“Nobody is getting launched into space!” I frown and pull the chargers out of the pack, handing them both to Blake. “See if you can reach that outlet.”
Next, I pull out the envelope containing the toolbox handle and its photo. I extract the photo, and after considering the handle for a moment, stuff that back inside. “Okay. The box is sitting on a table in this picture. Is this the same table?”
Francesca steps over to look. “No. I don’t think so. See that background? It actually looks like it’s out there, in the picture.” She points to the main area of the barn.
“It doesn’t have a height dimension on this one,” I say. “But you can see the floor. I would guess that’s like three and a half feet or so, wouldn’t you?”
“I don’t know. I’m terrible at guessing stuff like that,” Francesca says.
Blake reaches past me and flips open the toolbox. He hands me a tape measure and flips the lid shut again without saying a word.
“Oh. Yeah. Glad one of us is thinking.” I walk out into the barn, look up at the multicolored canvas, then turn to face the back wall. “Looks like it’s facing this way. There’s no table here now, but we can find something to use.”
“That’s not gonna work,” Blake says. He points to the light bulb above him with our chargers sticking out of the socket.
“Oh. Yeah. You’re right. We’ll have to do it in there to be plugged in. But we’re going to end up out here.”
“We won’t end up hitting that table whenever there is one?” Francesca says.
“Not if we do it right.”
“Okay. So May 2nd, 1989 right?” Blake says, starting to dial his chronometer. “What time?”
I consult the back of the photo. “1800 Zulu. So that’s what? 6 pm? But we’re in Montana so . . .”
“Mountain time. That’s minus seven hours,” Blake says. “That’s 11 am.”
“Except May is daylight saving time,” Francesca says. “That makes it noon.”
“Okay. It shouldn’t matter for the settings,” I say. “We can just set Zulu time.” I set the tape measure down and start to dial my chronometer settings.
“Doesn’t hurt to know what time of day you’re arriving though,” Francesca says.
“So we get there around noon, and then we immediately look for Mym?” Blake says.
“Yeah. Hopefully she hasn’t gotten far. I don’t know how she usually sets up her anchor shots, but how far could she get out here in the middle of a prairie, right?”
“Unless she blinks away using something else,” Francesca says. “Then we’d never find her.”
“Let’s hope that doesn’t happen.” I frown.
“We should get a move on in any case,” Blake says. “Before this generator runs out of gas, or he shuts it off on us.”
I finish my chronometer settings and compare them with Blake’s. I center the toolbox on the stool and then set the photo down in front of it. “Okay, the box is going to be about a foot back from the edge of the table, so that edge should be about here.” I gesture to our imaginary table edge and we all step away a bit to have plenty of clearance. I extend my left hand with the chronometer to touch the toolbox and make sure I have enough room. Blake hands me the charging cord to my chronometer.
“Oh shit!” Francesca blurts.
“What?”
“My clothes!” She immediately drops to my pack and rummages through it.
“Oh yeah. I forgot about that.” I look at my outfit and pull the waistband back on my jeans to double check my boxers.
I’m not too bad off. Need to lose the shoes and the jacket.
Francesca grabs her small armful of clothes and disappears around the corner into one of the empty stalls. I lean down to look through what’s left of the items in my pack. I pull out my flip-flops.
“My flip-flops got stolen,” Blake says as he lays his coat on the workbench and begins pulling off his boots.
“Yeah, that sucks,” I say, looking at the rough-hewn boards of the floor. “You can use one of mine if you want. We can share. That way neither of us is totally barefoot.”
“Okay. That might help actually,” Blake says.
I slide him one of my flip-flops and toss my jacket on top of his. A few moments later, Francesca reappears in her wrinkled short-sleeve top and jeans, and her flip-flops. She shivers as she lays her pea coat, hat and scarf on the table with our jackets. She gently sets her boots on the floor, then folds her arms and shuffles over between us. I toss Quickly’s journal back into my pack and sling it onto my shoulders.
“Okay. Now we’re ready,” I say.
“Where am I holding onto?” Francesca says. I extend my arm. She looks from me to Blake. “How about I be Blake’s backpack.”
Blake looks at her and then shrugs. “Okay.” He stoops down, lets Francesca wrap her arms around his neck, and stands up with her piggyback.
“If you suggest anything about me being heavy, I’ll knee you in the kidney,” Francesca says.
I plug in my chronometer and lift up my shoeless foot. Blake sways a little as he tries to balance on one foot with Francesca on his back.
“Carson was right,” I say. “We do look ridiculous.”
“Let’s get this over with,” Blake says.
I stuff the photo back in my pocket and touch my hand to the top of the toolbox handle, next to Blake’s.
“On three. One . . . two . . . three.”
We drop about six inches. Blake plants his other foot but still goes over backward. The chronometers’ charger plugs rain down on my head. Francesca rolls off with a thump and tries to get free, but Blake lands between her legs and the two of them end up in a tangle. It has to be sixty degrees warmer.
My one bare foot has landed in a pile of brown mushiness that I really hope is just mud. Blake struggles to his feet and I give Francesca a hand up.
“Thank God it’s warm,” she says, as she brushes off her backside.
I scan the barn around us. I don’t see her. “Spread out. Let’s see if we can find Mym.”
I hobble on my one flip-flop and muddy foot toward the barn door while Francesca and Blake fan out inside the barn. I scan the loft briefly and notice the color of the canvas in the rafters has changed to a vibrant blue and green. I open the barn door to bright, warm sunlight.
Oh that feels good.
The barnyard has a pickup truck parked in front of the house and a Palomino horse is leaning its head over the paddock fence, chewing tufts of grass. It lifts its head to consider me as I stumble out of the barn into the yard.
I hear a loud whoosh and a crackle like a dragon’s breath. A woman laughs from somewhere behind the barn. I turn and look back to the distant interior wall of the barn and catch movement through the thin spaces between the boards. Vibrant colors are shifting and changing.
“What is that?” Francesca says, as she and Blake exit the doors.
I back up a few steps to try to see the top of the barn. The roof looks like it’s moving. A massive dome of a dozen different colors is blooming from beyond the sheet metal roof.
“No way . . .” I mumble.
“What is that?” Blake says.
I lose the flip-flop as I sprint around the left side of the barn. As I round the rear corner, I slow to a stop to take in the sight before me.
Floating twenty feet off the ground and slowly rising is the biggest hot air balloon I’ve ever seen. A burly, bearded man with muscular arms is letting out rope from the massive wicker gondola. Looking down from his side is a petite young woman with curly blonde hair. I wave to her.
She smiles.
17
“I frequently lecture on the dangers of misusing time. People often ask me afterward about what I feel is the biggest waste of time, suspecting that I will say something like television or arguing politics. I think the biggest waste of time is feeling sorry for yourself. That and traffic. Thankfully I found a way out of that one.”
-Excerpt from the journal of Dr.
Harold Quickly, 1972
The man in the balloon confers with Mym about our sudden appearance. She touches his shoulder and speaks something into his ear. He pulls on a cord and the balloon stops rising, then slowly begins a descent back to earth. Francesca and Blake join me as I duck under the fence rail and walk toward the balloon through the tall grass of the pasture.
“Look at the size of that thing,” Blake says.
The balloon is immense. The gondola looks as though it would hold ten people. A metal cable connecting it to a big iron hoop in the ground grows taut as the wind attempts to push the balloon away from the barn. As it sinks close to the ground, the man gestures for me to come closer, and tosses out another cable.
“Tie us off over there!” He points me toward another iron hoop on the far side of the balloon, partially buried in the grass. I pick up the end of the cable and trot to the iron ring. The cable has an oversized carabineer clip on it. I snap that over the ring and stand back. As soon as I’ve completed that, he tosses another one out and points to an identical hoop on the opposite side. I repeat the process there. He moves to a winch on the railing of the gondola and begins cranking. He signals to Mym, who gives periodic pulls on the cord to lower the balloon as he cranks the cables tighter.
After a few moments, the gondola settles to the grass with a thump. The man gives a few more cranks of the winch and locks it in place. He gives Mym a hand climbing over the rail and she drops into the grass. Francesca, Blake and I convene in front of her and she smiles at us with curiosity. Something the bearded man is doing is causing the balloon to wilt rapidly behind her.
“Hello,” she says.
“Hi, Mym.”
She tilts her head a little as she considers me.
She looks young.
“Have we met?” she asks.
Damn. She has no idea who we are.
Francesca holds out her hand. “Hi. I’m Francesca.”
“Mym,” she replies, giving Francesca a warm smile.
“I’m Blake.” Another handshake.
She turns to me.
“Benjamin.”
She shakes my hand firmly while looking me in the eyes. “It’s nice to meet you.” She turns and gestures back to the bearded man climbing out of the gondola. The balloon now lies horizontal in the field. “This is Cowboy Bob.”
The man walks over to us and extends Francesca a hand first. “Bob is fine. This one loves to embellish.” He gives a jerk of his head toward Mym.
“There are a lot of Bobs in the world,” she replies. “So you’re Cowboy Bob. Makes you sound more eccentric when I tell people about you.” She gives him a grin.
Bob’s handshake tells of years of manual labor. He’s a little shorter than me, but more broad-shouldered. I had thought him older from a distance because of his beard, but on closer inspection, I realize he’s likely only in his late twenties. His close-cropped beard is neat and tidy compared to the buffalo man from town, but his dark eyes are just as friendly.
“We’re sorry to barge in on your ballooning,” I say. “We just needed a little help.”
“It’s all right,” Cowboy Bob replies. “I would have waited anyway if I’d seen you driving up.”
“Oh. We didn’t drive,” I say.
Mym has been observing my chronometer and nudges Cowboy Bob with her elbow. He looks down where she’s gesturing.
“Ah.”
“We actually came from your barn,” Francesca says.
“We may have left a rental car buried in a snow drift in your driveway,” Blake adds.
“Oh. Haha. You’re who did that!” Cowboy Bob grins. “That gave Levi fits when he found it.” He looks at Mym. “You should have heard him complaining. It snowed the next day and buried the car before he found it. He tried plowing through the lump without checking what it was first. Made quite a mess from what I hear.”
“I’m sorry to cause so much trouble,” I say.
“Oh, no. It’s fine. Levi is never happy unless he has something to complain about.”
“So who is he?” Francesca asks.
“He’s my ranch hand. He lives here full-time and takes care of the place while I’m gone.”
“He knew right away that we were time travelers,” I say.
“Oh, yeah. He’s seen me vanish out of this field enough times. And he’s met Mym over the years, so it’s probably getting to be old hat for him now.”
“You can time travel in this?” Blake gestures to the balloon.
Cowboy Bob smiles. “It’s the only way to go, if you ask me.”
“It’s really nice,” Mym says. Then she smirks at Cowboy Bob. “Not always nice for the birds.”
“Oh. Yeah. But that’s rare,” Cowboy Bob replies.
“What’s rare?” Francesca asks.
“Oh, this last time through— the balloon is really safe. Probably the safest way you can go if you ask me. There’s hardly ever anything in the sky you can run into . . .”
“He had just gotten through bragging about that.” Mym smiles.
“Yeah, of course. Having just said that, we moved, and there happened to be a flock of swallows flying through where the top of the balloon arrived . . .” He looks at Francesca’s horrified face. “Most of them were fine, mind you.”
“Except for poor Pokey.” Mym frowns.
Cowboy Bob gives her an exasperated smile. “Yes.” He looks back to us. “One bird didn’t make it. He got fused into the fabric of the balloon up top.”
“With just his little head poking out,” Mym adds, pouting her lower lip.
“Yeah. And it was sad, I’ll give you that, but it could have been worse. I don’t think it was a bad way to go.”
“He had his poor head stuck in a hot air balloon! What’s worse than that?” Mym chides.
“Well, he could have ended up in the burner, or the gondola, or us. At least he still had a nice view at the end.”
Mym shakes her head. “I think you still owe him a better apology.”
“I’m not apologizing to the dead bird. Again.”
Mym tries to maintain her frown. “He wouldn’t even say anything at his funeral . . .”
“So enough about the darn bird,” Cowboy Bob says. “Where are you all from? Other than my barn.”
“We’re from 2009,” Blake says.
“Florida,” Francesca adds.
“Oh!” Mym says. “Saint Petersburg?”
“Yes,” Francesca replies.
“What brings you out here?” Cowboy Bob nods toward the road.
“My Dad probably sent them,” Mym says. “You know my Dad?”
“We do actually,” I say. “But he didn’t send us. It’s kind of a long story.”
“Would it be a better, long, inside story?” Cowboy Bob asks. “We could get out of this field if you like.”
“Yeah, I think something just tried to crawl up my leg,” Francesca says.
“I’ll show you the house.” Bob guides us to a paddock gate that he unlatches and swings open for us. The horse whickers as we pass and plods over to Cowboy Bob as he closes the latch. He gives the mare’s face a quick rub and then leads the way across the barnyard toward the house.
Unlike the last time I saw it, the house looks open and inviting. The curtains have all been drawn and most of the windows are up. The front door is open, with just a screen door for keeping the occasional bug out. As we climb the porch steps, a clatter of dishes comes from inside and I realize someone else is home. Bob stops to take off his boots by the front door. Mym leaves hers there, too; only then does she notice that Blake and I are barefoot. Blake is holding the flip-flop I lent him.
“You guys were prepared for this, huh?”
I scratch behind my neck. “Yeah, we’ve been having a few clothing and footwear mishaps.” I set my backpack down just inside the door.
The front doorway leads into a spacious living room full of natural light that allows a great view of the ranch. It’s decorated in a western style with
leather furniture and a massive stone hearth. Much of the light is streaming in from above, where the high, wood-beamed ceiling has allowed room for extra windows. We pass under a loft balcony through a hallway lined with framed black-and-white photos. Among scenes of cattle branding and hay baling, I notice a photo of a younger Cowboy Bob cradling a baby goat. The photo looks old but it’s hard to tell.
We pass into a dining area that’s likewise well lit with sun. The rough-hewn table would seat a dozen people. The room adjoins the kitchen, and as we round the corner, a woman appears. Stout, gray-haired and perhaps sixty-five, she brushes her hands off on an apron as she turns to greet us.
“Not leaving yet after all, Mrs. A,” Cowboy Bob says.
“Oh, you brought me some more visitors!” The woman smiles.
“Yes, these are . . .” He turns to us.
“I’m Blake.” Blake is closest and extends a hand.
“Francesca.”
“I’m Benjamin.”
“How do you do. I’m Connie,” the woman replies. The edges of her green eyes have a lot of smile lines. “Are these friends of yours?” she asks Mym.
“Um. Possibly.” Mym smiles. Her eyes find mine. “Hard to tell what people are right at first sometimes.”
“You all lead the most interesting lives,” Connie says. “I don’t know how you keep anything straight.” She turns back to us. “Are you all time travelers, too?”
I nod.
“We try not to be,” Blake says.
“I’ll tell you, things just keep getting more fun around here. The ladies in my quilting circle never believe a word I say about this job. I’m sure they all think I’ve gone senile. When did you all get here? Are you hungry?”
“Um. Yeah, we just got in. I don’t want to impose or anything, but I could eat,” I say.
Francesca and Blake murmur agreement.
“Okay. I’ll fix you something up.”
“Mrs. A makes an outstanding lasagna,” Mym says. “I feel like I gain about ten pounds every time I visit.”
“Why don’t you all go sit on the back deck. It’s so lovely out. I’ll bring you out some iced tea.”
“Yes ma’am,” Cowboy Bob replies, and opens the screen door off the kitchen. The back deck is shaded by a tall, flowering tree. Its thin leaves are silver and it’s covered with white blooms.
In Times Like These Boxed Set Page 33