudgeonly.”

Mike pursed his lips together and nodded in agreement. “Yes, I can see why you’d want an eye witness account.”

“It’s a shame your string theory idea doesn’t come with a nifty little time machine to travel back and find out.” Caroline joked.

Mike paused and looked at the ground as he rattled the cup trying to put in down on the table.

“There’s not, is there?” Caroline gasped.

“Well… theoretically... we, I mean my supervisor and me, we have a half-baked something, but it’s not proven and we’ve no way of knowing if it would even work.”

“How half-baked?” Caroline had leant over and was holding Mike’s wrist tightly. “I’d go, be your guinea-pig, just point me in the right direction and Wham Bam, off I’d go back to 1875.”

“It’s not that easy...” Mike began, “.. there’s all sort of dangers... You mightn’t get back, you might end up in a different future.” He paused, looking into her eyes. “You’d really do it?”

Caroline nodded. “Yep.”

“OK, well first off, we have a few problems, and not just the chronology protection conjecture. We can only send you back in time to the same physical location. So just like Back to the Future, if we send you back to 1875, you’ll still be here, not in Paris. Secondly, just like Back to the Future, you’ll need clothing and money to fit in.”

“I’m already on it,” Caroline replied as she stood up. “I’m off to the second-hand shops. Are you coming?”

“Sure, why not. I mean, it’s not like I’m breaking the code of conduct from the ethics committee or interfering with the laws of physics or anything.”

As they stood in the basement of Armstrong’s Second-Hand emporium, Mike turned around the room, taking in the hundreds of second-hand dresses.

“So what are you looking for?”

Caroline pulled a book from her bag and after flicking through it, handed it to him and pointed to the picture.

“Here, this is ‘L’Absinthe’, translated as ‘The Absinthe Drinker’. It’s probably the most famous painting by Degas. We need to find outfits like that.”

“Do you always talk like a textbook when you talk about art?” Mike giggled. 

“Mais oui, bien sur,” Caroline replied.

“That’s actually good that you can speak French. I doubt you’ll find many English speakers there.”

Mike was surprised at how easily they found a suitable dress and he looked at Caroline as she did a quick twirl, flashing her underskirt. He inquired if she had authentic knickers on too. 

She took a step closer to him, giggled and told him, “That’s for me to know and Edgar to find out.”

Getting hold of genuine French francs was another matter altogether. Finally, after trailing round six specialist antique shops, they had a collection of late 19th-century money and her outfit. 

“Now we just need two tickets for the Eurostar and we can be in Paris tomorrow.”

“Just one thing, Mike?” Caroline’s worried expression was back. “How big is the time machine?”

“It’s ok, it will all fit in my laptop bag.”

------

The next evening, they were in their hotel room in Paris. Caroline had watched the early evening crowds thronging the street from the balcony, imagining what it must have looked like back in 1875. She could see the dome of the Sacre-Cour peeking out from between the buildings. She turned away from the window to appraise Mike as he typed some final adjustments into the laptop. She fingered the crinoline of her dress as she sat down beside him.

“Don’t be nervous,” he whispered as he took her hand. 

“Have you done this before?” The look in her eyes was a mixture of fear and anticipation. She licked her lips hesitantly.

“No, but there’s no reason to suppose this won’t work.”

“Does your supervisor know you are doing this?” 

The doubts suddenly started to flood her head. This was crazy. Here she was, dressed like something out of a Degas painting, getting ready to head back over a hundred years in the hope of bumping into the long-dead artist just to find out if he really was frigid. As Mike slipped the headset onto her forehead, she gripped his wrist.

“Maybe we should just go home.” her eyes were pleading, her lower lip trembled.

“No way,” Mike laughed. “This is going to be awesome. Just remember to be back here in 24 hours. That’s as long as I can allow the machine to run. Be back by 5pm, you only have one day, otherwise you’ll be stuck there forever.”

She saw his hand descend and press the spacebar on the keyboard, and suddenly everything went black.

------

Caroline opened her eyes. She was lying flat on her back. The room was in darkness. 

She sat up. There was a faint glow coming from the window and she could hear noises from the street below. She looked around. She called to Mike but there was no answer. No Mike, no laptop. She pulled the headset from her head and stood up.

Had it worked? She crossed to the window and gave an audible gasp as she peered out through the net curtains at the street below. The cars, billboards and traffic lights were gone and horses and carriages traversed the street instead.

“Oh my fucking god!” she whispered. “You crazy bastard, Mike. It worked.”

Once she spoke to the manager and paid for the room for another night, she stepped out onto the street of Pigalle. She could see the lights of the cafe bars twinkling around her as the dusk turned to night. She knew Degas and his contemporaries drank around here so decided the easiest thing to do was go and ask if anyone knew where he was.

A man approached her as she entered the bar. “Good evening Madame. Are you lost?”

This was not the question she had expected, but Caroline felt the men around her looking at her. She straightened her back, determined not to feel intimidated despite the fact the only women there were the barmaids and dancers.

“I’m looking for the artist Edgar Degas. Do you know if he is here?”

“I don’t, Madame, but you could ask him. He’s an artist too.”

The man pointed in the direction of a dishevelled looking man sitting drinking by the fire. She noticed the cane beside him as she approached.

“I apologise for interrupting, Monsieur, but I am told that you are an artist. Do you know where I can find Edgar Degas?”

The man snorted. “Try the Opera. You’ll find him hanging around the whores backstage. Not that he ever does anything with them.” 

The barwoman laughed as she placed the bottle of green liquid in front of him.

“Don’t listen to Lautrec, my dear. Edgar is a gentleman, unlike Henri here who fucks anyone who so much glances in his direction.” She smiled at Caroline. “The Opera is two streets away. Turn left and then go up the hill. You can’t miss it.”

Caroline nodded, speechless. Oh my god, Toulouse-Lautrec, she thought. Either this is a seriously intense dream or Mike really did it.

She approached the Opera cautiously. She was quickly realising that Paris in 1875 was very different from modern times and began to doubt she would be able to just waltz in through the front doors of the Opera House. A woman alone on the streets of Paris would be labelled as a streetwalker.

As she moved around the side of the Opera House, a door opened and a tall man in a top hat and cloak exited. She moved quickly forward and reached out and grabbed the door before it closed again.

She crept along a dimly lit passageway before entering the backstage area. She could see a group of dancers lined up. They had obviously just come off stage. There was a group of men being introduced to the dancers by a tall, older lady. The dancers all looked to be in their teens, early twenties at most. One man, a tall, distinguished man with greying hair sticking out beneath his hat, ran his fingers over a dancer’s face, stroking a stray strand of hair back behind her ear. He turned and whispered something to the older lady, before turning back to the girl who blushed and lowered her head.

The man moved onto the next dancer. He tilted her chin up, gazing into her eyes as he moved her face from side to side before smiling at her and taking her hand and leading her over to a chaise lounge in the corner. He sat her down and stood in front of her, unbuttoning his trousers and encouraging the dancer to take his cock in her mouth.

“Disgusting, isn’t it?’

Caroline turned to a tall man who had suddenly appeared beside her. “The Patrons basically donate to the Opera to have free rein back here. The girls are treated as little more than whores. Most of them are holding out in the hope they will be set up in an apartment as a courtesan.”

“Doesn’t the Opera management object?” Caroline asked.

“Object? They had the architects design this space specifically.”

“Are.. are you Edgar Degas?” Caroline stammered.

“I am Madame. At your service.” He took Caroline’s hand and leant forward to kiss the back of her hand.

“I..I’ve been looking for you. I wanted to meet you.” Caroline felt herself blush. It was like a serious case of hero worship and it was a struggle to get the words out.

Degas raised his hand to Caroline’s face, in a gesture eerily reminiscent of the man with the dancer minutes earlier, he turned her face from side to side.

“You should come back to my studio. I want to paint you. We can talk as you pose for me.”

With that he turned and walked off, expecting her to follow him.

They climbed the staircase to the third floor. He flung open the door and the smell of oil paint and turpentine hit her nostrils. The room was covered in canvases and sheets of paper. Pastel sketches, charcoal drawings and half-finished oil paintings cluttered the walls and surfaces. Caroline moved around, entranced as Degas lit several oil lamps so the room was flooded with light.

He shooed a cat of a wooden chair and gestured for Caroline to sit. He opened the cupboard and produced a bottle and two glasses. He poured the green liquid into the glasses and picked one up.

“Let’s hope the Green Fairy helps me capture your beauty.”

Caroline noted it was the same drink Toulouse-Lautrec was drinking and as the wormwood burned her throat, she realised it was absinthe.

Degas laughed at her grimace as he sketched her with pastel chalks. As he got her to turn her head this way and that, she asked him about his life and found that the text books were right. He loved the beauty of women but had never been with one. He described his life of solitude, how painting was his life and how he loved to sketch at the Opera. 

She looked at him as he sketched. The studied concentration, the narrowed brows as he chewed his lip in concentration. The only sound sometimes was the hiss of the lamp and the scrape of pastel on paper.

After a couple of hours and several glasses later, he stretched and placed the chalks back in their box. Caroline stood, placing her hands behind her neck and arching her back. She stepped forward and began to look at the sketches he had produced.

She felt tears form in the corners of her eyes. She thought she had never looked as beautiful as she did in those sketches. 

“You’ve made me so beautiful.” She looked into his eyes then stepped closer and brought her lips to his. She felt him stiffen but she continued to kiss him. Her fingers moving through his hair as her other hand reached behind and stroked his spine. She pressed herself against him, her breasts pressing against his chest.

She gazed into his eyes as she brushed her lips against him. His moustache tickled her nose as their tongues touched.

His hands moved to caress her. She felt his fingers caress the crinoline as he unfastened the hooks. She mimicked his movments, reaching to unfasten his shirt buttons, one by one, exposing his chest. Her fingers running through the smattering of chest hair, coarse and dark. Her fingertips caressing his nipples as she felt her dress being tugged down her body. She dropped her arms to help it fall to the floor. 

Degas stopped and stared at her, his hands millimetres away from her decidedly modern teal coloured bra.

‘Fuck’ she thought. I should have got an antique corset too. Throwing caution to the wind, she reached behind and unclasped the bra and let it fall, exposing her breasts to him. Her nipples were marshmallow pink and swelled with a combination of her arousal and the cool air.

Degas smiled and lowered his head, his mouth suckling her breast, tongue moving in ever decreasing circles zeroing in on the sensitive pink nub. She arched her back, gasping as she felt his teeth graze it.

While his fingers tugged the underskirts down, she wondered what he’d make of the matching teal thong. He pushed her back onto the bed, tugging the flimsy triangle of damp cotton down her thighs, revealing her triangle of soft ginger pubes.

He clambered on top of her, kissing her hungrily as his hand squeezed her breast. She wrapped her legs around him as he fumbled with his belt. She reached down to push his trousers over his ass, caressing the firm globes. He buried his face in her neck. She could feel his warm breath on her as his teeth nibbled her ear.

His cock felt hard and hot as he freed it from his clothes. She felt him pressing against her mound as he ground against her, as if trying to find his way from half-heard directions. She remembered him saying he’d never been with a woman and slowly lowered her hand to grasp the shaft.

It was thick. She moved her hand along him. It was long and thick. As she wrapped her fingers around the head, a trail of precum oozed out. His gasp in her ear signalled his enjoyment as she slowly smeared the precum over the tip. 

She guided the head to rub along her slit. The whole bizarreness of the situation, her lying on the bed, about to be fucked by her idol was making her drip. She smeared her juices up over her clit hood with his cock as he knelt on top of her, holding his weight off her with his hands. She could hear his breathing changing, laboured, panting as she caressed and circled her clit with the tip of his cock, feeling the heat and throbbing hardness on her.

She guided him down, letting the head rest agaisnt the entrance.

“Baise-moi, fuck me,” she gasped. She spread her legs wider and pushed herself up to meet him as he pushed down on her. The sensation of his cock sliding into her wet velvet made her cry out.

He pushed inside her then pulled out again. She felt the head dragged almost out of her before he slammed forward again. His face was buried in her neck. She could hear him whimpering, trying to hold it together as he thrust again and again.

‘I can’t believe I’m doing this,’ Caroline thought as Degas continued to thrust into her. Each time he slammed into her, he ground his hips in a circular movement, pressing his groin against her mound. The sensations created by grinding on her clit were sending electirc pulses through her. Suddenly Degas slammed into her one last time and gave a strange strangled cry and went still. His cock shook inside her and she felt the ropes of his cum fire inside her. He shook as one, two, three spurts of cum shot out of him before collapsing on top of her.

She wrapped her arms around him and held him as he lay, panting, drawing lungfuls of air back into him. Finally he looked up, blushing. 

She kissed him. As she looked into his eyes, she wondered, ‘Was this going to change the future?’

He rolled off her and lay beside her, grinning. “I’ve, well, I’ve never done that before.”

“Really?” Caroline replied, before deciding she didn’t want to come across as a complete slut. “Neither have I.”

She slid down off the bed onto her knees. Holding a knee in both hands, she slowly opened his legs and kissed her way up his thigh. The combination of her jucies and his cum were smeared over his cock and balls and she slowly licked her way along the semi-hard shaft.

Degas threw his head back and groaned as she swirled her tongue over his cock. She watched it stiffen and grow, lifting itself off his thigh as her tongue trailed up the underside of his shaft before slurping around the head.

Holding the shaft in one hand, she slowly milked it up and down as she brushed her cheek and red curly hair over his balls. She could see his fingers gripping the crumpled white sheets as his cock grew back to full hardness.

She looked up at him, watching him watch her as she opened her mouth to slide the head of his cock into her mouth. Her lips clamped around it and she sucked as she moved her head up and down, taking a couple of inches into her mouth.

“Oh God, Oh God, Oh God” Degas muttered, panting, squirming as Caroline sucked him. She lifted her head, letting the cock slide out of her mouth with a ‘pop’. Grinning, she stood up and straddled him, a knee either side of his chest. She leaned over him, her breasts hanging down, her face inches from him. Her hand between her legs, holding his cock. She guided him back to her entrance. 

She held his gaze as she lowered herself down onto him. ‘Fuck, that felt so good.’

He reached up and grasped her breasts, holding her boobs as she fucked him. God, it felt so good. His cock was big and hard and as she ground down onto him with every downward thrust, she felt the orgasm she’d been chasing return, building inside her. His fingers rolled and tugged on her nipples, every sensation sending ripples pulsing directly to her core. She could feel herself squelch as she rode him. 

As it came, she threw her head back, the orgasm washing over her, sucking the oxygen from her lungs. She felt him thrust upwards, holding almost in mid air as his cock twitched and more shots of cum filled her womb.

She collapsed on top of him, kissing him, giggling as the two of them panted, hearts racing.

She woke suddenly. She remembered cuddling Degas after their lovemaking. They’d talked about his life, the death of his mother, the war and afterwards, selling paintings to cover the debts. He told her he’d never felt like this before about anyone.

She glanced up and saw him sitting with an easel in front of him, painting her as she slept. He saw she was awake and smiled. 

“I was just wanting to capture you while you were asleep. Don’t move, just a few more minutes.”

She lay there and watched him paint. He wore the shirt she hadn’t got round to fully removing from him last night but nothing else. She smiled as she looked at his cock dangling between his legs and the memory of their lovemaking.

“Finished.” he announced, smiling. She climbed out of bed and wrapped the sheet around her as she went to stand behind the easal. 

“It’s beautiful,” she gasped. He had captured her likeness perfectly. Her red curls glinting in the morning sun.

“ I have done some preparatory sketches for other paintings too, Caroline.”

He showed her picture after picture, pastel sketches of her face and body. 

“Would you just get dressed and sit on that chair for a few minutes. I have this idea for a painting of a woman in a cafe.”

He sketched her as she sat, wearing her yellow dress and bonnet. As the realisation that she would have to leave soon dawned on her, she felt her face fall.

“Hold that thought,” Degas cried excitedly. The pastels whirled over the paper as he sought to capture her melancholy face. “What ever you are thinking about, keep thinking it,” he cried excitedly as he drew line after line.

“What were you thinking about?” he hesitantly asked after he put the chalk down.

“I have to go.” She replied sadly. “My friend is waiting for me and I have to meet him by 5pm.”

That’s ok,” Degas replied. “That will give me some time to finish the oil painting. I have all these sketches to work from. Perhaps we can meet for a drink later in the bar in Pigalle?”

Caroline didn’t know what to say. To tell him he’d never see her again seemed too cruel. 

“Yes, that would be lovely.”

“Au revoir, Caroline, "Degas whispered as she kissed him goodbye.

“Au revoir, Edgar, ” she whispered back, holding back the tears until she heard the door close behind her.

She stumbled down the stairs, the flow of tears flooding her eyes and it was only by holding onto the walls that she managed to make it safely back to the ground floor.

She entered the hotel and went up to her room. The headset was still hidden under the pillow. She looked at the clock. Five minutes to five. She lifted the headset then put it down again.

Did she really want to go back? She could stay. She had some money, a few hundred francs. She could stay with Edgar, they would be lovers and she would be immortalised in paint forever. 

But what if it went wrong? What could she do? In a world closed off to women, she'd probably end up as a prostitute or if she was lucky, a courtesan. She'd be spending her days sitting in a flat waiting for her sugar daddy to turn up.

With a resigned sigh, she placed the headset on her forehead and watched the hand of the clock click towards the hour mark.

The world went black. 

------

“Fuck, I think there’s a power outage.”

She opened her eyes to see Mike tapping at the keyboard.

"Sorry, Caroline. I don’t think it’s going to work.”

“What do you mean? It did work. I was there.”

“No you weren’t. I pressed the spacebar. The whole place went black. Then I said I dont think its going to work."

“Seriosuly Mike, I went back. I met Degas. I was even thinking about staying there, but decided I’d better come back and tell you it worked.”

“Bullshit. Stop winding me up."

“OK, I’ll prove it. Come on. The Musee D’Orsey is only a few minutes from here.”

Together they entered the Impressionist Room in the Musee D’Orsey.

“What exactly are we looking for?” Mike questioned as Caroline’s eyes swept around the room.

“You remember that picture I showed you in London, when we were looking for the dress?”

"Yeah, the Absinthe drinker or something.”

“Yes, well I posed for that painting today.” Caroline stopped. 

She took a couple of steps forward. There it was. The painting of the melancholy woman staring ahead with the glass of absinthe on the table in front of her. And there she was. It was definitely her. The red curls peeking out from under the lace bonnet. The same dress as the one she was standing in now.

“It can’t be,” Mike whispered. 

“It is, look. He’s even captured the way my nose turns up at the end.”

She looked at the description displayed beside the painting.

“It is the woman’s expression that draws you into the painting. It has been described as numbed by drink but her look of melancholy has more than a tinge of being numbed by despair and hopelessness rather than befuddled by drink. The artist’s model is known only as Caroline. She only appears in this painting and a number of sketches, along with one other painting never exhibited and which is believed to be buried with him. Degas described her as the lost love of his life.”