This was all coming at Max too fast. He couldn’t think clearly. He felt tears spring into his eyes, thinking about losing Angela and Brandon, and wiped them away. He noticed Dr. Time cocking her head at him and Max let out a heavy breath, full of questions.
“So what happens to right now?”
“Right now?”
“To our meeting. And all the things leading up to now.”
“You would only have memories.”
Max looked at Dr. Time. He could almost sense his neck hairs standing on end, thinking about this. He rubbed his forehead.
“What can I bring with me?” he asked.
“It’s impossible to physically bring back anything in time.”
“Just my memories?”
“Just your memories.”
Max shoved his hands into his hair, the information causing his head to pound with migraine-like intensity. He paced the floor. One thought raced through his head like it was speeding around the Indianapolis 500. You could heal people, dude. You could make a difference. He could apply himself, work hard, study, and not goof off like a teenager. He would have the mind of an adult. An adult that hated his stupid-ass adult job, pushing numbers and papers around. He could be a doctor. And still keep his family—Abby, Angela, and Brandon. Hell, maybe he could even fix the damn marriage problems the second time around.
Max stared at Dr. Time, crossing his arms in front of him. “What’s in it for you?” he asked. “Why are you doing this?”
“That’s easy,” Dr. Time said. “I’ve just explained that it’s impossible to go into the future. Our race is obsessed with Time—just like yours is obsessed with money. But the only way we can learn about the future is for someone to go back into the past, and tell us about it. Then we can correlate what actually happens in the future the subject experiences. And since only humans are capable of going back in time, we need a human. Like you.”
“I get it,” Max said. “You want me to report to you when I’m back in time.”
“Exactly,” Dr. Time confirmed. “That is, if you want to.” She reached her hand out and touched Max. “But Max,” she cautioned, “the Time Weaver is an opportunity for you. It’s not meant to allow you to escape from your current problems. I wish I could tell you that you have all the time in the world to think it over, but I need a decision quickly,” she said.
“Why?”
She glanced at the door. “Because another eager Max Thorning-like person could walk in the door at any moment, and snag the opportunity away from you.”
Max whipped his head to the door, eyes wide. Before him he sensed endless possibilities. His future was now a blank page—a page on which he could write a whole new story of his life, one that could have a whole new set of illustrations and captions. A future he could now rewrite. This was the treasure he’d secretly hoped for. This was the treasure he’d unknowingly found.
He wept at the memories he might lose. But he no longer saw another choice.
Without hesitation, he turned to Dr. Time. “Deal!” he said, holding out his hand. “Let’s do this!” Seriously, what did he have to lose but his crappy old job, and his miserable old life? Besides, he thought, I’d always wonder what I would’ve done if I was given a new life.
Dr. Time bit her lower lip, her eyes steely. She pressed her lips together, and stepped toward Max. “This is your destiny, Max Thorning. You’ve made your decision. Shall we get started?”
Chapter Seven
October 27, 2013 at 1:48 p.m.
“We need to identify a moment in time you’d like to return to,” Dr. Time said slowly. “And it must be a strong memory for you. The more powerful the memory, the better your chances of success.”
No problem, Max thought, excited now. What memory do I want to return to?
He gnawed on his bottom lip. The weeks before his marriage? Naw, too late. He’d already lost the girl he really had the hots for in high school—though he did savor the thought of “playing around” before the necessary re-match with Abby—and he’d finished university by the time he married Abby. The return date had to be before then. That way, he wouldn’t waste one single school course that could help him get into medical school.
That meant only one possibility.
He had to return to high school.
But how old was he at the beginning of Grade 11? And what year was it that September?
Max closed his eyes and calculated. He’d first entered high school in September of 1985. Yup—that’s right—he’d remembered watching the Back to the Future movie his first month of high school. All right, so Grade 11 had to start two years later, in September of ‘87.
Now for an indelible moment from September 1987.
Max thought and thought. Suddenly his heart pounded with the shock-waves of memory. Opening his eyes, he glanced up at Dr. Time.
“I’ve got it!”
“Yes?”
“The day of the lacrosse tournament against Borden High! September 16, 1987.”
“What makes that date significant?”
Max smiled at the memory. “I’ll never forget this one play…this fantastic play. There were seven minutes left in the game, and the score was tied. I jumped out of an ambush, snagged the ball, and raced around three players to reach the goal line! Boom! Game-winner!”
Dr. Time grinned. “Yes. That would be a good memory. Your sense of exhilaration, your sense of accomplishment, all within fleeting seconds. This could work!”
Max’s pulse beat rapid-fire at reliving the moment. “Okey-dokey,” he agreed, “what now?”
“First, I need the exact time on September 16, 1987.” She began programming the Time Weaver.
Max searched his memories, and sighed. “Shit, Doc! I don’t remember the exact time! It was about two in the afternoon.”
“That’s fine. We can start at two p.m., zero minutes, zero seconds. Now I need the location.”
“Confederation High School, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.”
She input the information into the Time Weaver. “Address?”
“739 McMillan Drive.”
Dr. Time moved her hand around an image of Planet Earth on the Time Weaver. The scale grew larger and larger until Max could see British Columbia, then the City of Vancouver as if a satellite was zooming in from the sky. It felt as if Max was flying, looking down from the clouds. A couple of times, he lost his balance and tripped and had to dizzily catch himself to stay upright.
“That’s my school!” Max shouted out.
Suddenly he was standing right in front of his old high school. Yes, that was it, as it’d appeared in September of 1987. It was a warm, sunny Vancouver day; the sunlight bathed the school in a radiant glow. 1980s cars were cruising around the main road leading to the school, and he saw students walking up and down past the school.
Dr. Time glanced at Max. “Where are you here, Max?”
Max screwed his eyes tight. Finally he pointed. “The football field. Behind the school.” It was real. It didn’t look like a hologram or a TV screen. Rays of light actually reflected off solid objects. It was as if some deity had observed real life, used a surgeon’s knife to scalpel a perfectly-shaped chunk out of it, and plopped it into a laboratory.
Max could now see the football field where he’d played in countless sporting events. He kept looking at the students passing by and chuckled at their 1980s fashions and haircuts.
“There!” he said, pointing, “that’s it! That’s where I was.”
Dr. Time peered at the field. “It’s empty.”
“It’s early. Look, there are some students coming up there now.”
Sure enough, a posse of teenage boys wearing team uniforms were laughing and joking and shoving each other around playfully. Max recognized one of them, David Leckie... and look! There’s Graham Squires, the school’s best player, the one the chicks in his class always swooned after.
Suddenly Max nearly choked with excitement. With watery eyes he looked and saw
himself as a budding 16-year-old, talking with another kid he remembered as Jake. The two of them were bringing up the rear of the group. Then together they raced off, their feet kicking up the mown grass as they ran to catch up with the others.
Max marveled at what he was watching. He was truly looking at himself as if he were there, a bystander in awe of his younger self. He felt the urge to run up to his younger version, give him a hug, and shock the living shit out of him.
“Now I see you,” Dr. Time said with a grin. “Such a handsome young man. How much more time do you think until your memorable moment?”
Max ran through his calculations. “Go forward an hour and ten minutes.”
Dr. Time adjusted the data points.
Instantly the scene before them shifted. In a flash they were suddenly zoomed to a boisterous lacrosse match, with the green team—Max’s—battling the blue team.
Eyes darting around, Max saw himself sitting on the bench, wiping off sweat. Max grinned as he absorbed the grunts and swearing of the players around him.
“Can you speed it up?” he asked.
“Sorry,” Dr. Time said. “We can change the time, but we can’t speed it up.”
Max grunted. “Try going ahead five minutes.”
“Will do,” Dr. Time concurred. The scene was immediately replaced with another; now the players seemed to have jumped off one side of the field and onto the other side, as if a portion of a film reel had been cut out.
“There!” Max shouted, pointing to his younger version holding a lacrosse stick up high. “I’m positioning myself out in the clear for a pass. Can you freeze that moment, or will it be too late?”
“Max, this isn’t like a live game,” Dr. Time said. “You can replay the same scene a hundred times if you wish. And, yes, the Time Weaver allows us to pause a certain scene.”
“There! See Stan back there? He’s going to lob it my way!”
Together they watched as the lacrosse ball sailed through the air. Max beamed as he saw himself jump high into the air, breaking free of rival team members, and then catch the ball while the fans cheered.
“Stop there!” Max commanded.
Dr. Time froze the image of Max in mid-air. “Mark 15:18:24. Is this going to be your key memory?”
“Yes!” Max said, unable to take his eyes off the image. “I definitely remember this. I’ll never forget how I felt. There was a total rush that came over me.”
“Good. Hold that thought.” Dr. Time adjusted the Time Weaver. “What you have to do now is go in there and take your younger self’s place. If you don’t get it right, it may require several hundred takes.”
“What do I do now?”
“I just told you.”
“Yes, but what happens when I actually go back into 1987?”
“You’ll be in a 16-year-old body. But you’ll still remember your life up to this moment we’re experiencing now, which is October 27, 2013. You’ll remember me. What you do after that is up to you. Dr. Time will always be here. It may be a previous Dr. Time; it may be me. But remember, you can only go back in time, never forward. As far as we know, no one’s gone back into time more than once.”
“Okay,” Max said, mustering up the strength to take that final leap. It was decision that would alter not only his own life, but hundreds of lives connected to him. He knew he had to do this, though. “I’m ready.”
“All right, then,” Dr. Time said. “Good luck, Max.”
“At the earliest, I’ll see you again in, uh…”
“Assuming you see me the first moment of the first day I arrive on Earth, it’ll be in seventeen years, three hundred and twenty days, ten hours, fifty-seven minutes, and twenty seconds.” She smiled. “Assuming…”
Max lifted a hand, pressing her lips together. Then, without thinking about it, as her eyes popped wide, he hugged her. “Goodbye, Dr. Time.”
“Goodbye, Max.”
Max took one last look at the enormous room that housed the Time Weaver, the frozen split-second scene of the lacrosse game in front of him, and finally, at the solitary figure of Dr. Time, who was looking curiously at him as if he were a specimen in a laboratory.
He swallowed hard.
He took a deep breath.
He stepped into the Time Weaver.
Dr. Time shouted at him, “Assume his position.”
Max did as he was told. He walked through the hologram, fascinated by the faces of people he knew. All of them were seized with the thrill of the ongoing gam and were totally oblivious to the spectacle of older Max strolling by, observing them.
“That’s better,” Dr. Time said. “Try to anticipate the younger Max Thorning’s next moves.”
I’m sixteen and playing competitively in a lacrosse game. The ball’s up there. Where will the ball’s trajectory go?
“Okay,” Max said, “I’m ready.”
Without overthinking it, he assumed the position.
“I will say, ‘one, two, three, go!’” said Dr. Time. She stood by the Time Weaver interface. “Ready? One, two three…”
Max leapt, catching an imaginary ball with an imaginary stick, slightly to the right, then feinted to the left, crouching as he shifted position. Seeing the live players react to his younger self—all preserved in exact Time—assisted Max a lot.
Damn it! Feel it. I’m sixteen and in high school. I am no longer forty-two years old. I live for the thrill of lacrosse. I want to impress my teammates. I want to be the object of desire for the beautiful girls cheering from the sidelines. I have no care in the world. Be free!
I love lacrosse. God, how much I miss it.
I miss high school – the best times of my life.
Max almost forgot about Dr. Time’s cue, “…go!”
With a start, Max snapped into action. He saw the ball. Yes. He knew what he had to do to get it. For a moment, he forgot what year it was. He was just a naïve high school boy who badly wanted a goal. A kid who fervently wanted to earn bragging rights. That was all that mattered. From out of the blue, he heard a female shout out her excitement.
Suddenly, he felt a stick-like object in his hands, high above his head. And then, there it was. Something plopped into the end of his stick.
His heart raced.
The crowd roared.
His teammates reacted with exuberance.
It was a beautiful feeling. Something was right.
He just knew it.
Chapter Eight
September 16, 1987 at 3:18 p.m.
The first impression Max felt upon his arrival in his past was the solid touch of the lacrosse stick with the sudden mass of the ball slamming into the netting.
Slaaam!
The second was the sudden change in the air around him. It was now breezy, sunny, and moist. He could feel the heat on his face and arms. He was back among his high school peers, at an event he never thought he’d experience again in his lifetime. He was sixteen again, and so was everyone else playing on the field.
The overload of sensory information was too much for him. After catching the ball, Max dropped from mid-air, and slammed to the turf, landing clumsily on his feet. Then his knees gave away and he crumpled to the grassy surface, dropping the stick, slamming the lawn face-first. Surprisingly, it didn’t hurt. It was like landing on a haystack.
There was an audible groan from the crowd around him, with cheers from the opposing team.
“What a wuss, Max!” a male voice laughed.
“Max, you pussy!” another male voice moaned.
“Oh man…” Max himself groaned. He felt dazed, and unsteady on the ground. He quickly looked at his arms—his arm hair was blond and fuzzy, for God’s sake. His arms were leaner, more sinewy. He touched his face and found his skin was soft. So soft. No middle-aged, five o’clock stubble! Awesome! He rubbed his shaggy hair with both hands. It was long and wavy and sticky with sweat, just like Max remembered it.
Max gave his jawbone a firm push, popping his cheekbone back into place.
>
“You OK, Max?” another voice asked.
Looking up, Max was temporarily blinded by the afternoon sun. He was able to make out the shadow of an older man lumbering up to him through the throng of players. Max’s heart skipped a beat. It’s my old coach, Mr. Lyon! Holy crap! He looked the same as if he hadn’t aged in twenty-five years. Actually, he hadn’t—yet.
“Max,” Coach Lyon breathlessly asked, “hey buddy, you OK?”
Max nodded, in shock.
“Your head OK?”
Max dizzily nodded.
“Did you screw up your ankle?”
Max shook his head.
“Well then, get up!” Coach Lyon grabbed Max by the scruff of his neck and heaved him to his feet. “Five minutes left—get your ass back in the game!”
My God my God my God. Max felt his skin turning into goosebumps. For some reason his face was tear-streaked. Quickly his mind turned back to the game. Focus now, Max. Dammit, dude. Finish the game. Look inconspicuous. Unwind later.
Max gazed at the rival teams. The players were screaming at him, and gathering position in preparation for the faceoff. “Come on, Max! Holy shit!” his buddy Stan shouted. Where was his spot? He couldn’t remember. He played offense, didn’t he? Left wing. Just like hockey.
“Max, over there, you dumbshit!” Stan motioned Max to the left, opposite an unguarded rival player. Max nodded, staggered across the field, and then raced to his spot. Stan put his arm around Max and winked at him. All eyes on the field were trained on him, with serious looks.
The whistle blew.
The whistle startled Max, and he fell backward on his ass. “Ooof!” Scrambling to his feet, he stumbled off. As Max ran, he marveled at himself. His legs were fit, supple. He ran without any perceptible stress on his body. It was like running through space, but at the same time firmly entrenched on the ground. And it felt so freakin’ good to be running to daylight with people in the stands cheering their heads off.
[2013] Life II Page 5