Time Travel Omnibus Volume 1

by Anthology

  Sophia looked from me to her daughters and back again. “Oh dear. I hope it’s okay that I brought the girls? I didn’t think—”

  I forced a smile. “It’s fine, of course.”

  “I’m so sorry for your loss—your entire family—I can’t imagine. Do you want to talk about it?” she asked. “Didn’t it happen about a year ago?”

  One year ago, today. But I shook my head. “It happened a year ago, but no, I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “It’ll get better,” she said. “Just take it one day at a time.”

  She had no idea what she was talking about—thank God. It was more like one nanosecond at a time. I cleared my throat. “So you’ve run into some trouble? You need a tutor?”

  The girls had decided on one big chair and were both sitting in it, poking each other.

  “Kayla! Brianna!” Sophia said, her good temper beginning to crack. “Girls, please behave.”

  The older girl got up and whispered something to her mom.

  Sophia said, “Okay, girls. You can explore the coffee shop, but please be quiet while Mommy talks to this nice lady.”

  They were off in a flash toward the window that looked over the university across the street.

  Sophia turned back to me. “What were you saying?”

  I was not going to obsess about little girls. I turned my palms up.

  “What can I help you with?”

  She frowned. “It’s just that grad school is so much more difficult than I was expecting. I feel like I’m not prepared, especially for quantum mechanics. There are these weird interpretations, like the Transactional one with waves that go forward and backward in time?”

  “Yeah.” I nodded. “You’re thinking of the handshake between the retarded and advanced waves. They’re supposed to cancel one another out. You’re in luck; quantum mechanics was my specialty—”

  A strange rocking noise came from the corner of the room by the window. I glanced over and saw the younger girl had climbed up the huge wooden shelf and it was starting to topple over onto the other girl.

  Sophia cried, “Oh my God!”

  We both jumped up.

  This cannot happen again! The next thing I knew, I was standing next to the shelf holding it up against the wall as merchandise showered down on me.

  They kid working behind the counter yelled, “Hey! You break it, you buy it!” but made no move to come over and help us.

  While ducking down, I thought I saw a woman who looked like me sitting at my table, but when I looked back she was gone.

  “How? What?” Sophia asked. Then she rushed over to us and grabbed her daughter off the shelf and hugged her.

  I managed to set the shelf upright.

  “Kayla, what were you doing? You should know better than to climb furniture!” Sophia bent down and hugged both her daughters at the same time. “I would just die if anything happened to you two.”

  Sadly, that probably wasn’t true.

  After a few more moments of hugging, Sophia let go of her daughters and stood up. She looked at me. “I don’t understand what just happened. But thank you from the bottom of my heart.” There was that luminous smile again. “You just appeared next to the shelf. It was like magic.”

  My mouth fell open. “Wait. You saw me do something like magic?”

  Could it be my doctors were wrong and I wasn’t crazy? A tiny seed of hope sprouted in my chest. “I’m not sure what happened. I just knew I couldn’t let the girls get hurt. Can you tell me what you saw?”

  “I didn’t really see anything,” she said. “I was looking at my daughters.” She shrugged. “I thought you were sitting over there, and then you materialized out of thin air in front of the shelf.”

  I nodded even though I didn’t quite understand. There was something important here though.

  “I hate to think what would have happened . . .” she said.

  “Me too,” I said.

  “Oh dear, Abigail, you’re bleeding!” Sophia said.

  I reached my hand up to my head. It was wet, and when I held my hand out it was red with blood. Weird.

  “You have to let me take you to the emergency room,” she said. “It’s the least I can do—you might need stitches. I’m parked right outside.” She took me by the arm and led me out the door.

  Outside on the curb I had an unfortunate epiphany as she directed me to her nondescript dark SUV. She expected me to ride in her car! I hadn’t ridden in a car for almost a year—not since the accident that claimed my family. There was no way I was getting in that car. I stopped abruptly on the sidewalk. “No. Thank you, but no, I’m not going with you.”

  “What?” Sophia asked. “You have to go to the hospital.”

  My heart was racing. “No. You don’t understand. I was in a crash with my family. I can’t ride in a car!”

  “Well, I can’t let you bleed to death,” she said. “Should I call an ambulance?”

  “No!” Unwillingly, my mind went back to Emma’s fine hair matted to her little head with blood, to Isabella’s dulled unmoving eyes, and the bubble of blood that came out of Jacob’s mouth when he tried to speak, right before he never tried to do anything again.

  Suddenly the pieces fell into place. I just went back in time to save Sophia’s girls, so I should be able to save my girls! I concentrated with all my might on waves that went back in time, and then I felt a Herculean wrench.

  I was standing on a front stoop, my old front stoop, and I felt very woozy. Maybe an ambulance wasn’t such a bad idea. Shaking, I lifted my finger to the doorbell and pressed the button.

  As I heard footsteps approach in the front hallway, I had to grab the front planter to keep from keeling over.

  The door opened and I found myself face to face with . . . me.

  Apparently dazed, other-me reached out and took my hand.

  And then I did fall over.

  The next thing I knew, I was lying on my old family room couch.

  I appeared to be leaning over myself, peering into my face. “Are you me?” the other me asked.

  “Yes.” There was something important I was forgetting. “Wait! What day is it?” I yelled.

  “Tuesday, October 31,” she said, crouching down. “You’re in bad shape. Can I take you to the hospital?”

  “The year! What year is it?”

  “2006,” she said and paused. “Time travel?”

  “Yes. I have to warn you.”

  “Warn me?” She leaned back, her eyes straying to a family portrait. She gulped. “Who do I, er, we lose?” she asked, her voice husky.

  I forced back tears as I looked at her, unable to speak.

  She looked at me, then at the picture, and then back at me. “All of them?” she whispered.

  I nodded, tears escaping.

  “Oh my God,” she whispered, tears running down her cheeks. “How? What happened?”

  “Car accident. Jacob driving.” I tried to wipe my face, but my hand was shaking too much. “Tonight.”

  “Tonight? Oh, my God.”

  I felt so dizzy I almost couldn’t get the words out, “On the way to the trick-or-treat party.” I was starting to feel something was seriously wrong with me.

  She leaned over the couch and clutched me to her. “Oh my God. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.”

  When she finally released me, I said, “I don’t feel so good.”

  “You do look ba—uh, you could look better. I’m calling 911.”

  As she called an ambulance, I struggled to stay conscious.

  “They’ll be here in a couple minutes. Hang in there.” She grabbed my hand. “Uh, how did you get back here?” Her face brightened. “Did you build a time machine?”

  “No. Transactional interpretation,” I whispered. “I guess the waves didn’t cancel out.”

  Other-me looked off into the distance. “The advanced waves that travel into the past and the retarded waves that travel into the future don’t always cancel out?” She peered at me. �
�But that would violate causality.”

  I tried to nod. “Yes. You’re good, stay in school—” I could hear the sirens approaching, but they were fading.

  “Abigail?” she asked. “Come on, stay with me!”

  “If you keep them safe, it was worth—”

  She was gone. I could tell because the haunted look left her eyes, and my soul shuddered.

  There was pounding on the front door.

  I went over to open it. “She’s over here.” I led the EMTs into the family room.

  They ran over to her and knelt down. One of them said, “Twin sister?”

  I nodded as the tears started cascading down my cheeks again.

  “I’m very sorry, miss. She’s gone.”

  I sank down in a chair, cradling my head in my hands. Oh my God.

  “Abigail!” Jacob yelled, running into the room. “Why’s there an ambulance here? Abigail! Answer me! Are you okay?” He must have seen the figure on the couch because then he screamed, “No!”

  I jumped to my feet. “Jacob! I’m here. I’m okay.”

  He ran over to me and crushed me in his arms. “Thank God,” he said into my hair. We clutched each other as if our lives depended on it.

  “What’s happening, Mommy?” Isabella asked from the front hallway.

  Jacob and I let go of one another, and I ran into the hallway and hugged them. “Girls, please don’t go into the family room.” I turned back toward Jacob. “Can you please take them into the kitchen?”

  “But we have to get ready for the party, Mommy,” Emma said.

  “I’m sorry, girls. We can’t go to the party,” I said.

  “Aw! I wanna be a fairy!” Emma stomped her feet.

  “That’s not fair!” Isabella said, throwing her long hair back and forth. “I wanna wear my costume!”

  Jacob came and took them by the hands. “What the hell is going on? Do you have a twin sister?” he whispered to me.

  “I’ll tell you later,” I whispered back. “Girls, you can put on your costumes. We’re going to have our own party at home tonight.”

  I watched my very confused husband lead our grumpy daughters into the kitchen and another tear escaped.

  It was worth it. Anything would be worth it.

  APOLOGY

  Sam Ferree

  “At no point in the past or future will your life have any bearing on anything, at all,” the redheaded, twenty-something time traveler with a sleeve of tattoos tells me. “That’s why it’s okay to kill you.”

  She is sprawled across my leather couch in the exact same position as I found her when I woke up to take a shower. She has muddy, brilliant yellow sneakers and they’re propped up on the armrest. I just bought that couch.

  “Would you mind taking your shoes off the sofa?” I ask.

  “Oh,” the time traveler says. She takes her shoes off, walks to the door and puts them down on the mat. “Sorry about that.”

  “It’s nothing,” I say.

  She is wearing a deep blue suit, but the jacket is hanging on the hook and she has the sleeves rolled up on her white dress-shirt. A green-striped tie hangs undone around her neck.

  “So,” I say. “You’re from the future.”

  “That’s the short of it. And that I’m going to kill you.”

  “How did you get into my apartment?” I ask. Maybe I should call the police.

  She shrugs. “Oh, they gave me a key. Comes with the service.”

  “Uh, who’s ‘they?’ ”

  “The Bad Day Company. They run this specific time travel service where people can pay to come back and kill you. Great stress reliever, but a little pricey. I had to pinch pennies for a month between my two jobs to be able to pay for this. And the suit.”

  “A month?” I say slowly. Once, I sat down, figured it out and got very depressed when I realized I had worked for eight days solid to pay for my now muddied couch. Eight whole days calling people to interest them in car insurance. Not for food or heat or electricity, just that couch. It is a good couch, though.

  “A month, yeah.” The time traveler puts her hands on her hips and strikes an intimidating pose that I’ve seen championed by teachers, managers, and girlfriends, the kind that seems to invalidate all my protests.

  “Do you know how much rent costs in the future?” she continues. “Life is hard for a twenty-six year old, former philosophy and psychology student.”

  “So, not much has changed in the future?”

  “Bite me.” She goes back to the couch and pulls out what looks like a handheld game consol, but not one I’ve ever seen before. She’s playing Tetris.

  “I’m going to go take a shower,” I say.

  “You business majors are all alike,” she grumbles.

  “How did you know I studied business?”

  She rolls her eyes and points at herself. “Psychology major.”

  “Well,” I say, “I’m going to take a shower.”

  Maybe I shouldn’t go to work. In which case I wouldn’t really need to take a shower since I usually just stay at home on my days off, but the shower might clear my head.

  As I take my shower I try to decide what I should tell my boss. “Sorry, I’m going to die today. I know I should have given you two weeks notice, but I just found out.” Better not call at all. So instead I try to decide whether or not to masturbate, but with my soon-to-be murderess in the other room it feels somehow perverse. Just before I turn off the flow I can feel the hot water start to ebb. What luck.

  I don’t even realize I’m shaving until I cut myself. It’s pretty deep, right on the left curve of my jaw bone. This is the last day of my life. Does it matter if I’m presentable? Well, James Dean and Janis Joplin didn’t leave beautiful corpses, but they were important and I’m not. Maybe I should ask the time traveler if she’s studied Confucius and if he has any advice on the proper thing to do in these situations.

  My apartment is a tiny, single bedroom affair, but luxurious for Chicago. It has hardwood floors—albeit a little scuffed—pretty good heating, and the neighbors are generally quiet.

  My room is nearly empty except for a bed and my record collection on the floor. I put on Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue. I’m not going to work today so I don’t need to wear business attire, but the time traveler is wearing a suit so I guess I should be courteous and dress up a little. I settle on a pair of khakis and a maroon shirt that I used to wear to parties. The clothes feel crisp, old, out of use.

  Through the window I see it’s another cold, gray autumn day and the lamps are still shining even though it’s eight in the morning. The air has the slight zest of coffee brewing somewhere. It’s the little things.

  When I go back to the living room the time traveler is nowhere to be seen. It could have been another mundane waking-up dream. Okay, a little less mundane than the rest, but still.

  But then I hear her voice in the kitchen, “I’m in here!”

  She’s sitting at the tiny, fake-marble table that takes up most of the floor space. There are two bags of McDonalds in front of her.

  “I bought us breakfast,” the time traveler says.

  “I’m vegetarian.”

  “So am I,” she says, sipping from a styrofoam cup. “I got us pancakes.”

  I sit down and she hands me a bag with three soggy, sweet cakes inside. There are two cups of Starbucks coffee. It’s the most I’ve eaten for breakfast in a long time.

  “So how do I know you’re from the future?” I ask.

  “There’s going to be a catastrophic earthquake in San Fran tonight,” she says, negotiating the words around a mouthful of syrupy pancake. “Thousands will die.”

  “Aren’t you morally obligated to do something about that?”

  She gives me that look again. “Stop an earthquake?”

  “Fair point,” I admit. I nibble at the spongy cake and say, “You’re the same age as me.”

  “Yup,” she says. “You have the option of meeting up with you at any time in your life
. I chose to meet you when you’re twenty-six. Some people kill you when you’re an old man or a child, but that just seems weird. I’m afraid of what it would say about me if I killed you when you were just a little kid.”

  “What it would say about you . . .?”

  She points at herself again. “Psychology major.”

  “Oh.” I sip my coffee. Sumatran. Good choice. “But, uh, won’t this be murder?”

  “Nah.” She waves a hand and then begins to pour sugar and cream into her own cup. “They had a court ruling on this a couple years back . . . or a couple years ahead for you. Since you won’t ever do anything that’s worth while you’re exempt, so to speak.”

  “Are there many people like me? That don’t have any bearing on the past or future at all?”

  She shakes hear head, thinks about it for a moment and then shakes hear head again. “No. Just you.”

  That’s good to know.

  “So, uh, why haven’t you killed me yet?”

  She holds up her cup of coffee.

  “Because we’re eating. Besides, I like the past. I might as well relax and enjoy myself a little. And besides again, I haven’t decided how to kill you yet.”

  “You haven’t?” I feel this could get ugly fast.

  “Nope,” she shakes her head. “I mean, at first I thought I’d just poison you or something—relax. Drink your coffee. But I’ve always really wanted to shoot someone. Would you be okay with getting shot?”

  “Well, I guess that wouldn’t be terrible.”

  “Stabbed?”

  “If it’s in the heart.”

  She smiles and then throws out her arms a bit, like she’s showing off or going in for a hug. “What do you think of the suit?”

  “It looks good on you,” I say, trying to keep up.

  “It’s hideous. I bought it secondhand.”

  “If you say so.”

  She rests her chin on her fist and sighs. I didn’t realize how small she is until now, probably only a few inches over five feet tall. Her hair is dyed too; I can see the blonde at the roots. She looks at me like an indignant know-it-all teenager and just for a moment I feel like a clueless father. Or the clueless boyfriend about to get dumped. Or just clueless.