by Keith Hughes
He might have to find someplace else to launch his journey. Ness headed for the exit, his shoulders slumped. A pressing need drove him to visit the men’s room before leaving, though. As soon as he entered, his disappointment disappeared. If he didn’t know the PDA remained untouched in his pocket, he might have assumed he had already traveled back in time. The sinks, along with the matching fixtures, dated back to the 1930s. The cubicle walls were newer but appeared to have been installed during the early years of Lyndon B. Johnson’s presidency. A peek inside showed the toilets matched the other plumbing in the room.
It’s perfect. Ness smiled.
After locking himself into one of the stalls, he performed the deed that had brought him to the room in the first place. Then he retrieved the PDA. Doing a little math in his head, Ness set the device for March 27, 1987. He would arrive midway through the spring semester of his junior year in college, which included his first physics course taught by Dr. Bertrand. The date had no special significance he could recall, but because it was a weekday, he should be able to catch the professor at his office. He set the arrival time to seven o’clock in the morning. The stall should be empty because the library would be closed.
Taking a second to steel himself for the journey, Ness centered himself in the open space in front of the toilet before pressing the launch button. He experienced the same sensations as before, but the pouring of himself from one time to another took infinitely longer. Finally, color returned to his world.
Ness wrinkled his nose. The odor was the first indication that the bathroom held other occupants. Even worse, the rustling of a newspaper from behind signified he shared the stall with someone else. Ness turned to see a man in a janitor’s uniform staring at him over a copy of The Detroit Free Press. Resisting the urge to study the front of the paper for the date, he turned to unlock and open the door.
“I am so sorry.” He stepped out quickly. “I assumed this stall was empty.”
When he shut the door again, he heard the stall’s occupant engage the latch then rattle it a bit to test the lock. Ness escaped before the janitor could ask about his presence there hours before the library opened. He made his way out the front doors without encountering anyone else.
From the sidewalk, Ness surveyed the street. The cars that passed ranged from models made in the 1960s and ’70s to what would be the newer ’80s vehicles. The sight reminded him of the annual Dream Cruise, a roving classic car show that crept up and down Woodward Avenue one weekend every summer. A quick examination of a nearby newspaper box confirmed he had traveled to 1987, and tension eased in his back and head. He existed beyond the grasp of Glenn and his Things.
Traffic was light so early in the morning, so he jaywalked to the other side of the street and waited in front of the Detroit Institute of Arts for the northbound bus. After only a few minutes, it arrived, and he grinned at the cheap fare compared to 2008. He sat near the door, as the ride along Woodward Avenue would be short. A map affixed to his first bus stop of the day confirmed he would need to ride only a few blocks north to the main bus station. In all honesty, he could have gone on foot, but he wanted to get there as soon as possible.
A short time later, Ness bought fare for a Greyhound heading to Kalamazoo, the home of his alma mater. Once again, he found himself appreciating the prices in this time compared to his future. Ness felt a surge of panic when he handed over one of the newer twenty-dollar bills from his wallet. The cashier puzzled over the large, offset image of Andrew Jackson, but Ness plucked the bill back and muttered something about Monopoly money. He dipped into Dr. Bertrand’s envelope and handed her one of the twenties. The cashier looked at it curiously for a brief second, but the familiar bill passed muster, and she counted out his change.
A bag of chips and a Sprite from a vending machine served as his second breakfast while he waited until boarding time. He watched from a slightly comfortable seat in the station as other travelers went about their business. The focus of his life for the last two days had disappeared, the deep-seated fear of being caught by the minions of Intellisys. The stress caused by his circumstance had the muscles in his back knotting with dread. Ness was only beginning to understand how much it had affected him. Safe from Glenn and his goons for the time being, he reveled in a sensation of freedom. There was no way they could find him now. He had lost himself in the past.
CHAPTER TWELVE: Yesterday
Friday, March 27, 1987 11:51 a.m.
Something along the road woke Ness from an unsettled sleep. Regardless of the culprit, be it a horn, conversation on the bus, or even a shift in the movement of the vehicle, his rest was interrupted. He sighed as he opened his eyes, squinting against the bright sun streaming through the almost-clean windows. He saw signs for businesses in Albion ahead, which meant they had about another hour to go. As he shook his head, Ness’s mind returned to the subject of his dreams. Proximity to the time and place had resurrected his memories of the momentous failures from his short-lived romantic experiences at Western Michigan University.
The memories started with Nancy, his first real girlfriend. They had met in one of his photography classes in his second semester of his freshman year. Their shared interest in art had grown into a relationship by midterms. For a time, they were almost always together. There had even been discussion of plans to get together over the summer. But about three weeks before the end of the term, she suddenly stopped all contact. She sat as far from him as possible and would not come to the phone when he called. Over the summer, he wrote her a few letters, none of which ever garnered a response. When some came back marked “Return to Sender,” he ceased writing. He tried once to contact her when he returned for his sophomore year, but he realized it was futile after she refused to speak with him. After his failure with Nancy, he mainly kept away from the opposite sex. No one else stood out to him as interesting or desirable—until his junior year.
He had always enjoyed running, but participating in the WMU track team had not occurred to him until a member stopped him during his morning run. After their discussion, he tried out and made the team. That gave him access to the WMU fieldhouse, an oversized building that hosted events ranging from sporting competitions to commencement ceremonies. But the indoor track turned out to be Ness’s primary interest.
He first saw Angie while running in the fieldhouse on a rainy spring day. She was playing tennis on one of the courts situated inside the track, and Ness could not keep his eyes off her. Only a little shorter than Ness, she wore her brown hair pulled back into a ponytail. Her tan headband matched her tank top and tennis shorts. Her toned legs and the muscles in her arms were evident as she swung her racket. Ness’s captivation had been so complete that when he tried later on, he could never recall who she played against.
A couple of weeks later, as he was entering a bar called Bag End with a few buddies, he nearly ran into her as she was leaving with her friends. Before stepping around him, she gave Ness a precious smile, which he cherished for days after. Later, he recruited his friends to find out her name, and one of them told him she was Angie McGuire. For the rest of the night, Ness had a hard time paying attention to the conversation as her name kept running through his mind.
She became his favorite part of running, and he ran on the inside track even on days when the weather was beautiful. Her erratic playing schedule left him uncertain if he’d see her, but he didn’t want to miss a single match. Silently watching as he pounded out miles on the track, he grew to love her smile. Once, she laughed at a particularly dicey shot going her way, and the crystalline purity of her amusement entranced him.
Even her bad moods enticed him. After losing a match she badly wanted to win, she threw her tennis racket and let out a screech of rage. As she stalked stiffly to the locker rooms with her bent racket in hand, Ness could not help smiling at the intensity of her emotions.
Close to the end of the semester, Ness knew he should do something about his infatuation. But before
he could gather his fortitude and risk rejection, Angie took matters into her own hands. On a snowy December day, Ness had the indoor track to himself because most of the other students were preparing for finals. The tennis courts were empty, so he ran, recalling the amused curve of her lips and the music of her laugh.
On his way back to the locker rooms, he saw someone sitting against the wall near the doors, where they could have been watching him run for the last half hour. As he got closer, the person stood and stepped into his path. A jolt of emotion shot through him as he recognized Angie, her hair out of the ponytail and hanging loosely about her face. She wore a soft-pink blouse that contrasted with the deep blue of her jeans.
She smiled at him, and his brain threw a rod. All his cerebral activity ground to a halt, and Ness wouldn’t have been surprised if smoke were pouring from his ears. He tried to return the expression, but he could tell by the way her smile dimmed that he had not succeeded. He came to a stop a few feet from her, thankful he at least still had gross motor control.
“Hi, I’m Angie. I play tennis here sometimes when you’re running. Your name is Ness, right?”
What little gray matter remained under his control lurched, and he realized she had gone to the trouble of finding out his name. He recognized the importance of the interaction, the instant when his infatuation could become something more. He tried to open his mouth and respond, but his brain was still producing nothing but error codes. Instead, he nodded, which was far from ideal, but it beat simply staring at her. His lack of verbal response appeared to confuse her slightly, causing her brows to wrinkle in bewilderment.
“I was hoping you’d like to get a cup of coffee. With me. After you’ve had a chance to shower, of course.” She gave a small laugh, which paled in comparison to what he had heard before.
Ness finally forced his brain to kick over, to engage in something approaching cognitive processing. The woman of his dreams had asked him out. How could he not respond? But even with his desire to accept, to spend some time with her, his malfunctioning brainwaves focused on the worst detail possible. “I don’t like coffee.”
A horror unlike anything he had ever experienced before enveloped him as soon as the words left his lips. He knew he needed to say something else—anything else—as her smile faded like dew on a hot day. But his tongue joined his brain’s work strike. Ness did the only thing he could—walk past her and into the men’s locker room. Shame filled his heart, and he knew he had blown an important opportunity.
He showered in cold water as a self-inflicted punishment. When he could stand no more, he dressed and left the locker room, clinging to the fantasy that she would still be waiting for him to emerge. However, he had seen the bloom of anger on her face as he passed her, and in the depths of his soul, he knew she would be gone.
The rest of the semester passed in a haze of self-recrimination, and Ness took his finals on autopilot. It continued into his Christmas break, but time away from campus helped him get back on equilibrium. When he returned after the new year, he resolved to find Angie and apologize. He could not leave things as they were.
For the rest of that winter and spring, he could hear the jeering laughter of fate when he went in search of her. About three days into the spring semester, he learned she had graduated at the end of the year. Angie would not be back, and he could find no one who would provide contact information. Almost sick with frustration, Ness eventually acknowledged he had blown his only shot.
His anger and inwardly focused blame prevented him from developing any other deep relationships for the remainder of his college days and even as he established himself in his career. Once out of college, he risked a few ill-advised attempts that predictably ended in disaster. Eventually, he abandoned the idea entirely, embracing the life of a confirmed bachelor with a sense of resigned finality.
The grinding of shifting gears drew Ness from his distressing ruminations. The bus was leaving the interstate and would be at the station in a few minutes. He watched the eastern edge of the city flow by. The unfamiliar area was empty of nostalgia. Still, it took an effort to not imagine seeing Angie everywhere he looked.
When the bus finally pulled into the station and opened its doors with a hiss, Ness filed out with the rest of the passengers. The air nipped at him, and he zipped the hoodie. Turning west, Ness could not help imbuing the two-mile walk to the campus with a sense of self-flagellation. He knew it would seem much longer than it should, his steps hindered by the weight of unfortunate memories.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN: Warning from the Past
Friday, March 27, 1987 2:07 p.m.
If I didn’t know better, this could be any time in the last thirty years. Granted, no one had cell phones and Ness could tell styles of clothing and automobiles were different, but people were going about their business as they did in his home time. That reality remained truer on the college campus than anywhere else. Students partook of the same activities they had during visits he’d made years after his graduation. It gave him a sense of unreality, as though he straddled the line separating his present and his past.
The WMU physics building loomed before him. The early spring sunlight illuminated the facade without doing much to enhance its overall appearance. Its style was common to the college, an architectural sameness shared among most of the buildings that hailed from the 1960s. It projected a sense of stolid academic prowess, a reminder that the university was as effective as it always had been.
Ness stopped outside the building, catching his breath after the climb. Most of the campus sat atop a formidable rise, which he didn’t recall having as much trouble with as a student. Already warmed by the walk, he had tied his hoodie around his waist before the hill’s halfway point. As he stood puffing at the top, students passed him, no doubt dismissing him as an old man.
“You hoser!” a young man shouted at him as he approached and gave Ness a big grin. “Nice shirt, man.”
After smiling his thanks, Ness looked at his garment. He kept forgetting it had stuff printed on it. He thought of it more as camouflage than clothing, but he examined his chest to determine what would have elicited such a reaction. The text “Take off, eh?” did sound vaguely familiar.
Once Ness regained his equilibrium, he passed through the glassed door heavy with memories, as if he strode in the footsteps of his past selves who had visited the professor before. The overactive air conditioning pulled him from his musings and nudged him to put the hoodie on again. He zipped it high enough to cover the lettering on his shirt. The location of the doctor’s office on the second floor made the stairs the easiest option. In the hallway, he could hear the disjointed sounds of people talking in the various faculty offices he passed.
As he approached Dr. Bertrand’s door, it suddenly burst open. An angry student stalked toward him, a few pages crushed in a clenched hand. Ness recognized his younger self, and suddenly, he knew exactly what day he had arrived. Of all the days to visit! Is this a joke played by my subconscious?
He looked back to see his younger copy stomp away and jerk open the stairwell door. Ness could not help but be amused at the anger of his younger self.
“Be seeing you.” The slapping sound of his other self’s footsteps faded quickly, and Ness relived the moment in a sudden memory. He descended two steps at a time in a barely controlled fall. After nearly bowling over a female student crossing the lobby, he had almost broken a glass door in his rush to get outside. Once he escaped the physics building, Ness ran out his frustration, taking no notice of his route, rage fueling his steps. When he finally lay exhausted on someone’s front lawn, chest heaving, he had no idea where his feet had taken him. It had taken him almost half an hour to walk back to the apartment.
Shaking aside those tendrils of memory, Ness turned back to the closed door with a black-and-white sign reading Dr. F. Bertrand. Ness steeled himself, as his mentor would be much younger than the older version Ness had grown familiar with. Even so, Ness found t
hat when he entered the office, his mental preparation had been insufficient. For a second, he froze, stunned by Dr. Bertrand’s vitality. Bertrand regarded him with a cocked eyebrow as Ness stepped fully into the room, allowing the door to close behind him.
“Can I help you?” Dr. Bertrand’s soft drawl, the result of spending his childhood in Louisiana, remained the same, but the tenor itself sounded so much firmer than Ness’s recent memories.
“Yes, I hope so. My name is Nestor Relevont.” He suppressed a grimace at the utterance of his full name. Since the doctor repeatedly eschewed using his chosen nickname, Ness had no choice but to use the full version.
The professor’s forehead wrinkled as he glanced toward the door, obviously thinking of the younger version who had stormed out of the office mere seconds before. The doctor studied Ness’s face carefully for several seconds before recognition caused his eyes to widen. He sat back in his chair, which creaked loudly.
“Astounding.” Dr. Bertrand’s eyes roamed over Ness’s clothing and face. “When are you from?”
Ness had been dreading that question. During the many conversations they’d had over the years, limiting the amount of information about the future when interacting with people of the past had been a recurring topic. A discussion of the mechanics of time travel had also been labeled as taboo. Dr. Bertrand had been adamant there should be as little intellectual residue left behind as possible.
“I, uh, I probably shouldn’t say.”
A wry laugh erupted from Dr. Bertrand, and he gave him a knowing look. “I see you and I will spend a little time together.”