I nodded.
My mom stood beside my chair with her hand on my shoulder. I could still smell her lilac perfume—the scent I most linked with things being right with the world. I was confused. But I was okay. Lex was there. And my mom was there too. I took a big breath and looked around.
The crowd stared at me expectantly, as if they were waiting for me to break out into a speech. It was kinda bizarre.
“Who are all these people?” I whispered. “And why are they all looking at me?”
“They’re…we’re from the Guild,” Charlie said, smiling. “And they’re looking at you because you did something amazing. You changed Guild history.”
He motioned to an older woman with long, black hair, streaked with white and skin the color of Hosa’s. She was tall, and willowy, and had high cheekbones. She smiled at me and held out her hand.
“This is my wife, Rachael,” Charlie said, beaming at her.
“Hello, Autumn. I’m honored to meet you.” Her voice was husky and her handshake firm. As she leaned forward, her necklace swung out, gleaming in the sun from the picture window. There were beads of lapis, jade, and silver, and there was a silver dove in the middle.
“That necklace,” I said, pointing. “I recognize those beads—”
“Ooooo, me too!” squealed Lex, jumping up and peering in to see it closer. “My beads! A.J., those are my beads, the ones you gave the Indian!”
“Hosa?” I asked in wonder. “How…”
“My many-greats grandfather,” she said proudly. “This necklace has been in my family for almost two hundred years, passed down from generation to generation, along with the story of the great Aaajaay.”
“No shit!” I said. “Whoops, sorry, Sam! I have a story? Look at this one.” I lifted Hosa’s necklace over my head. “Hosa gave this to me…like…a few days ago. It was his.” I held it out to her.
“Oh, Charlie,” she said, getting tears in her eyes. She took it from my hand and held it against her chest. “Hosa planted your oak tree, you know.”
“My tree-house tree?”
“That very one. The first time he saw you appear; you dropped a handful of acorns. His family was on a hunting trip. That summer, they camped in the valley that is now Boulder. The boy thought the acorns were magic and he planted them. Your tree was the only one that took root. After your second visit, Hosa visited that tree every year until he died, hoping you’d appear again.”
“Hosa saved our lives,” I said.
“I know the story,” she said, smiling. “He was a great man. In his honor, someone from the family visited the tree every decade until finally the town grew up around it. That’s how I met your grandfather. I wanted to see the tree that Hosa planted.”
Charlie smiled and put his arm around her. He looked down at me. “We have a lot to discuss, young lady. But first, someone’s really anxious to talk to you.” He nodded at Lex. “Do you—”
“I’m so on it,” Lex said, grabbing my hand.
She grinned at my grandfather and pulled me through the crowded living room and then the yellow kitchen. People scattered to let us pass. We walked through the kitchen slider. The sun hit my eyes and I shaded them with my hand. At that point, I was just going with the flow. Sam was good. My mom was back. Charlie was alive and—”
I felt him before I saw him.
I felt him strong, and firm, and all encompassing. His power wrapped around me in a welcoming embrace. I turned to the left, hardly daring to hope.
He was leaning against my oak, his beautiful, blue eyes staring straight into mine. A.J., he whispered…inside my head. It was the most beautiful sound I’d ever heard. He smiled and ran his hand through his hair. That was some first kiss!
My knees got weak and wobbly and I could hardly breathe. You remember! I whispered back.
And I didn’t hide my eyes. I didn’t look down. I didn’t stay silent or just stand there, waiting for someone else to make the move. I didn’t even hesitate. I ran full bore and jumped into his waiting arms. The rest of the world disappeared.
But Constantine didn’t.
Slowly, over the next few days, I began the task of acclimating to all the changes. Sam told us the story of what went down when Lex and I launched into the vortex. When Sam walked in, and Constantine grabbed my shoulder…well, everything went wild.
Constantine got knocked almost sixty years into the past, straight to Charlie at the oak tree. I’d been concentrating so hard on Charlie and the tree when I connected to the matrix, that I just flung him there. Apparently, my power is pretty strong. Go figure.
Constantine spent almost a week there, filling Charlie in on everything. Charlie is like Ipod, perpetually curious. He grilled Constantine nonstop. Con taught him to handle his power, to shade, to use reflexive gravity, to find the Guild—he taught him everything he knew.
Charlie’s had over sixty years since then to innovate. He completely remade the Guild. Charlie’s timeline changed the moment Constantine told him he wasn’t crazy. So it was all in motion before we even rang the doorbell at the house in Seattle. I’m still trying to get a handle on it.
When Sam walked in and tried to grab me, he hit the tree instead because I was already gone. But he was linked with the jump so he kept the memories of both timelines. It turns out that there were things going on in my family that I knew nothing about. Both my parents felt the energy—the static and the creepy-crawlies—just not as intensely as me. They thought it was nerves or something. That’s why Sam drank so much, trying to calm it down.
Charlie said my Shadow energy was the only thing keeping Sam from going off the deep end all those years. That’s why he’d be in such bad shape whenever I was away. We don’t know why Guild technology didn’t pick up on Sam when he was born—his whole adoption is a mystery. Maybe we’ll find out someday. We have time.
As for my mom, she’s a Shadow like me. She just didn’t spontaneously jump. I guess that’s one reason she was so fond of her grandpa Charlie. She didn’t understand it, but she felt better when she was around him. He balanced out her vibrations. The same for when she met my dad. When they were together, everything was better. It sure explains their love for trees.
That girl in the photo? I have a sister—yeah, Summer Aspen Jones. What didn’t change was my mom’s tendency to pick weird names. Summer’s sweet. Apparently, she and the other me got along okay; but I can’t remember yet. As I said, I’m still integrating. But I think I’m going to like having a sister…besides Lex, of course.
The other A.J., Lex, and Ipod knew for years that the big day was coming. Charlie had them prepared to merge with the broken us when the time came. They’d merged before, so they weren’t afraid or anything. But still, I thought it was pretty brave of them to take on our baggage. They just stood there waiting for the appropriate moment, and poof, they integrated into us.
I mean, once everything balances out, they’ll /we’ll still be them/us, just with some additional memories. I don’t know what it will be like yet to have the other A.J.’s memories, but I’m ready to find out.
Lex and Ipod seem to be integrating faster than I am. That worries me a little. But Charlie says it will all sort out, and I’ll be even more powerful, once the other A.J.’s memories surface. It sounds strange, but Lex and Ipod think it’s really cool having both sets of memories. Ipod says it rocks because the other him learned all kinds of stuff he didn’t have a chance to. Now that walking-Wikipedia brain of his is filled with even more data.
Ipod lives right next door with Charlie and Rachael. They adopted him. That kinda makes him my grandfather. We get a kick out of that. Constantine told Charlie how Lex and I found Ipod and made sure that he knew the time and place. So this time, Charlie found Ipod in the ditch. And the Hammer never beat him up again.
That’s a story, boy. The Hammer, he’s in a cage. Ipod’s mom? Well, she didn’t run back to Japan, deserting Ipod, after all. That was just a Hammer cover-up. The Hammer whacked her and buried her in the back yard. He
got a little carried away one night when the hedge funds were crashing.
It was a tragedy, but leave it to Ipod to be logical about it. He was so young when he lost his mom, he barely remembers her. Ironically, it makes him feel better that she didn’t just abandon him. He’s merging two timelines and loving the part of him that spent the last eight years with stepparents who care about him. Plus, the Hammer will never lay hands on him again.
Ipod handles a lot of the tech stuff up at headquarters. He’s totally in geek heaven, having access to technology from another planet. Him and Charlie, boy, are they a pair. I couldn’t have imagined a better father for Ipod.
Lex, well, she’s still got my back. She lives with us like before. This time, those twin beds are ours. We still hang out in the tree house, but it’s nice being closer to the bathroom. Lex still thinks she’s boss but that’s okay. I guess she was boss in both timelines.
We’re in training—you know—to protect the time line. Yeah, think about it. It’s so freakin cool! With Charlie at the helm, the Guild is totally different than the one Constantine knew. Once we’ve finished training, we’ll go on missions to rewrite the timeline. I try to imagine myself doing that, but I can’t quite get there yet. Still, I know how to hide and wear a disguise. It’s a start.
Constantine told me about melding. I didn’t care. Maybe sharing his experiences made me feel connected, but that wasn’t why I loved him. Anyway, it didn’t matter. We had time now to figure out what was going on with the two of us. We were having a really fun time working on that.
Con’s integration was really confusing. We didn’t know it at the time, but the Guild Con had mentioned when we took him the message, was the Guild run by Charlie. Yeah, that timeline had already been changed before Lex and I made it to Seattle. And in the new timeline, Charlie had made sure that that Constantine and the other me never met so that nothing interfered with Lex and my trip.
Charlie did a lot of planning over the years to make sure everything worked out smoothly. But the important thing—at least to me—is that Con kept all the memories of us together: the hallway, in the past…everything.
After his visit with Charlie, Con returned to current time. Once he integrated with the Constantine I had kissed half a year earlier, he knew he had been wrong about Ipod and me. That Constantine had been going nuts all those months, waiting for the tenth of May. After that kiss, he wanted to track me down immediately. But this time he used forethought and waited so he didn’t chance screwing things up.
Since the timeline had been changed, Con no longer had a travel block. He showed up shortly before Lex and I arrived back at the tree house, using the branch Lex had left on his coffee table. He cleared things up with Ipod. He met my parents. He talked to Charlie again. It’s funny how Con could have arrived before Lex and I did. It’s complicated, this time travel stuff…really complicated. When I flung Constantine back, and he told Charlie why he disappeared at random, it changed everything.
Sure, Con did most of it. He rewrote the original timeline. He was the one who told Charlie how to find the Guild and rescue Ipod. But I sent him there. If I hadn’t done that, Charlie would never have found out he wasn’t crazy. Of course, Charlie built the tree house in the first place. So he started it all. Without that, we might not even be here.
Okay, maybe Sam would be here, but he’d be a mess. Well, maybe not because my mom wouldn’t have killed herself, if I hadn’t been born and then disappeared, making her think she was crazy. But then, if Charlie hadn’t disappeared, she wouldn’t have joined Greenpeace and met Sam. And who knows who Sam might have met. My God, he might have married the Chihuahua. Then maybe I’d be Lex…or no, a combination of Lex and me. I’d be Ajex.
It’s really freakin confusing.
When it comes right down to it, I saved my mother. I saved my father, too. Okay, I didn’t exactly swoop down with a cape and yank them from a burning building. I’m no super hero. But if I hadn’t been born, they wouldn’t be here.
Salvation by existence.
If it weren’t for my strangeness, none of this would have happened. It’s hysterical, really. Talk about irony. I’m like a freakin hero in Guild history. Yeah, me!
Bite that Sloane Cheney!
I guess I’m not jinxed. Suddenly, I have—you know—hope and even a bit of confidence. I mean, come on…I have Constantine!
How cool is that?
Constantine? What can I say about him? Oh. My. God. It would take volumes. But as Lex says, “tick tock.”
Places to go, people to see…
Timelines to rewrite.
THE END
AUTHOR’S NOTE
Dear Readers:
This note is for you…yes, YOU, the wonderful people who took the time to read my book. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. I loved writing Rewrite Redemption. And by the time you read this, I will be hard at work on the sequel.
This is my first book. Even though I’m coming from complete obscurity, I chose to self-publish because I believe that is the wave of the future. This book will rise or fall, depending completely on your opinion—you, the reader. If you liked the book and want to tell your friends about it, that helps me. And if you want to rate or review it on Goodreads or Amazon, you’re really doing me a solid. Thank you. Only time will tell how it all turns out.
I’d love to hear from you. Tell me what you liked and what you didn’t. Tell me the kinds of books you’d like to see in the future. I hope to have the next book out sometime in 2014. Until then, please keep in touch with my website: www.jhwalkerbooks.com. I will blog from time to time.
With much appreciation,
J.H. Walker
ACKNOWLEGMENTS
This book is dedicated, with endless love, to my husband and partner, Rod. Without you this book would not exist.
The young adult genre is brand new to me. I was a sci-fi/fantasy buff. I was never fond of elves, or dragons, or talking animals. Nor did I like intergalactic warfare. But take a book with a contemporary character and add a paranormal twist, give it an alternative sociological aspect, or set it in the future…that was my kind of reading. You had to search far and wide, but there were authors giving characters paranormal abilities and circumstances before some of today’s Y.A. authors were even born. And as for dystopia, if you haven’t read Octavia Butler’s Parable of the Talents, you’re missing out. Thanks to all of you, the writers of my early years. You opened up my mind as to what might be possible.
My endless thanks and appreciation to Rachael Harp, my brilliant and creative designer, for her stunning work on my website, the book cover, the chapter images, and everything I’ve used for J.H. Walker Books. My thanks to Steven Truex for building the website. You guys rock!
My sincere thanks to Kris Kendall, for her tireless effort in finding and correcting the many flaws in my manuscript. If any remain, it’s because I continued to revise and edit for four months after what was to have been her final proofread—my bad. Grammatical errors that remain are the result of my stubbornness in having my characters stay true to their voices and not grammar.
My thanks and love to my daughter for reading the manuscript and for all her suggestions and support. The same to my son for being the source of much of Constantine’s voice. It’s all good. I love you guys.
And last, but not least, there is one person without whom this book would never have been written…my husband and partner in all things. You kept my computer world running, which is no small feat. Although this is a young adult novel, you listened to me read it out loud—twice. Then you read it yourself several times. You turned it from a Word document to an eBook. This book is better because of you. This book exists because of you. Your support of the project and me was unwavering. You are my person, the love of my life. When Fate sent you to me, she, as my characters might say, did me a solid.
© 2013 by J.H. Walker, Inc
All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in any form, in whole or in part, witho
ut written permission from the author.
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictionally. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
COVER
A.J.'S RULES OF INVISIBILITY
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 39
CHAPTER 40
CHAPTER 41
CHAPTER 42
CHAPTER 43
CHAPTER 44
CHAPTER 45
CHAPTER 46
CHAPTER 47
CHAPTER 48
CHAPTER 49
CHAPTER 50
CHAPTER 51
CHAPTER 52
CHAPTER 53
CHAPTER 54
CHAPTER 55
CHAPTER 56
CHAPTER 57
Rewrite Redemption Page 38