by Damien Boyes
A small white clock on the wall shows it’s just after three—then I realize I’ve never seen that clock before. We never had a clock like this. And the couch is in the wrong color—and in the wrong place.
Then it hits me—this isn’t our apartment. I check the door but the number’s the same, “1C.” I’m in the right place, what’s going on?
Just to be sure, I run up the stairs. The bedrooms are in the same spots, but other than that, all wrong. Mine looks like a little boy lives in it. There’s a Star Wars bedspread and He-Man toys all over the floor. I stand in the doorway, unable to accept what I’m seeing. This can’t be.
I dash across the hall and Mom and Dad’s bedroom is similarly changed. The curtains are pink instead of blue, the bed is under the window, and the wardrobe is gone.
We don’t live here anymore.
A key fumbles in the lock downstairs and then there’s the familiar creak of the front door opening. I spin and take the stairs two at a time, hoping that somehow it will be Mom coming through the front door, but instead it’s a woman with a little boy shuffling along behind her legs.
Her eyes grow wide. “Who the hell are you?” she says, and puts her arm in front of the boy, protecting him from the stranger in her house.
“I was looking for my parents …” I say, and then find I can’t speak.
How could we not live here? My keys still work, but everything else is different.
“This is our house,” she says, her voice tense. “Get out, now.”
“I’m sorry,” I say, and step slowly toward them. They must be as scared as I am. “I must have the wrong apartment.”
The woman doesn’t say anything as I brush past them and out the door, but I hear it slam and lock behind me. Back outside the world seems normal as ever. The hum of cars and the smell of the lake and the distant noise from downtown are all as I remember, so why are Mom and Dad gone?
I turn and stare at the apartment building, willing the world back to normalcy. Where has everyone gone? How am I supposed to find them?
The hospital. Dad will be there, I know it. Where else would he be in the middle of the day?
I start running, retracing the journey I made last night with Grackle. At least I think it was last night—I don’t even know what day it is. Now that the sun is shining again, I can hardly believe all that really happened. Downtown is back together. All the houses are intact. Even the oldest tree in the city is standing as I jog past, just as it has every day for hundreds of years. The terror of last night all feels so distant now, like it happened to someone else, years ago. Like a story I heard once, and not the single most terrifying night of my life.
There’s a newspaper box on the corner of Delaware and Allen and I check the date: June 28, 1983. Last I remember it was the 9th.
I’ve been gone almost three weeks. Three weeks!
Could the city have rebuilt already? Have Mom and Dad moved somewhere else?
I get to Main Street and the hospital is standing, the big blue H once again a beacon in the sky. No way they could have rebuilt the whole hospital.
My stomach clenches. None of this is right.
I streak through the Emergency Room doors and scan the waiting area for Dad. The plastic chairs are mostly empty—just a few people with minor complaints, a world apart from the way I saw it last. Dad isn’t out here, but Janice is behind the intake desk this afternoon. She knows me. She’ll be able to help find Dad.
I dash over to the window and put my mouth through the hole in the plastic. “Janice,” I say when she looks up at me. “Where’s my dad?”
Janice’s face flickers with annoyance but she smooths it over with her most patient face. “Who’s your dad, hon?” she asks, but slips her finger under the desk to where the panic alarm is.
“Julian Wong,” I say, frustrated. “Janice, it’s me—Jasmin.”
I step back so she can get a better look at me, maybe she doesn’t recognize me because my face is pressed against the glass, but then all at once I know that’s not it. She doesn’t know me at all.
“I’m sorry, I don’t think we have a Julian Wong here,” she says, but she’s got both her hands above the desk, so I guess she isn’t about to call security on me anymore. “Maybe I should call you a doctor.”
“I don’t need a doctor,” I say, my voice raising until it’s almost a shout. “I need my dad!”
Her voice grows stern. “Don’t raise your voice with me, Miss,” she says. “Do you need help or not?”
“Yes,” I say, and the word comes out a squeak.
I don’t know what’s going on. Everything’s the same and different at the same time. Maybe I do need help. Maybe I’m losing my mind—
I take a step back and nearly fall and Janice jumps out of her seat and calls to someone behind her.
An orderly I don’t know emerges from inside the ER and helps me into one of the chairs. I sit and breathe, trying to force my brain to make sense of what’s happening. Why is my apartment not mine? Why does Janice not recognize me?
A woman with short dark hair and horn-rimmed glasses emerges a moment later, and as she comes up to me and kneels in front of me I finally remember her name.
“Dr. Mulroney,” I say, barely able to contain tears of frustration. “Can you please help me find my Dad?”
Dr. Mulroney glances over at Janice, who just shrugs. “Who’s your dad?” she asks.
I take a deep breath, trying to calm myself. “Julian Wong,” I say. “He’s a nurse here. I went home and he wasn’t there but he should be working now. If I can just talk to him—”
The doctor’s face scrunches up. “Julian Wong?” she asks. “Do you mean Doctor Julian Wong?”
I shake my head. “No, he’s a nurse. I’m sure he’s right inside there,” I say, pointing to the ER doors. “If you’d just let me in I know I can find him.”
“There’s no Julian Wong here that I know of,” Dr. Mulroney says, and looks again at Janice, who shrugs again. How can they not know him? And if he isn’t here, how am I ever going to find him? “Can you wait here a moment? I might have something that can help.”
I nod. It’s not like I have anywhere else to go.
“Be right back,” she says and pats my knee and leaves me to stare at the floor.
I don’t know what I’m going to do, don’t even have anywhere to go. Some kid is sleeping in my bedroom and I think I have like fifteen dollars in my pocket.
The doctor comes back a moment later with a magazine in her hand. She’s got it folded over and kneels back down and when she shows it to me I almost leap out of my chair.
It’s Dad. There’s a picture of him. His hair is a little thinner, but it’s him. “That’s my dad!” I say, though I’m not sure how it could be.
“Dr. Julian Wong,” she says. “He’s the head of Emergency Medicine at New York Presbyterian at Columbia. You say he’s your father?” She looks skeptical.
Columbia University? Dad used to talk about his dream of teaching at Columbia, used to take me there and walk the campus—but how did he end up as head of Emergency Medicine?
I notice Dr. Mulroney waiting for my answer and nod, but I don’t think she believes me.
“Why don’t you come inside and we’ll check you out. Are you sure you didn’t hit your head?”
I wish. That would make way more sense.
“I’m okay,” I say, and she leans back as I get up. I need to get out of here before they decide there’s something wrong with me. “I was just … confused. He, ah, used to work here and—I forgot.”
It sounds just as lame to me as it must to her, but I don’t know what else to say.
“Are you sure?” she asks, standing now but not following me as I back toward the exit.
“Absolutely,” I answer, putting on my best good girl voice. “Sorry for bothering you.”
I stumble back outside into the sunshine and the doors close behind me and no one chases after me to toss me in a straitjacket or anyth
ing. Except now I need to figure out how I’m going to get to New York City with fifteen dollars in my pocket.
19
Destination Unknown
I head in the general direction of the bus station, trying to work out how I’m going to pay for the ticket to New York when I get there. I had a hundred and fifty dollars in my desk drawer I could have used, if my desk was still in my room anymore. Maybe I can hitchhike, but the thought of sharing a car with a sketchy stranger for six hours …
And then I remember what Antheia said: the entirety of time and space is mine.
When I was in the Aperion, I just thought about home and there I was, standing on the street in front of my apartment. Maybe I can do that to find Dad too. I’ve been to Columbia enough with Dad over the years, I can picture it pretty clearly in my mind. As crazy as the past day has been, it’s at least worth a try.
I duck into an alley so I don’t disappear in full view, close my eyes, and try to imagine being at Columbia University, but nothing happens. When I open my eyes I’m still in the alley.
How am I supposed to do this? What if I can’t?
I try again, squeezing my eyes together and concentrating on remembering Columbia’s massive medical complex, the maze of big yellowed buildings and the traffic on Broadway, but nothing changes.
I swear under my breath, ready to give up. Antheia said I’m now boundless, whatever that means, but what good are superpowers if I don’t know how they work?
One more try. I take a deep breath in and out and close my eyes and instead of trying to hold the whole of Columbia Medical Center in my head, I picture the statue in the park across the street—the one with the soldier carrying his wounded friend.
My thoughts plummet, like someone’s pulled the plug out of my mind. I get light-headed, and I think maybe for an instant I pass out, but then I’m surrounded by traffic noise and my clothes are getting soaked.
It’s raining and the temperature has dropped ten degrees. I open my eyes to make sure I didn’t drop in the middle of the street and see the big statue in front of me, and even though I’m wet and cold I yelp with joy.
I did it! Somehow I traveled from Buffalo to New York City in an instant.
I check to make sure all my body parts came with me, and satisfied I didn’t leave anything behind, rush into the hospital. Now to figure out how a random girl off the street is supposed to get in to see the head of Emergency Medicine. I don’t suppose I’ll be able to walk right into his office and say “Hi.”
Even before that though, there’s an odd thought gnawing away in the back of my head—what if I do find him and he doesn’t recognize me?
Someone else is living in our apartment, Dad doesn’t work where he’s supposed to, and Mom’s nowhere to be found—what if I’m not his daughter anymore either? My lower lip begins to quiver, and I bite down on it. I can’t think like that. He’ll know me.
He has to.
There’s a stack of New York Posts at the newsstand just inside the doors, and the date reads June 30. Two more days?
I jumped from Buffalo to New York City instantly, but it took two days to get here?
I don’t know how any of this works, but at least I’m here.
Inside I walk the halls until I find a directory on the wall, and sure enough, there’s a Dr. Julian Wong listed. His office is in the admin section on the second floor, and I find a stairwell and run up the flight of stairs and breeze through the hallways until I find his office.
His name is on the open office door, but a woman, who I guess is his secretary, is sitting behind the desk inside reading a textbook. Her face is pinched behind large glasses and she’s dressed like a librarian, but she can only be a few years older than me. She narrows her eyes when she sees me peeking in the door.
“Can I help you?” she asks as I step in. There’s another door just behind her, cracked slightly. I can hear papers rustling inside.
Dad.
My heart’s hammering in my chest. All I want to do is rush past the secretary and burst through the door and throw my arms around him, but instead I say, “I’d like to see my da—I mean, Dr. Wong.”
“You’re a student?” she asks and sets her lips in a disapproving slant.
Do I tell her the truth, that I’m Dr. Wong’s daughter come to find him, or make something up? She’s watching me, the thin line of her mouth bending to a frown. I have to say something.
“I, ah—yeah, I’m a student and I have a question about the … assignment. The homework.”
Do they even call it homework in university? I have no idea.
“The homework?” Her right eyebrow is halfway to her bangs.
“Yes,” I say. “The homework—the assigned work. For Dr. Wong’s class. That I am in.”
She looks me up and down, lowers her textbook, and glowers at me through the top of her glasses. “It’s summer break,” she says. “Classes ended last month.”
Panic tumbles in my gut. I’m so close.
“I know, that’s why this is such an emergency—I’m so far behind.” I know I’m not making any sense. My voice is on the edge of hysterical, but I don’t care. “If I could just talk to him. It’ll only take a moment.”
She glances over her shoulder at the door behind her, the door keeping me from my dad, and then back to me. “Dr. Wong is a busy man. He has an entire department to run, he can’t stop what he’s doing just because a student has an ‘emergency.’ If you’d like to see him you can make an appointment like everyone else. Come back this afternoon.” She trails her finger down the appointment book in front of her. “He has an opening at three.”
“No!” I say, louder than I intended. After everything that’s happened—I’m not leaving here without seeing Dad … but flying off the handle won’t help. I need to suck it up, and get myself under control. I take a breath, reset my smile, and try again. “Sorry, but this really can’t wait. Just two minutes, please.”
The secretary stands, blocking me from the door. The message is clear: if I want to go in, I’ll have to go through her. “If you don’t leave, I’ll have to call security. Is that what you want?”
I don’t. But I’m not walking away either. I feel something growing inside me. My fingers tingle with a rush of power, and all at once I know, if I wanted to, I could toss this girl aside and kick the door down, but I’m not about to hurt some innocent person just doing her job, no matter how unreasonable she is. There’s another way, though.
I manage to just get a peek inside Dad’s office, just enough so that I can make a mental picture of it. Part of it anyway. That’ll have to do.
“Ok, then,” I say, backing down, acting contrite. “I’ll come back this afternoon.”
The secretary puts her hands on her hips but doesn’t move, waiting until she’s sure I’m leaving the office before she returns to her seat.
I take a few steps down the hall and duck into the stairwell, check to make sure the coast is clear, then close my eyes and imagine myself in Dad’s office. When I open them again, I’m there.
Dad’s sitting at a big wooden desk, his head buried in a stack of papers. He looks older, with gray in his hair he didn’t have yesterday, but also somehow more distinguished. It suits him.
I watch him work for a moment. There’s a picture of Grandma and Grandpa Wong on the wall behind him, standing on either side of him at what looks like his graduation. I only ever met them once. There are other pictures of him with young women and framed certificates of appreciation, but no evidence of a wife or kids. He isn’t wearing a wedding ring.
He must hear me breathing because he snaps his head up and sees me staring at him. I get ready for his face to spread in a wide smile, for him to race around the desk and take me in his arms. I imagine his clean and spicy scent and the warmth of his embrace—but none of that happens. Instead he blinks in alarm, shoots his eyes to the door to the waiting room, and furrows his brow in concern.
There’s no happiness. No recognition what
soever.
My dad doesn’t know me.
“Can I help you?” he asks, in a curt voice that’s used to giving orders, far from the gentle tone of the man I remember. Maybe he can see I’m trying not to cry because he calls out, “Shelley!”
The secretary pokes her head in and her eyes grow wide as she sees me standing there about to bawl. She looks back and forth between the office and the waiting room as if expecting to see twins or something.
“How did you get in here?” she asks, but before I can answer she’s got me by the arm, trying to drag me out. “I’m sorry, Dr. Wong. This woman came in yesterday and said she was a student and wanted to see you, but I told her to come back at three and she never returned. I don’t know how she got by me, I’ve been right outside all morning.” She gives me a dirty look. “Did you crawl past the desk? What could be so important that you’d—”
Dad holds up a hand. “It’s okay, Shelley. I don’t think she means any harm.” He gives me a patient look, and there’s the dad I remember and I can’t stop the tears. “Do you?”
I shake my head. I don’t, I just want to see him.
“There we go then,” he says, picking up a box of tissues from his desk and handing it to me.
“Thank you,” I say and wipe my eyes. I’m ashamed to be crying, especially in front of Shelley, but even with all the practice I’ve had restraining my tears in my life, the past day has been too much for me.
Dad smiles at me. “No harm done,” he says. “Thank you, Shelley, that’ll be all for now.”
She scrunches up a scowl at me before turning and beaming at Dad. “Of course, Dr. Wong,” she says. “Can I get you anything? A tea?”
“Oh no,” Dad says, and points to the mug on his desk. “Still got this one. Would you like a tea?” he asks me and I just shake my head.
Shelley gives me another dirty look as she leaves the office and keeps the door open behind her.
“Forgive her,” Dad says as he retreats back behind his desk and sits. “She can be overzealous in her protection of my time, but she means well. How did you get by her?”