“Sounds great,” Dexter said.
They left the office and had an enjoyable dinner at an upper west side seafood restaurant that Dexter chose.
The future paid.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
October 5, 2015
Erica stood in front of her class and scrolled down on her tablet. The projection on the front monitor followed her movements as the class watched, each of her students ready to echo her notes onto the devices in front of them.
Today’s was not going to be the same kind of lecture as usual, though. She’d been thinking about it on the way to Stanford from her home in San Francisco, and while they were in the middle of a key piece of the curriculum, she wanted to challenge their minds in a different way. Of course, the impetus for the lesson was the way in which her own mind had been challenged, but there was no need to relay that to them.
She hibernated her tablet and the monitor to her left went blank. “Okay,” she said, “I’d like you all to close your tablets and laptops. We’re going to do a different kind of exercise today.” She watched as they followed her instructions, noticing some of her more cerebral students struggling with the concept of temporarily banning their technology. “We’re going to talk about time travel, and I’m going to turn this into a project for you. But don’t worry. It’s one that I want you to have some fun with.”
She stepped out in front of the desk and sat on the end of it. It was a comfortable pose for her to teach from, which made her wonder why she rarely did it. “I want each of you to pick an era in American history that – if you were able to time travel – you would choose to visit. Now that’s an easy question that you probably play with your family while you’re on a road trip. But I want you to take it to the next level. It’s not about what you would be able to see there. Or experience there. I want you to think about what you would want to learn from the people that lived there. Yes, take away all of the pitfalls of time travel – about interacting and causing changes, going back to give your grandfather the plans for the internet. We’ll just assume that all of you are of pristine enough character to behave.”
A few chuckles went across the room as the door to her right opened, interrupting them. Simultaneously, the students all turned their heads to address the interloper, and Erica followed suit.
Standing in the doorway was Jeff Jacobs.
She was caught completely off-guard, which was probably what he’d wanted, and she knew that the smile on her face would be giving away exactly how happy she was to see him and how touched she was that he’d actually taken the trip to see her. Her heart was pounding in a way that usually only came in the moments before presenting to a group of prestigious academics – or, of course, before ambushing a British Colonel to rescue a captured friend.
But Jeff simply smiled, gave a quick wave, and slid quietly into a seat near the back of the class. He leaned forward on his elbows onto the table in front of him.
Erica realized she’d not only interrupted the class, but she’d interrupted her own thoughts, as well. “Class, we’ve been joined by a good friend of mine, Dr. Jeff Jacobs, who is an astrophysicist from New York. New Jersey,” she corrected herself. She turned to Jeff. “Dr. Jacobs, we were just delving into a new assignment, where I’ve asked the students to choose an era in history that would be the most interesting for them to time travel to. Off the top of your head, any ideas?”
Jeff smiled at her and looked around the class. “Well, I don’t have the background in history that the folks in this room do,” he said, “but if I was handed a time machine with an open-ended invitation, I’d like to see the Egyptians building the pyramids.”
“Oh, I’m sorry,” she said. “American history. We’re sticking to American history for this project, everyone. This is an American history class.”
“Oh, geez. Well then, I’ve always had a thing for the California Gold Rush. What those people went through in order to build this part of the country... Crossing some of the most treacherous landscape on the continent with no certainty that they’d find success at the end... That’d be something to experience.”
“Well, you know I like that answer,” Erica said, smiling. People in-the-know laughed. “Okay, here’s what I want you to do for two weeks from now: I want you to pick an era and a place – even better if you can pick an event in that era and make it more specific, but I understand that you may want to keep it broader. I want you to build a survey of the types of questions you would ask if you had the opportunity to sit down with the people living at that time and place. Think about the other history that’s going on at the same time – think about what we’ve already talked about in this class. Put yourself in the shoes of those people. If you go, as Dr. Jacobs suggested, to the California Gold Rush, think about the fact that, in ten years, the Civil War will begin for those living at that time. What’s happening that can foreshadow that? What’s just happened and how is it affecting the time you chose? Demonstrate your knowledge of the time period, and your understanding of how events and instances and people’s decisions in history are all linked.”
One of her favorite students, a Chinese woman named Li Huang, raised her hand. As much as Erica liked her, she was one of the clearly confused ones when the tablets had been ordered closed. “Are you talking about a paper?”
Erica shook her head. “Not necessarily, though it can be if you’d like. I want you to use your creativity. Write the script of your dinner with a family from that time period.” She was thinking off the top of her head, but the last thing she wanted people to do was get stuck within the confines of another paper. “Draw a comic book. Interview someone in period garb on camera. Just connect the dots for me in whatever way you think is the best to present your interpretations. Have some fun with it.”
A hand went up in the back of the room. She acknowledged Kyle McAfee, one of the middle-of-the-road students who did well when he was paying attention, but was usually focused on other things besides history. “Dr. Danforth, where would you go?”
She smiled again. “I’d probably go with Dr. Jacobs.” She looked over at him and thought he might’ve been blushing. “To the Gold Rush!” she added when she heard giggles. “Behave. He took my answer.”
The class laughed and she bid them a good weekend. The room emptied out quickly, though she did notice one of the students, Charlie Roberts, who usually kept very much to himself, stop to talk with Jeff on his way out. When everyone was gone, she stood and started to approach Jeff, but was interrupted when the door opened again.
She turned to see Dr. William Shepherd, Dean of the History Department, walk into the room. He glanced at Jeff still sitting at his desk, then turned back to her without addressing him. “Erica, do you have a moment?” he asked. The tone and the crackle in his voice was one of excitement he couldn’t contain.
“Sure,” she said, nodding. “What’s up?”
“We just received a five hundred thousand dollar donation to the School of Historical Sciences from an anonymous donor, who in the accompanying letter said that you were the reason for the decision to contribute. A cashier’s check. Could you shine some light on this for me?”
She tried to keep her face expressionless as best as she possibly could – she had no clue if she was successful. She shook her head. “I don’t know. Maybe I gave a speech somewhere, or they saw my show...”
“I don’t know,” he said, “but well done. Very well done. I’ve got to go talk to the accounting department.” He walked away, but stopped in the doorway and turned back to her. “Lunch tomorrow at the Club. Lunch is on me.”
She started to say something, but the door swung closed. So, she turned to Jeff, who had now stood and was slowly walking to the front of the room.
“Dammit,” he said. “I was going to ask you to lunch tomorrow. He beat me to the punch.”
“Where’d you get half-a-million dollars?” she asked.
“How do you know it was me? You’re a very charming person.”
“Cash?”
He was smiling. “Cashier’s check, was what he said. I figured we could spare some to ensure that history is studied the way it should be studied – at academic institutions using written documents and word-of-mouth accounts.”
“That’s very noble of you,” she said. “Something I’ve been wanting to ask you that I’d forgotten about... I know that you, personally, didn’t go with me to 1831.”
“Right, that was another me.”
“Okay,” she said, sorting things out in her head. “But was it you that stopped us from going into the records office? In 1831?”
“It was, yes,” he said, leaning against the table in the first row of seats.
“I thought of that on the flight home. I was trying to figure out which version of you might’ve done that, and realized it was probably the most recent version. Then I tried to figure out why you did it.”
“Does it matter?”
She thought for a moment, then shook her head. “No, I guess not right now. But someday I’d like you to tell me. But when did you go back? It had to be after we returned from saving Dexter and before we destroyed all of the time devices. Unless... You didn’t have another device somewhere, did you?”
He smiled. “How about we talk about this over dinner?” He was trying to be romantic.
“No,” she said, not getting sucked in. “You had another device.” Even as she was saying it, her spirits were sinking. If he wasn’t done with time travel, there was no room for him in her life.
He shook his head and held up his hands to calm her. “I’m going to be honest with you. I used the device one more time, with Agent Fisher’s permission. I felt terrible doing it, but I used it to fix one bad situation that had been caused by previous time travel stupidity on my part, and now the device has been destroyed. There are no others.”
“With Fisher’s permission?”
“Yes. He understood the need when I explained it to him, and actually came with me to chaperone.”
“You guys are buddies now?”
Jeff laughed. “I don’t know how to answer that.”
“And now it’s gone? There are no more devices? You’re done?”
“It’s over,” he said, reaching out and grabbing her arms. His touch was firm, but somehow gentle. Masculine and caring. “Can I take you to dinner? Please?” he asked.
Was his answer good enough for her? She took a deep breath. It was for now, at least. She nodded her head.
He smiled and exhaled and let go of her. “Good. I’ve been looking forward to this.”
She started to pack up her things. “You know,” she said, “I’ve already had a very nice dinner with you in Times Square in the future. Sitting across the table from you won’t be a new experience for me.”
“Are you trying to make me jealous of myself?”
She smiled. “Is it working?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact,” he said, nodding and laughing. “I guess it’s up to me to show you that I’m the better man, then.”
“Well, let’s see what you’ve got. One rule, though...”
“There’s a rule?”
“I don’t want to talk about time travel on our second first date together.”
“So it’s a date?”
She smiled at him and walked out of the classroom.
Jeff followed her again.
CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT
April 17, 1981
Vinny Manelo was just happy to be back to work, so he wasn’t about to let the drizzle bother him. He’d been laid off from his construction job for over three years, taking menial handyman work wherever he could find it to feed his wife, Angela, and their five-year-old Anthony. It had been a terribly tough time and he was glad to have seen the ‘70s go by the wayside. The ‘80s had much more promise.
Even though he’d dropped out of high school after 10th grade, he was smart enough to know that the strength of a country’s economy could easily be gauged by how many shovels are in the ground and cranes are in the air. There hadn’t been a lot the last several years, which was why his union had pretty much had him on standby all that time. But suddenly there was work. He’d been called to do grading and site prep for a new office building on a piece of vacant land west of where the Meadowlands Sports Complex had opened a few years before, and when this was done, there was another job right after it in Metuchen, about a half-hour south. This building here would be office and lab space. Though, he didn’t care what was in it – just that he had a chance to work on it, and that it stood for the next fifty years.
A bulldozer passed in front of him and pushed a clump of mud and brush out of the path. It was swampy here in parts of North Jersey, but the city had zoned this area clear for construction. He wasn’t going to question the guys who gave the permits.
As the machine pulled around for another pass, Vinny stepped forward to inspect a gray area that had been unveiled when the mud was removed. It was an enormous rock - at least four feet across and buried deep – that the bulldozer wouldn’t be able to get. He stood and did a spin to find his foreman so they could wave over the backhoe. He yelled to him over the noise of the machines. Man, it felt good to be back at work.
The foreman, a guy he’d just met named Carl, strode over to him, his boots sinking in the mud with each step. “What’s going on?” he yelled back to him.
“Won’t be able to bulldoze this one out,” he said. “We have to dig underneath it.”
“That’s a big son-of-a-bitch, isn’t it?”
“Yes, sir.” Normally, he wouldn’t have called his foreman “sir,” but he was so pleased that later that night he’d be able to go home and have his Angela greet a working man at the door, he was feeling over-the-top.
“Alright, I’ll get the hoe.”
A few minutes later, Carl came back, directing the driver of the backhoe toward the place where the rock was embedded in the ground. The dipper was thrust into the mud and, after a few minutes of maneuvering, the boulder was successfully excavated, leaving a giant hole behind it. By the time they were done, a small crowd had gathered. The men cheered and then went back on their way. For Vinny, it was pretty cool to see the rock come out, but it had been necessary before the foundation could be poured.
As he stood at the top of the hole, though, looking in, a glint of silver caught his eye, embedded in the wall that had lined where the boulder was resting. He took a look around and saw no one was paying attention to him, so he leaped down into the hole to inspect it. It was a metal stick half protruding from the mud, so he grabbed and pulled. It came out easily, and he stared at it in amazement.
The stick was about ten inches long and had a small screen and a series of buttons like a fancy calculator. There was a compartment in the back that was closed tight, and a red button that fit his thumb. Other than that, there were no distinguishing markings. It was an astonishing find.
“Manelo!” Vinny heard a voice call from above him, though he didn’t see anyone. While it was taboo to take anything from a dig site, he couldn’t help himself, and he slid the metal stick underneath his protective vest. A moment later, he saw the foreman approaching. “What the hell are you doing in there? We’re not paying you to play in a hole.”
“Sorry,” he said, climbing out. “I thought I saw something.”
Carl looked past him into the hole. “Jimmy Hoffa down there?” He laughed and slapped him hard on the arm.
“I thought it might be.”
“Fat chance,” he said. “Get back to work.”
Carl walked away and left him standing there, holding his prize under his jacket. When he was sure no one was watching, Vinny situated the stick in the inside pocket of his coat so it wouldn’t fall out.
After putting in a full day of work that felt really good, Vinny took the Turnpike to his home in Edison. He came through the front door just like a husband and dad should, and was greeted with a big hug from Angela, proud of her man. Life was good.
&nbs
p; “Are you hungry?” she asked as he pulled his boots off in the doorway. “I’ve got chicken started, and those little potatoes you like.”
Vinny smiled. “It sounds perfect,” he said. He walked up the stairs to their bedroom and changed out of his clothes, then slipped into a five-minute shower. It was refreshing and rewarding, and when he got out he could smell the spices that Angela had put on the chicken before putting it in the oven. It seemed even his senses were heightened by his new sense of worth. Thank goodness.
Before going downstairs, he grabbed the metal stick he’d found on the site that afternoon and went down the hallway to Anthony’s room. He could hear him playing inside, so he rapped on the door.
“Who is it?” his six-year-old son, his pride and joy, called from inside.
“It’s your father,” he said. A moment later, the door opened and he ducked inside. Anthony was playing with action figures, which were strewn all over the floor. “What’s up, pal?”
“Not much. Just playin’.”
“Hey, look what I found today at work,” he said, pulling the stick out from behind his back and showing it to him, enjoying the shouts of “cool” and “neat” that the futuristic-looking stick earned him.
“What is it?” Anthony asked, taking it from him and inspecting it.
Vinny shook his head. “I don’t know. Looks like some kind of computer that you hold in your hand. Probably some secret spy equipment or something.” He hammed it up for him.
“What are you going to do with it?” Anthony asked, looking up at him.
“Doesn’t look like it works. You can have it to play with.”
“Cool!” he said, pushing the buttons on it and talking at the screen like he was James Bond. “I’m glad you got this job.”
“Well, I probably won’t be able to bring home new space technology every day,” Vinny said, laughing. “Just be careful with it. It’s not for playing rough.”
“Okay, Dad. But can I take it for show-and-tell on Friday?”
Fate (Wilton's Gold #3) Page 33