All I needed to do now was find Oliver. I had to stop him from going to the antique store and making plans to go to the facility with Dad. Instead, I had to convince Oliver to come with me. And at the same time, I had to avoid allowing my other self to see me.
Scrambling to find a place to hide out and watch for them to arrive…watch out for me to arrive…I decided the ice cream shop would be the best choice. I found an unlocked door that led to the darkened interior and hunkered down inside to wait. It wasn’t until I was alone in the quiet of the shop that I realized how hard I was breathing, and how hard I was shaking. My nerves were so on edge that I was struggling to maintain control. I knew I needed a new plan to get Thaddeus back with me so I could make him see himself, but for that, I needed Oliver.
By the time I heard voices breaking through the hovering silence, I was no closer to understanding what I was about to do. I couldn’t let myself see myself, but I had to get Oliver away from Kate and…me.
“This is going to get confusing,” I whispered aloud as I moved towards the windows, cringing when I bumped a few boards and caused them to fall to the floor with a crash.
Outside, Kate, Oliver, and the other Holly jumped and looked cautiously around before quickening their pace. Suddenly, our walk down Main Street made a lot more sense, as I knew exactly what was going to happen. Soon enough, they were going to reach the pay phone and then the old version of our dad was going to step out of that antique store…
I froze in my spot when the realization dawned on me…I should have gone to the antique store first! What had I been thinking? I almost smacked myself in the forehead with frustration for not realizing my mistake sooner.
With little time to spare, I sneaked quietly out of the ice cream shop and sprinted across the street just as Oliver reached the payphone. Knocking gently on the door of the store, I begged silently for Dad to hurry and open it. I needed to get inside and out of sight before Oliver and the others turned around and saw me. Finally, I heard the lock click free, and a very confused older version of my dad poked his head out.
Without saying a word, I rushed inside and closed the door. “I have to hide in here somewhere, so I don’t see myself!”
“Holly?”
“Yes, Dad, it’s me,” I said and watched his eyes widen as he stood in shocked surprise, staring at me. “Look, I’ll explain soon, but I know you’re our dad and I know you were about to go outside and call that group of kids in.” I pointed through the window to Oliver, Kate, and my other self. “You still need to get the three of them off the street but is there somewhere I can hide until it’s safe to talk? Please? Something bad has happened, and I need your help!”
He sputtered for a moment before he managed to say, “Hide in my back office, down there, quickly.”
I nodded and raced through to the back of the store out of sight. A moment later, I heard the front door open and Dad’s voice calling out to Oliver, Kate, and the other me. Soon after, they entered the shop, and I peeked out of the office door to see the recent event play out all over again, just like pressing rewind on a movie.
Eventually, their steps disappeared upstairs and I sat down on the floor, staring at the machine in the bag. I waited impatiently for Dad to come back down so I could explain everything and get his help.
***
I wasn’t sure how much time passed while I waited. But the entire time, I kept a close eye on the machine, scared it would somehow disappear, and my plan for using it against Thaddeus would fail. I still had no real idea of what I was doing and my stomach ached from worry over Oliver, the one I left back at the facility. And Kate. And Mom and Dad. The thought of them all stuck in those tiny rooms in that horrible place ate away at me, and especially the fact that Mom had been locked up there because she was considered a crazy person.
Everything was so messed up, and it was technically all my fault. I was the one who had gone poking around in the attic and found the machine. And although we were able to meet our dad, what if we couldn’t fix anything? What if all we were doing was reaffirming that he wasn’t meant to be with us and now we’d never have a chance to get our family back together again? As I sat there, the doubts piled up around me, and it became harder and harder to believe any good was going to come of this.
The doorknob suddenly turned, and I quickly wiped the tears from my cheeks. When the door opened, Dad stood there, his brow creasing with worry the second he saw me.
“Holly? Are you okay?”
I sniffed hard and tried to smile.
His face softened, and he sighed, holding out his arms. “Come here, kiddo.”
I didn’t want to break down and cry, but seeing Dad standing there, not the Dad I should’ve had, but a much older version that got dragged into this mess just like we did, had me crying hard as I went to him. He hugged me close, just as I always imagined him doing when I wished he was around. I began rambling on about something or other when he chuckled in my ear.
“What’s so funny?” I mumbled as he dabbed at my cheeks with a handkerchief.
“You are just like your mother, that’s what,” he smiled. “Always forgetting to see the good possibilities before you rush towards how horrible everything is.”
“But everything’s so messed up! Look at what we did to our hometown! And Mom, and what happened to you…all of it is so bad!” I hung my head as the weight of our latest mistake hit me again. “I know what happens at the facility. You can’t go there!”
He opened his mouth as if to ask me how I knew that, then gave his head a little shake. “Okay, we won’t go there Holly, but you have to keep holding onto hope that we’ll figure this out. Everything will be alright again.”
“How do you know?” I asked. “How? Every time we’ve used that machine, things have become worse, not better. Either that or we’ve changed things without even realizing it! What if we do something and we can’t go back…if we ruin everything for good? What then?”
“We won’t,” he promised and held my hands tightly. “You are two of the brightest kids ever. You and your brother have already done things I never thought you’d be capable of.”
“I think most of it was by accident,” I mumbled.
His smile widened. “Maybe. But you know your grandpa didn’t get the machine to work for him either until a freak accident! He was stuck for years on those plans of his until one day he was so mad that he kicked the thing, and then it worked. Just like that.”
“So you’re saying we should kick it?” I suggested.
He shrugged. “Metaphorically speaking, you should kick it I think.”
I wasn’t sure that made sense, but then I heard footsteps coming closer, and Oliver’s voice. “Hey, Dad? What did you want to show me?” Oliver stepped into the doorway and blinked a few times before his face screwed up. “Holly? What…wait, why are you down here…” His gaze drifted past me to the machine on the floor. “What’s that doing down here? I left it…I left it upstairs.”
“Different machine,” I told him, “and I’m a different Holly.”
“Right, yeah, cause that makes sense,” he muttered. I watched him run a hand through his hair as he blew out a heavy breath. His cheeks puffed out, and he looked as though he was either going to throw up or that he desperately needed to sit down and sleep for a while so he could pretend this was all a bad dream. I knew the feeling well.
He stared at me for a moment longer before speaking. “So…exactly what time zone are you from?”
I glanced from him to Dad then down to the machine. “It’s complicated. But I’m here now, and I need your help. You and Kate and me, Mom and Dad…all get stuck in that facility for the mentally unstable with Thaddeus,” I explained briefly. “We were separated, and when I saw the machine, I took a chance. I meant to bring Thaddeus back with me—”
“What? Why would you do that?” Oliver’s voice rang out in alarm.
Dad shushed him and took a quick peek into the shop, making sure Kate or the other
me hadn’t come to investigate all the ruckus. He gently closed the door.
“Because…I may have come up with a plan.” I wrung my hands nervously, unsure if he would go for this or not. “Remember when I first accidentally saw myself?” I held up my hands, recalling the way they’d disappeared before my eyes. I shuddered at the idea of it happening again and pressed myself even deeper into the office, just in case the other Holly came poking around. The door was closed, but I knew myself all too well. I was nosey by nature, and a closed door wouldn’t stop me from bursting inside to see what was going on.
“Yeah, but what does that have to do with Thaddeus?” Oliver frowned.
Before I could answer, Dad’s eyes lit up, and he grinned. Then he started shaking his head. “No, absolutely not. I will not have you going through with it.”
“What do you mean, no?” I asked quickly. “Come on, we get Thaddeus to see his other self, and then he disappears. It’s perfect!”
“No, it’s too dangerous. I do not want you attempting to drag Thaddeus around with you and that machine! It’s too risky, and I will not have you and Oliver risking your lives.”
“But Dad, this could fix everything!”
“Or it could make everything worse; it could ruin what few chances you have of getting things back to the way they were,” he argued. And a few more worry lines seemed to appear on his face. “Trust me, kids, Thaddeus is a smart, dangerous man. I know you think this is a good plan, Holly, but he always manages to figure everything out before you even finish knowing what you’re going to do.”
Oliver glanced at me nervously as Dad paced around his office. “Dad, what happened back then? On the day you disappeared? You never actually told us.”
“I poked my nose in Thaddeus’ business, trying to get him to stop.”
“Dad? Please just tell us what’s going on here,” I urged.
He had that same worried look Oliver would get when he was overthinking something for school or a new invention of his. But after a slight pause, Dad sighed heavily and then began to speak. “The first time, Thaddeus contacted me and said he wanted to meet and talk things over. I wanted nothing to do with the project, not after your grandpa purposely tucked away all the notes and hid the machine. He’d given me that locked box for a reason and I planned on keeping it secret, keeping it safe as your grandpa requested I do.”
“The letter we found from Grandpa,” Oliver said slowly, “it said something about solving the greatest mystery of our lives. That was finding you, right?”
“Well, he had gone into the future alone and when he came back that last time…he was different, worried.” Dad sank onto a stool, pulled his handkerchief from his pocket and took his glasses from his nose to clean them. “We packed everything up, the machine, all his notes, everything. Then not long after that, he passed away, and I never looked at the notes or the machine again. I couldn’t bring myself to mess with something that had brought so much tragedy into his life, and mine. Your mom missed him terribly. She could barely stand to talk about him, so I let his memory rest in peace, along with all of his work.”
I exchanged a confused glance with Oliver, but he was too busy watching Dad.
“Then,” Dad continued, replacing his glasses, “Thaddeus began contacting me. He called at first, sent a few messages and your mom and I ignored him. We went about our lives, I taught at the school, and we enjoyed our time together with you kids, as a family.” His eyes narrowed and his body hunched.
“Dad? What happened next?”
“He showed up at the house when I wasn’t at home,” Dad whispered angrily. “Upset Maggie so much. She was in a panic, thinking he was there to hurt her or one of you. When she told me, I threatened him, warned him to stay away from us.
“So, what happened?” I asked, already knowing it wouldn’t be that easy.
“He said if I wanted him to stay out of our lives, I had to meet him and bring William’s notes.” He hesitated for a second before he went on. “So I agreed to meet him at the storage lot that’s just down the road from here.”
“What?” Oliver exclaimed, but Dad held up his hand.
“I showed up, even though I had no intention of giving him anything he could use. I planned to see what he had and destroy it all for good. Get him off this time-machine madness and be done with it. Maybe even figure out if he had anything to do with your grandfather’s death and get the police after him.” Dad smiled sadly. “But the second the door closed on that storage unit, I knew I’d made a big mistake. I’d underestimated him just as everyone else had and I wound up paying the price.”
“So you remember all that?” I asked, really wishing we could get out of this confusing timeline and back to normal.
“Yes, I remember it all. My young self was thrown through the years until I was an old man. When I landed back in the storage unit, Thaddeus was waiting for me with the news of what had happened…and with the knowledge that I would never see you kids or Maggie, again.”
“But Mom, she would’ve understood,” I argued. “You could’ve gone to her and told her what happened!”
“It wasn’t that easy. How could I go back to her? And how could I explain it to you kids? I look like your grandpa, not your dad.” He shook his head. “No, it was safer for everyone if I stayed away. Though it killed me to do it.”
I felt so sad at the pain in his words as he spoke. “But I had to stay away from you three, and from a distance, I watched Maggie fall apart because I’d disappeared.”
I rested a hand on his shoulder. Oliver did the same. He reached up to hold both our hands as he sniffed hard, fighting back the tears.
“We’re going to fix this,” Oliver said sincerely. “We’ll find a way to get our family back together again.”
“I can’t let you keep bouncing around through time. I will not let your mother lose the two of you permanently. I won’t.”
“But if we don’t do anything then we’re stuck in this present,” I reminded him gently. “Dad, we can do this. Oliver and I, I know we can. You have to trust us. We’re your kids, remember? I’m pretty sure Oliver is just as smart as you are.”
“And Holly’s as crazy brave,” Oliver said, glancing at me. “She came back here from the facility all by herself to stop us from walking into a trap.”
Dad still didn’t look convinced. But we had no other options.
“Uh, Holly?” a voice sounded from behind Oliver.
The three of us whipped towards the door that we hadn’t heard open. I realized that thankfully, it was only Kate standing there and not my other self. She looked horribly confused. She pointed at me then turned and looked towards the stairs. She blinked a few times, then blinked again before stepping inside to join us.
“Whatever…” she said, shaking her head trying to process the fact that I was standing in front of her. “I’m assuming something went wrong?”
I stared at her blankly then laughed as I hugged her. “This is why I love you,” I told her as she hugged me back. “Nothing bothers the great Kate.”
“I wouldn’t say that…but, you’re here from…what…the past or the future?”
“The future. And yeah, I’m here because things went wrong, really wrong.”
Kate nodded slowly. “Okay, so what do we need to do now? And we’d better hurry before the other Holly comes downstairs and finds you here.”
Dad stood up from his stool and placed the machine on his desk. “Your grandad always talked about some failsafe switch, a reset in case something went wrong while the machine was in use,” He peered at it closely, turning it over to check underneath. “The question is…where is it?”
He set the machine down again and spun it around, removing the back panel. Oliver looked on, fascinated as he leaned closer and watched Dad pull out a bundle of wires that seemed to run through the entire system. I peeked inside the machine and shook my head. It was very complex looking, and I was relieved that Dad and Oliver were there with me.
&nb
sp; “So, what would the failsafe switch do?” Oliver asked as Dad separated the wires carefully and slowly until we were all staring down at a rainbow of color.
“It was meant to take you back to the first time you used the machine. And by doing so, the theory was it would erase all the flow-on effects of your time travel. That was the theory, mind you.”
“Back to the very first time?” I asked hopefully, but not ready to believe it could be that easy.
“Well, that’s debatable since it depends on which one of you used it first,” he mumbled, reaching further inside the machine. “The point was to go back and prevent everything that was caused as a chain reaction. As you can imagine, it’s much easier said than done and I know he was still working on it before he packed it all away. But I have no idea if he managed to make it work or if the ideas were all still in his head.” Dad bit his lip as his hand searched for something. Then his eyes widened, and he laughed in triumph. “There it is!”
There was a click, and the lights of the machine switched from blue to red as it hummed to life once more. I took a step back, not sure what was about to happen. I watched Dad work the wires back into the machine and reattach the panel.
“So what do we do now?” Oliver asked. “Where is it going to take us?”
“Who used the machine first?” he asked.
“I did, but I used it on my own to get Holly’s school book back.”
“And then you later used it for all three of you, right?” Dad asked. We nodded. “Then with any luck, your grandpa worked out the bugs before he passed away. And it will now take you back to that moment.”
“Just like that?” I asked, staring at the machine and filled with doubts. “It can’t be that simple!”
“There is a small chance the switch’s use was not fully realized,” Dad said, tilting his head back and forth, “but this is your best option for resetting what’s been changed and getting things back to normal.” He stared at us long and hard before passing the machine to Oliver. “I have faith in you both, I really do!’
Time Traveler - Books 1, 2, 3 & 4: Books for Girls aged 9-12 Page 24