by Jina Bacarr
I catch Lucy on her way out, smelling of my perfume and wearing the charm bracelet I gave her. She takes a moment to give me a look I can only describe as winsome yet heartfelt. Eyelids flutter, cheeks tint pink. As if she’s cognizant beyond a doubt I’m not the same sister she knew, though she doesn’t know why. Then she gives me a quick peck on the cheek and is out the door before I say a word. I smile. I’ll see her soon. Junior? He’s off with his friends after church. I have an uncanny feeling he’ll find his way home when I go back to my own time.
I start up the stairs, then stop and look back. Ma is sitting in my place, the two of them whispering and holding hands. She chuckles at something Pop says and all is right in their world. Soon they’ll be setting up the artificial tree they got last year, getting out the ornaments, mixing soap flakes with water and then brushing it on the branches to look like snow. Giggling like two teenagers very much in love.
I linger there for a while, breathing them in. I want to remember them like this because I’ll never see them again.
Mildred is waiting for me in her dented old pickup truck when I sneak out of the house early the next morning. I’m running on adrenaline and so nervous my chest hurts, but I can endure anything to save Jeff. She sits in the driver’s seat, smiling at something she reads in a letter she’s holding, her truck parked not too close to the house to avoid catching Mrs Widget’s eye. I have no doubt the post is from the reverend and I make a mental note to reconnect with her when I return to my own time.
My heart skips so fast I don’t feel the cold when I race over to her, carrying my overnight case, and jump in. I press my lips together tight to prevent blurting out the madness driving me forward, that I can change the past and save Jeff. Nothing has ever made my heart beat faster than knowing what I have to do today, pound so loudly in my ears I barely hear the truck’s engine purring. This is my last chance to tell him about the letter. I gave him plenty of hints, but I haven’t told him the truth. Where I’m from, why I’m here. My heart is ready to bust open, wanting to tell him. I never expected the forces of time would be so stubborn and take me on a journey with so many twists and turns. Like they’re toying with me.
Not today. I know what I have to do. I smooth down my red coat, playing with the buttons. One will soon be missing. Like a piece of my heart. I’ll leave it here with the people I love, while I pray my man will escape from the nightmare that awaits him.
To make that happen, I wear the same gray silk suit, stockings, and shoes I wore coming through time along with my blue silk hat. I have to play this scene out step by step so I don’t upset anything in the fragile timeline that runs along an invisible track side by side with what already happened. I’ve yet to understand it or the whimsical power of the Christmas train, but I have the feeling the two tracks will mesh together somewhere to create a different future.
If I do this right. No doubt. It has to be magic.
‘I never thought doing the Lord’s work would have me helping a runaway bride, Kate.’ Mildred puts the truck into gear and takes off with the biggest grin on her face. ‘So I don’t forget, here’s your train ticket.’ She hands it to me. ‘Jeff asked me to give it to you.’
I fidget with my gloves as I take it from her and lay it on my lap so I won’t lose it. ‘I’m more jittery than any bride.’
I’ll never be a bride if I don’t save Jeff.
‘Jeff is a lucky man,’ she says. ‘Let’s get you on that train.’
She races down the road spitting up dirt and gravel, traveling much faster than the thirty-five mile an hour speed limit set by the government to save gas. I’m grateful the road is empty and I thank the stars no one is about.
I speak too soon. I lean in, my eyes disbelieving. My God, Mrs Canton is rambling straight toward us in her big empty bus. Spewing up debris, the gears grinding. Her head hanging out the window, blonde curls whipping in the wind.
‘What’s Mrs Canton doing out on the road so early?’ Panic creeps over my skin like someone dumped a kettle of cold fish down my back. She’s still heading toward us, trying to force us off the road.
It’s not on the timeline. She’ll ruin everything. What am I going to do?
Mildred grimaces. ‘I bet she overheard me talking to Mary Sue about going on a mission of mercy at the gas station yesterday. It didn’t help when I started humming “Here Comes the Bride”.’ She exhales in a loud whoosh. ‘I’m so sorry, Kate. I can’t believe I was that foolish.’
No. No. No. Since Mary Sue took over as attendant at the local gas station to free up the men, it’s more of a gossip stop than a gas stop. I bet Sarah Canton saw Mrs Rushbrooke chew me out at the dance and put two and two together. She’ll do anything to ruin me.
‘We’ve got to outmaneuver her before she does something stupid.’ The morning chill seeps through me and my skin tingles. ‘I can’t miss that train.’
‘You won’t.’ Mildred grunts as she shifts gears. ‘As the reverend says, God is our co-pilot.’
She takes off so fast, I have to hold onto the door handle. We hit fifty, then sixty miles an hour, the vehicle racing along the far side of the road, its bulky, metal frame rattling from side to side as we zoom by the school bus with just inches to spare. A close call, but Mrs Canton isn’t done with us. I spin around and see the bus screech to a stop behind us and do a one hundred and eighty degree turn and keep right on our tail. Is there no stopping her?
‘She’s behind us,’ I sputter, not believing what I’m seeing. I have no one to blame but myself. I wouldn’t be in this predicament if I didn’t challenge her authority. I was so hungry to see Jeff, I pushed the timeline to the limit and I’m paying the price. Who imagined she’d turn up now?
‘I have an idea, Kate.’ Mildred slams her foot on the gas and, putting her shoulder into it, she turns the steering wheel hard, making a sharp right onto a dirt road and heads toward the train station over an old horse and wagon trail.
I whisper a prayer and twist my head around to see if Mrs Canton is following us. Yes. Somehow she keeps on our tail, zigzagging along the trail, honking her horn. I get a bad feeling. Why won’t she let it go? I’m racked by a scary thought come to visit me. Back then, we rushed to the train station but Mildred got a flat tire. That incident is part of the original timeline. Yes, I’ve altered some events since I’ve been back, but what happens today must stay the same. It’s the key to my saving Jeff. I’m afraid if anything changes, it will put the whole timeline off and I can’t save him. I feel it in my bones. A silly notion, but I can’t shake it off.
The truck keeps going, making deep tire marks in the soft dirt, going over rocks and shaking us up. We hit one rock so hard, I bounce up on the seat and hit my head on the windshield. A sharp pain from the impact slices through me, making my eyes blink rapidly, sending me into a controlled panic. No, God, no. I can’t go back now. I can’t. I force myself to hold steady, not lose consciousness, keep focused. No way am I going to black out like I did on the train.
I turn around, keeping my eye on the bus following us, my body humming in a fast rhythm. Mrs Canton is gaining on us, driving so recklessly she doesn’t see a low hanging oak branch. She swerves around it, but she’s not quick enough. The branch slaps down hard over the roof of the bus and covers her windshield, forcing her to screech to a halt.
I let go the breath I’ve been holding. She won’t bother us anymore. Now to get to the train station.
‘You did it, Mildred.’ I rub my forehead, a headache pinching my brain. Thank God I’m still here. ‘Thank you.’
She squeezes my hand. ‘You can thank me later, Kate. We’re almost there.’
The pickup truck bounces over the road, hitting rocks and brambles and jostling us from side to side. I pray with every bounce we get there before the train leaves. My stomach is churning and I can’t help but wonder if I’m fooling myself. There never was a chance to save Jeff, it’s all a cruel joke. That makes my heart ache more than my head, praying the love I have for him
is strong enough to overcome whatever forces are at play here.
What if he’s gone when I get there… No, I can’t give up. This is another test and if I have faith in what Ma calls the power of the unseen hand to guide us through the darkest night, I’ll make it.
Then a familiar note strikes a chord in my brain. The truck’s engine sputters and coughs when Mildred zooms over a large mound of dirt in the middle of the road. We don’t see what’s on the other side until it’s too late. A big hole. We stop dead.
‘Lord, help us, please,’ Mildred prays, grinding the gears, her foot jammed on the gas. When I lean out the window, all I see are the big heavy wheels spinning in the dirt.
I jump out, a strange blip clicking in my brain, like something snaps into place. An urgent chill seeps through my red coat, pushing me to look down, see, believe, go. Well, I’ll be—. The front end of the truck sank into the hole and leans to one side. We have a flat tire. The first time we ran over nails and debris in the road, but it’s a flat tire nonetheless.
I swear I cry from sheer relief. Whatever I changed since my return didn’t affect this critical moment. I don’t know what forces are at play here, dark or whimsical, and that’s what scares me. I’m running out of options. I have no idea how much longer I’ll remain in this time. It’s not something I can pinpoint.
But I have a feeling whatever brought me here is warning me to get this over with and go. That I’m living in a fairy tale and the clock is getting close to striking midnight.
I’m not leaving until I warn my prince.
Mildred thinks I’m crazy when I hug her and ask her to understand if I don’t remember the details. She nods, believing I mean when I hit the windshield, knocking the breath from me. I grab my case. The timeline is intact.
I catch the wind at my back and I take off running, pushing myself to run faster than I ever have. I don’t want to give this fickle notion called time any reason to stop me from finding Jeff. I have to get on that train and warn him.
While I still have a chance to save him.
23
The long, blaring call of the train engine’s whistle slams into my ears as I push through the turnstile, my red coat whipping around me, the tension building in me as I try to keep out the cold. I don’t slow my pace but jostle my way through the arriving passengers, who are tired and weary from a trip with each railcar filled to capacity. Soldiers home on furlough wander through the station along with a few civilians who offer to give them a ride into town. I don’t see my man anywhere.
Don’t do this to me. Please, Jeff, I must see you. Where are you?
I run up and down the platform. Waiting for something to happen, like the century old wood to buckle, the wind to smash into the weather vane and spin it round and round. Lightning, thunder. Something that propels me into the scene.
I wander aimlessly like an actor who forgot their lines. Do I move stage left, stage right? How do I find him? I don’t even know what railcar he’s in. Wait. My ticket. I reach into my side pocket, but no, the letter’s there. I tucked it away before I went through the tunnel back in my own time, but I don’t have time to check it. The other pocket is empty… oh, no, I was in such a hurry, I left it in the truck. Different from before when Jeff had the tickets. This time he gave mine to Mildred to give to me.
I stop. I don’t know where to go, can’t move, as if I hang suspended, hovering between here and my own time, a dreamlike, pearl-gray steam hissing between the wheels of the big locomotive. Since the hour is so early, only a few local ladies are on hand to give out coffee and donuts to the soldiers hanging out the passenger windows.
Then I hear whistles, catcalls. Seeing me, a soldier jumps off the train, asking to carry my overnight case. I’m waiting for my fiancé, I say. Lucky fellow. He whistles again, then gets back on the train to tell his unhappy buddies.
A moment later, as if on cue, the final call of the train whistle blows and the locomotive comes to life. Huffing and puffing like a fairy tale dragon in search of a storybook to tell its tale.
Not without me, you don’t. I head for the end railcar, holding onto my blue silk hat and gripping my case, making my plan. Start there, keep searching, the sleeper car, dining car, observation car, until you find him—
‘Miss Arden, Miss Kate Arden,’ I hear someone paging me.
I spin around, anxious. I heave out a big puff of air. I don’t realize I’m breathing so hard. Nerves. ‘Yes.’ The word comes out a whisper. Barely.
Smiling, the stationmaster tips his hat. ‘A gentleman asked me to give you this if he missed you. He said he couldn’t wait and had to get aboard the train.’ He hands me a letter.
Yes. That letter.
I don’t open it. I know what it says. That he has to leave without me. He’s under orders and can’t tell me the details, but he’ll get a furlough before he goes overseas and we’ll be married as planned. But he didn’t come back and we didn’t get married.
I put down my case and grit my teeth to keep from shattering into pieces. I never felt so alone, so wrapped up in darkness that it suffocates me. I can’t bear to read it, so I crumple up the sealed letter and stuff it into my suit pocket. We didn’t miss each other back then. After I read the letter, I searched the station until I found him. This time something shifted, pushed him to get on the train earlier, which upset the original timeline. It was intact till now.
I need to find out why that happened. A sudden awareness teases my brain, telling me who’s behind his sudden departure. Mrs Rushbrooke.
‘Was there a woman with the gentleman who gave you this letter?’ I ask the stationmaster. ‘Wearing furs and a pillbox hat?’
He looks down. I see his nose twitching. ‘You wouldn’t mean Mrs Rushbrooke, would you?’
‘I would.’
He nods. ‘Right pushy she was, if you don’t mind me saying so.’
‘I don’t.’
‘The gentleman kept looking over his shoulder, but she’d have none of it. Hustled him aboard quicker than a greased pig on a run, but not before he slipped me the letter to give to you.’
I notice the stationmaster doesn’t mention Jeff by name. I suppose he figures he’s said too much already.
‘Did she get on the train with him?’ I have to know.
The stationmaster shakes his head. ‘The gentleman insisted she go home. It didn’t take too much to convince her. She didn’t look none too pleased surrounded by rowdy young soldiers.’
This new development makes my heart stop. I pray her showing up doesn’t shift this critical part of the timeline into a new direction I can’t fix. She’s like an errant queen bee intent on jabbing her stinger into anyone who gets in her way.
Did she know Jeff was waiting for me? She must have. I had a few minutes to say goodbye to him back then. Now I don’t. It has to be her doing. I’ll never forget her snide remarks and the catty look on her face at the dance, like she knew Jeff would get the urgent call to report to Washington. Then she ruined our elopement plans by making sure he got on that train. Without me. Leaving me standing here without any chance of seeing him, holding him, or telling him about the letter I received back in my own time.
I have to get on that train.
The first time I didn’t press him when he told me he had to go alone. That I couldn’t ride with him till the next stop. I was a lot braver then, believing I’d see him as soon as he got a furlough. I felt proud, determined to start acting like a good officer’s wife even if we had to wait to get married.
Now with the unbearable fear of not finding him urging me on, I push such thoughts to the back of my mind. Saving him is the only thing that matters.
I ask the stationmaster where Jeff boarded. With a big smile, he points out the middle car and wishes me luck. I run hard down the long stretch of tracks, my lungs bursting as I race from the back car toward the middle where Jeff is. I swear I hear the fates of time laughing at me when the locomotive starts pulling out of the station before I get there,
the big wheels creaking and groaning.
Faster and faster. Steel grinding against steel… the tracks wet and slick from the steam.
My heart breaks. What capricious wind of time would do this to me? Whip me into a frenzy and then leave me here? The train picks up speed, the soldiers hanging out the windows, waving goodbye, eager to be on their way. Somewhere Jeff is among them.
I drop my overnight case and keep going till I’m out of breath, my ribs hurting, my cheeks red. I don’t stop. I can’t lose him again. A man who filled my heart as a young girl and then tipped it with sadness when he left, leaving me a lopsided mess of vanished dreams. I run faster and faster until I see him through the window. Looking for me, his face etched with a piercing pain.
‘Kate!’ he yells, and then he disappears from the window.
‘Jeff, Jeff!’ I scream. In no way I ever imagined, I get close enough to the train to grab onto the side metal handlebar a split second before Jeff appears. I keep running, how I don’t know. I swear my body leaps onto the bottom step of the railcar as he grabs me by the arm and pulls me aboard. I nearly collapse, then take a moment to catch my breath. In doing so, I turn around and watch as the train pulls out of the station disappearing behind me.
Then I see her.
Yes, her. My other self. She comes out of the shadows in a flash of red and every fantastical moment of this strange trip is ripped apart in an instant. Flying to the winds like silken fibers on an invisible cloak come undone. I have no doubt in my mind what I see on the platform. The girl in the red coat was waiting on the sidelines for this moment to reappear. Standing there, shoulders slumped. She’s waiting for me to do what she can’t before she returns home to Ma and the others waiting for her. Find Jeff. She can’t go any farther.