The Inheritance Paradox

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Design by Nathan Everett

Cover image by Aris Suwanmalee, ID 677039602

licensed from Shutterstock.com

eBook Edition

ISBN 978-1-967290-21-5

This book contains content of an adult nature. This includes explicit sexual content and characters whose beliefs and comments may be contrary to your religious, political, or world view. The content is inappropriate and in some cases illegal for readers under the age of 18.

One (My Story)

“Does Mom have a Goodwill bag here somewhere?” I asked. I was trying to sort through old clothes in Dad’s closet. It was the first step in what I knew would be a long process of downsizing.

“Don’t go putting that in the donation bag! That’s a perfectly good suit,” my father said, pointing at the old black suit I was holding.

“Dad, you haven’t worn a suit in ten years,” I complained.

Getting the amount of crap in my parents’ house reduced was going to take forever. Fortunately, we’d started well in advance of when they needed to move out.

“You’ll need something to bury me in,” Dad growled.

Shit! That was a low blow.

“You’ll probably outlive me,” I said. “Dad, you aren’t moving because you’re getting ready to die. Please don’t pull that kind of thing on us. You said the place was too hard to maintain. You and Mom want to travel more and not be tied down here. You shopped for that cottage for a year, and you love it.”

“It’s too much for you to maintain,” Dad sighed. “Nathaniel, I don’t hold it against you. It isn’t fair for us to expect you and Brenda to run around fixing the plumbing, or mowing the grass, or cleaning the house. You’ve got a lovely home of your own and we’re proud of you. There would be no reason for you to want this one instead. It was wonderful when we were a young family, but your sister isn’t even in town to help, and we talked to her about whether she wanted the place. I know what a strain it is for you. I’m not senile, no matter what you might think.”

“I don’t think you’re senile, Dad. Really.”

Well, I wasn’t absolutely sure. Dad always liked to tell stories. I’ve always loved listening to them. Someday, I’m going to write one myself. It’s just… He treats these stories he tells as if they actually happened to him—like they’re the stories of his life. As he’s aged, he’s become more adamant that even stories that happened in the twelfth or thirteenth century were really happening to him—as if he was a time traveler of some sort. Mom’s no help. She just says lots of people have past life experiences they remember. Yeah. She’s kind of woo-woo, too. You see what I mean.

Listening to his stories when I was a kid and seeing the size of his personal library and love of books, was part of what convinced me I wanted to be a writer. I even went to college and majored in English with an emphasis in creative writing. Really a useful degree. I’ve heard the ‘Do you want fries with that?’ joke a million times.

But I proved it was a useful degree. I work at a medical equipment company as a technical writer. I document new technology, write instruction manuals, and even contribute articles on health for the website. Doesn’t that make me a writer?

I just don’t have the same gift for telling stories my father has. And after spending eight to ten hours a day struggling to comprehend what the engineers and scientists are working on so I can document it in English real people can understand, I just don’t have the energy or desire to park in front of a computer and write something creative. I’m written out by the time I get home.

Besides, I want to spend what time I have left from work with my family. I don’t like working late hours and missing dinner with the kids. They’re teenagers now—sports, theater, band, dating. I don’t think either my sister or I were that big a burden on Mom and Dad when we were teens, but I don’t remember a single time Dad missed an event either of us was involved in. He attended the spelling bee, the science fair, the ball games, and everything else. Having sat down as a family for every evening meal of my childhood and teens made me committed to spending time with my own kids.

“What was all the shouting about?” Mom asked, coming into the room where I was still holding Dad’s old suit.

This thing had to be at least as old as I was. Maybe I could get him to go shopping and buy a new one. It was a little threadbare.

“He wants to put my suit in the Goodwill bag,” Dad whined. Oh, wow! Now I know where my beloved daughter learned the fine art.

“Oh, no,” Mom said. “You can’t do that.” She took the suit from me and brushed imaginary lint off it. Then she returned it to the closet. She shuffled through Dad’s clothes and pulled a black shirt out, moving it to be next to the suit.

“What’s so important about that suit, Mom?” Brenda asked.

My beautiful wife! She absolutely adores my parents—especially Mom. Mom stepped in when Brenda was desperate. She was orphaned when her parents died in an auto accident. She was about twelve then and was passed around from foster home to foster home until she ran away.

I saw her on a street corner in the rain one night as I was driving home from college for the weekend. I don’t have a Lancelot complex, but I couldn’t drive by without stopping to help the poor girl crying in the rain. She had nothing but a little bag slung over her shoulder.

I parked and ran back to see her. Well, that was scary, I suppose. Kind of for both of us. I kept my hands where she could see them and didn’t get too close.

“Are you okay?” I asked. Stupid question. “I mean, is there anything I can do to help you? Do you need money? Food? Clothing? I mean, you’re just standing in the rain.”

She looked at me as if I was crazy. Maybe I was.

“So are you,” she spluttered.

Well, yeah. I’d just parked and ran to see her.

“Yeah, we’ll both be soaked to the skin. Let’s go into McDonald’s across the street and get dry. I’ll buy you a burger or whatever you’d like.”

“Really? I’m not a whore.”

“No! I’m not offering to buy sex. I just… My Mom would kill me if I just left you out here on the street and didn’t try to help. Come on. Let’s get out of the rain.”

I just led and she followed me across the street and into the burger joint.

“Are you hungry? Can I get you some hot chocolate at least? A burger and fries?”

She nodded, shivering. I stepped up to the counter and ordered enough food for both of us and some extra, too. I took the number they gave me and led her to a table.

“You’re soaked through to the skin. I’ve got clothes in my car. Let me get something for you to change into. You just grab our food when they call the number, okay?”

“Okay. Are you real?”

“Yeah. And I’ll be back in a jiff. Don’t give away my part of the food!”

“Okay.”

I ran back to my car and pawed through my stuff. I was twenty-one years old and on my way to my parents’ house with my laundry. Heck! It was dry. That’s what was important, wasn’t it? I grabbed sweats as being the warmest thing I had with me. I had a T-shirt and a pair of gym shorts that didn’t smell too bad. I even grabbed my towel. It was in the laundry, but it was dry. I bundled the things together and ran back into McDonald’s. She was just carrying our tray to the table.

“Here we are,” I said. “Grab a few bites and then go to the restroom and get dry and changed. Just wrap up your current things in the towel when you’re done. We’ll get them washed and dried. Um… I’m Nathaniel, by the way.”

“I’m Brenda,” she said.

She was sniffling, though I wasn’t sure if it was from the cold or if she was crying. She gulped down most of the hot chocolate and then took the clothes to the restroom. I went back to the counter and ordered two more hot chocolates. While she was gone, I used my cell phone to call Mom.

“Mom, I just found this girl standing in the rain soaked to the skin. I think she’s homeless or something. I’ve given her some clothes and bought her food. What else should I do?”

“Nathaniel! Are you okay?” Mom asked. Trust her to think of me first.

“Yes, Mom. I just think this girl needs something and I don’t know what else to do. She’s just a kid, Mom.”

“Oh, my Good Samaritan. We need to assess what she needs and then find a solution. She could be a runaway with people worried about her. Is she with you now?”

“I gave her some of my clothes and she went to change in the restroom. I mean, she was soaked to the skin, Mom. I stood out there long enough to get wet, and it was only a couple of minutes.”

“Okay, just stay on the phone until she gets back to you. I want to talk to her.”

“Her name is Brenda.”

I handed Brenda the phone as soon as she returned to the table and told her my mom wanted to talk to her. I won’t go into too much detail, but the next couple of hours changed our lives. Mom and Dad drove up to East Lansing from Ann Arbor and picked Brenda up. I followed them home. None of us thought it was really right for her to ride in my car until we all knew more about each other.

I’ll just say that Brenda didn’t leave Mom and Dad’s house. They applied to the State for custody because she was only sixteen. My sister Megan was only eighteen, but she was already at Harvard for her junior year. She’d only be a year behind me when she graduated.

Sorting Dad’s clothes for donation, Mom was in control again.

“Oh, honey! Dad wore this suit on our first date. And he wore it for our wedding. Why, he even wore it to your wedding! And if this is the suit he wants to be buried in, I agree completely,” Mom said.

Oh. I guess I’d been told not to touch it.

“Was that the same black shirt, too?” I asked.

It seemed every family photo had Dad in a black shirt. Sometimes he had a tie, but usually it was that same banded collar.

“No. Or I don’t think so. Your dad had a lot of those black shirts in the eighties,” Mom said.

“I guess it was just the rebel in me,” Dad said. “I couldn’t afford a leather jacket. Now these old jeans can be donated if you think anyone would wear them.”

It seemed like he was moving us past the suit conversation. That was closed. I took the jeans from him and held them up. The side seams had been split from the hem to the knee, and a wedge of paisley cotton was sewn into it.

“Dad, did you ever throw out an article of clothing in your life?” I asked. I looked at the back and there were two colorful patches sewn into the seat of the pants.

“Well, of course I did. Things wear out. Especially anything I got after about 1990. They don’t make clothes the way they used to.”

“That was also when I told him if he needed patches on his clothes, he could sew them himself. I had two children to take care of and didn’t need him to be a third,” Mom laughed.

“Well, I’m not going to be pigheaded about keeping things. Let’s just clear out anything else you don’t think I need,” Dad said.

“It doesn’t make a difference what we don’t think you need, Dad,” Brenda said. “You can keep anything you want. We aren’t trying to make you get rid of stuff if you want it. That cottage we viewed had big closets in it.”

“You’re a good daughter,” Dad said.

One might assume that was a passive aggressive criticism of me as a son. It wasn’t. I’ve been in my father’s presence long enough to know when he’s being critical. It’s not often. It’s more an illustration of how open and transparent he is about most things. He meant purely that Brenda was a good daughter, even though she’s his daughter-in-law. I don’t know how their relationship could be closer. Mom and Dad love her every bit as much as they love Megan and me, or my children.

We got a lot accomplished during the afternoon, but none of us was trying to get everything done at once. We had time until their new cottage in the retirement village was finished. Pretty cool concept—small homes where retirees could live independently but have all the services they might need at hand. The village and accompanying apartment building were next door to a regional hospital. In the apartment building, there was a dining room and anyone who wanted to traipse across the parking lot could have dinner there. Or dinner could be delivered to the cottage.

Staff people stopped by each day, just to be sure everyone was okay and that nothing was needed. Groundskeepers took care of the mowing, shoveling, and exterior maintenance, while there were people on call to resolve any interior issues, like plumbing or heating. I was glad Mom and Dad could afford to live in the place. They’d make enough off the sale of the old house to pay for years in the retirement village.

Brenda and I were still talking about the day and how much there was to do as we got ready for bed.

“It’s hard, isn’t it?” Brenda asked as we settled down together.

“Oh. Is it? I guess maybe it is nearly.” I snuggled up close to her and began kissing her neck as I nudged against her.

“Nathaniel! You know what I mean!” she giggled.

“Yeah, I suppose so,” I said, rolling back to my side of the bed.

“You don’t have to stop,” she teased.

I rolled back toward her and she met me half way with a deep kiss. Brenda has always been a willing partner, ever since we were married. That will be twenty years in June. And that wasn’t as soon as we met. Remember, she was only sixteen back then. We didn’t really start dating until she was nineteen, and we were married two years later. Knowing how much she loves my parents, me, and our children has never been an issue in our relationship.

Sometimes when I look at her, I still see that nearly drowned waif I dragged off a street corner to feed. I’m just so filled with protectiveness that I know I’d do anything for her. Now I was forty-four and she was thirty-nine, but I’ll always see her that way. We made love like it was our first time. When I was sure she’d gotten all she wanted, I just held her and whispered how much I loved her.

“Moving your parents,” she said.

Sometimes it takes me a minute to catch up with where her mind is. She was just going back to the conversation about it being hard. I just nodded.

“Sorting out all the things from the old house. Even getting the house ready to sell. You technically lived there until you graduated, and I’d lived there for three years before we started dating,” she said, holding me tightly so I didn’t roll over and go to sleep.

“I suppose so. I’ve been so focused on getting Mom and Dad ready for the big move that I haven’t thought about what it means to me. I’ve found a few things of mine I’ve tossed into a box to bring home and sort. I know it must be a lot harder for Mom and Dad. I try not to get impatient,” I said, caressing her. “I keep thinking one day it will be Zach and Lisa who have to go through all this with us.”

“I even packed a box of my stuff, too,” Brenda said. “I didn’t have anything when I moved there, but I’ve found a whole box of stuff I left behind. We should take the opportunity to start downsizing, too.”

“And Megan’s stuff?” I asked. My sister had been in college in Boston when Brenda moved into her room.

“She told me to just toss anything I came to, but I can’t do that!” Brenda said. “I know some of those things are precious to her. She’s just so wrapped up in her work right now, it’s hard for her to think of anything else. I wish she was here with us.”

“She’s planning to spend two weeks here for Zach’s graduation next month,” I said. “I know she’ll still be working remotely late at night, but she’ll do her best to get Mom and Dad ready.”

“Do you think Dad is having problems letting go because he’s afraid it will all be forgotten? The house itself is part of his story,” Brenda said. “I mean, Mom said it was a family property.”

According to Dad, he and Mom didn’t have two nickels to rub together when they met. He was thirty. Mom was twenty-four. I could never figure out how they afforded the house. Dad’s cryptic reply was just that it came from his past and was a family property. Regardless, they’d lived there forty-five years and there was no mortgage on the property.

“I wish I could ferret out what Dad’s past really was. The stories he tells…”

“Maybe if you wrote them down, it would make him feel better. Like the past wouldn’t just be forgotten,” Brenda said.

“How do I separate the real from the fiction? Like when he fought with some farmer in Scotland because he wanted to take his daughter away to save her from the witch hunters?”

“It’s an exciting story. Why not write it down? Treat it all as if it really happened. Maybe Mom’s right and it was past life memories,” Brenda said.

“I just wish I knew more about who he really was. I mean, since he married Mom, everything is pretty clear. There were no past life stories after they were married. But he was nearly thirty when they met and none of his fantastic adventures even came in the years before they met.”

“You could investigate. Research it on the internet. Find his birth certificate and start building the story from there.”

“Hmm. His father died in ’76. Grandma passed when I was about ten—must have been 1990. I suppose I could find more info,” I mused.

“Just be sure you really want to know.”

“What do you mean?”

“I asked Mom about it a while back. She said he’s always been unwilling to talk about life before they met—there was too much to think about after they met. You know the singer they called The Man in Black?” Brenda asked.

“Johnny Cash? Yeah. What’s he got to do with it?”

“Mom says Dad always dressed in all black. She thinks maybe he was in prison before they met. It’s possible.”

“Hard to imagine him doing anything illegal, isn’t it? He’s always been so strait-laced,” I said.

“Maybe that’s why.”

The conversation petered out as we drifted off to sleep. My dad in prison? I really needed to investigate this.

Two (My Story)

The following Sunday was bright and clear. It looked like the last vestiges of winter had gone and spring had finally arrived. Mom wanted us over for a big family dinner. Zach, Lisa, Brenda, and I all figured we’d be doing more packing after the meal.

“This is so much work, Mom,” Brenda said.

“We’ll need a good meal in order to have the energy to work this afternoon,” Mom replied.

“After a meal of your pot roast, we’ll probably all go to sleep,” I said.

“Oh, I just love to serve a family dinner,” Mom said. “I don’t think there’s really room to serve us all in the cottage. I’m going to enjoy doing it while I can.”

“If you really want to cook for the family, you can come to our house,” I said.

“Could she, Dad? I want to learn to make this pot roast thingy,” Lisa said.

I wasn’t sure how, at sixteen, she suddenly developed a domestic streak to go along with her scientific and business side. She was an excellent student, and I was sure she’d follow in Megan’s footsteps with some kind of super-scientific study of atomic medicine. I should be used to it by now. My daughter was a constant stream of surprises.

“Of course, honey,” I said. “Grandma and Grandpa are actually going to live two miles closer to us after they move. I’m sure they’ll be over all the time.”

“Don’t make it sound like we’ll have nothing else to do in our lives,” Dad said. “We already have friends who live over there. That’s one of the reasons we chose Liberty Manor. Independent living while we’ll still have staff to do things like the yard work and maintenance. Poor Zach won’t be drafted into mowing every week during the summer.”

“I don’t mind, Gramps,” my son chimed in. “I’m looking forward to tuning up the mower this afternoon and getting the first cutting done. I want to make sure the blade is sharp and the engine is clean.”

As intellectual as my daughter was, Zach was mechanically inclined. I wouldn’t argue with that.

“I don’t know where you get your mechanical ability,” Dad said. “God knows your father and grandfather don’t have a bit of it. Worthless college degrees and careers doing something completely different.”

“What was your degree in, anyway, Dad?” I asked.

He’d never mentioned his college life, and I thought this might be a place where I could start getting more information about his life.

“Basket weaving. Kept me out of the Army,” Dad said, evading the issue again.

“Grandma, how did you and Grandpa meet?” Lisa asked. “Did you meet in college?”

My kids must be just as curious about their grandparents as I was.

“He was my knight in shining armor. Here’s a lesson for you: Stay away from places you know aren’t safe!” Mom said. “It happened that both of us were in a place where neither one of us had any business being. That’s all I’ll say about that. The thing is, when I left, I was followed and those three men were going to make sure I didn’t get home. Sure enough, I was grabbed as soon as I was out of sight of the front door. All of a sudden, your grandfather came charging in and pushed them away, dragging me off before they could catch us. All that just so he could ask me out on a date.”

“Shining armor?” I chuckled.

“All right. My black knight. He always wore black back then,” Mom said.

Zach headed to the garage to get the lawn mower out. The women all shooed Dad and me away so they could talk ‘girl-talk’ while they cleaned up the dishes. A little sexist, I thought, but it was the way they worked. Dad and I went to the library.

Mom and Dad’s house was old—like more than a century—and had been added onto in different stages that gave it that quirky feeling of not all being on quite the same level. It wasn’t a mansion, but Dad had separated one room out as his book room. He had a writing desk in it where he sat to pay his bills. I’d set him up with a laptop computer and a tablet reader, but aside from checking his bank accounts each morning, he didn’t really use either one of the computers. The real focus of the room was the shelves and shelves of books. Dad just loved books of all kinds. When we were little, he’d call us into the library in the evening and read to us. I could still see Meg and me, sitting on the arms of his big chair as he read to us.

There was an overhead light fixture that we flipped on when we went in so we could see what we were doing, but usually there were just the desk lamp and reading lamp turned on. There were a few open boxes in the room, and I could see some bare spots on the shelves.

“Are you getting rid of all your books, Dad?” I asked. If he was, they’d go straight to my own little study. It wasn’t as big as his library, but I came naturally by my love for books.

“Heavens, no! But we won’t have room for all of them in the cottage. I’m sorting them out and you can help me.”

“Sure, Dad. Why so many boxes open at once?”

“First, there are books I’ve never read and really don’t care about. That’s the box by the door. You know, sometimes a book looks good in the bookstore, but you just never get around to cracking the cover. Then your interests change a little and that book no longer has the same appeal it had when you bought it.”

I looked in the box by the door. There were only half a dozen books in that box.

“If you decide you want some of those, you get first choice. The rest, we can give to the library. I doubt we’d get much for them in a sale. Most of them are brand new, even though they might be fifteen or twenty years old.”

“Okay. Just tell me when you have a book for this box and I check it out.” I knew already this box would go straight home with me.

“Right. Now, the box on my desk chair is for books I’ve never read, but I intend to. These are going to the cottage.”

I looked and in addition to the box on his chair, there was a full box on the floor next to it.

“We should inventory them as we’re sorting,” I suggested. “Just a spreadsheet with title and author. It would be sort of our own card catalog of the Holbrook Library.”

“You can do that. I know the books on my shelves. Which brings me to books I’ve read and doubt I’ll ever look at again. But I might. So, I’m getting them ready to go to storage. Maybe if they are out of my sight for a couple of years, I’ll forget about them,” Dad said. “I know it’s silly, but I’ll spend a little to have a storage room where I know some of the things I think are valuable are kept, even if I never go there.”

“I get it, Dad. You know, I still have all my writing and philosophy textbooks? I’ve never even thought about getting rid of them. It took me about two seconds to get rid of my calculus textbook,” I laughed.

“You’ve got a good start on a library of your own. Maybe someday you’ll want some of these books.” He turned to the box on his desk. “This box is for collector items.” He’d really only just begun pulling books off the shelves and seemed to have done it randomly so far. “I want these where I can enjoy just looking at them. I have several books signed by the authors. A few are first editions, back in the day when that meant something. And there are some that I happened on in sales or used bookstores. Take a look at this uncut edition of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. It and several others were part of my father’s poetry collection.”

“What do you mean, uncut?”

“Look at the pages. Two deckle edges, but the top edge is a fold. The book was bound before the top of the pages was trimmed. It’s a nice gold-embossed leather binding, too. A fellow book lover was sitting with me one day and offered me $1,500 for it.”

“Why didn’t you sell it?”

“I figured if he was willing to snap off an offer like that, it was probably worth a lot more. I don’t really know, though,” Dad said.

“That makes sense. Any other boxes?”

“This one. I’m trying to be conservative about what goes into this one, but these are books I’ve read and I’m pretty sure I’ll read again. They just spoke to me. Maybe it’s been ten or twenty years since I read it, but I want it nearby. They will go with me to the new place,” he said.

The box he pointed to was already full and an empty sat beside it. Dad loved to read and if he only took half of his library with him to the new house, it would be more than most people have in their entire collections. I wasn’t about to argue about what he wanted to do with any of the books unless he said he was throwing one away. I’d snatch that up and read it just to find out why he hated it so much.

I began randomly pulling books off the shelf and handing them to him while he told me a story about each of them, then selected a box for it. It was a task he could have done alone, like he’d begun, but there was something special about sharing this task with him.

“When I retired, I didn’t really know what to do with my time. Lynn wanted to travel, but you can’t do that all the time—especially with the house to take care of. I spent a lot of time reading and looking for books related to some of the travel I’ve done.”

That was a well-known code for his belief that he was a time traveler. I’d heard stories before, but I determined that when he told another story like that now, I’d really pay attention and then write it down.

“I know I could get my whole library on my reader thing and carry it in my back pocket, but there’s nothing like the feel of paper between your fingers. It makes reading… more than the words. Reading is about the texture of the paper. It’s where the book falls open when you’ve been reading it. It’s the smell. I don’t think an author ever imagines that his book will never be more than a bunch of dots on a computer screen. I think when he writes the book, he imagines it on a bookshelf, being held in someone’s hands, being experienced in a physical medium. I think when I buy a book and sit to read it, I’m participating in the author’s vision. Yes, it’s more than the words or the story.”

“That’s profound, Dad,” I said.

I could relate. Nearly everything I wrote was only meant for electronic consumption. I didn’t much like reading on-screen if I was reading for pleasure. Of course, specifications, documentation, instructions… those weren’t pleasure reading. I was fine with reading them on screen. When I read for pleasure, I liked to sit in lamplight and hold the book, much as Dad had done when he read to us as children, and as I’d done with my own children.

I intentionally tried not to clear a shelf and leave it empty. I’d randomly pick a book and hand it to Dad to put in the right box. Occasionally, he’d set it aside to consider later. I was going to slate some time soon when I could go through all the boxes we packed and make that spreadsheet catalog. I wasn’t sure when I’d manage it. There were hundreds—maybe thousands—of books.

I pulled one off a high shelf to hand to him and it rattled.

“What’s this, Dad?” I asked. “Do you have secrets hidden away on the bookshelf? Old love letters?”

He took the book box from me and held it against his chest. His eyes got a glazed faraway look in them.

“It’s the stories, Nat. There are more stories in this box than in all the books on the shelves.”

He held it out to me and nodded for me to open it. I don’t know what I thought I’d find, but it looked like it was full of junk. There were ribbons, old coins, a button, a pocket watch, a ring, a torn corner of what looked like a map. It was almost like a kitchen junk drawer. My eye was drawn to the pocket watch, and I lifted it out of the box to examine.

“What’s this, Dad?”

He took the watch from me and opened it to look at the face, not showing it to me. He closed it and then closed his eyes as if he was communicating with it—or trying to.

“It’s the memory of Galahad. He controlled my travels back when. I used to imagine he lived in the watch. It was easier than thinking he lived in my head.”

Dad sank down in his chair and motioned me to sit in his desk chair. I could tell I was going to hear a story, and we were probably done packing for the day. I moved a box so I could sit and zeroed in on him. I’d promised myself I’d pay closer attention to everything he said.

“You know your mom remembers a beautiful and romantic version of how we met. It’s not exactly the whole story. You need to understand, son. I was not—maybe I’m still not—a particularly good man. That night was an example of me at the lowest point of my life.”

* * *

By the time Dad finished his story, I was stunned. It was more detailed and emotional than he’d ever told before. The sound of the lawnmower outside had died. I could hear the women coming toward the library and shook myself as if I’d been in a trance, listening to my father. Maybe I was. Maybe I’d never listened to one of his stories so intently. I looked at the watch in my hand and just nodded my head.

“I’m going to write this all down, Dad,” I said.

He smiled at me and nodded.

“Dad! Look at all the neat stuff Grandma is giving me!” Lisa called, bursting into the room. “Wow! You guys packed a lot of books! Look! Grandma gave me some cookbooks, too.”

“I’ve already taken two boxes of kitchen utensils to the car,” Brenda laughed. “I think we’re setting up a cooking school in our kitchen.”

“Well, I’m not taking any books with me yet,” I said. Dad closed the lid on the box he held and stood to put it back on the shelf. I offered him the watch.

“Keep it. It will help you remember,” he said.

We kissed my parents goodbye and headed out. Zach had cleaned the mower and had it back in the garage. He was wiping his hands on a rag. He hugged Mom and Dad and we all piled into the station wagon.

“What did you get from Dad?” Brenda asked.

“I’ll show you later. I need to get some stuff written down before I forget it. Do I have an empty journal?”

“I can’t imagine you without one. Do you ever write in them?”

“I don’t want to sit in front of a computer for this.”

I did a lot of fussing around when we got home. Lisa and Zach both had plans for the holiday on Monday. Zach was just three weeks from graduation. I planned to work as long as necessary on the story my father told me.

I had a fresh cup of coffee and had just settled down at the desk in my own version of ‘the library.’ It was actually shared by both Brenda and me. I didn’t think either of us spent as much time in it as Dad spent in his. She stepped into the room and gave me a kiss on the head before going to bed.

“What did Dad give you?” she asked.

I’d promised to show her when we got home and hadn’t gotten around to it. I pulled the watch out of my pocket.

“This is one strange little watch. There is no way to tell time with it,” I said. “Dad looked at it as if it held the secrets of the universe, though.”

“And he gave it to you?” she asked, opening the cover and staring at the bizarre face of the watch.

“Said he never needed to look at it anymore. I should keep it safe.”

“Is it in the story you’re going to write?”

“Yeah. I don’t quite understand the import of it, but it’s part of the story.”

“I won’t delay you. Just know I’m in bed to hold you anytime you need a break,” she said, giving me another kiss.

“I love you, Brenda. You are my anchor.”

She left the room and I stared at the blank journal in front of me. I checked my fountain pen and inserted a new ink cartridge. I wasn’t sure if I should put the date at the top of the page or a page number or a title of some sort.

When I was in college and for a while after, I used one of my half dozen fountain pens to write all my stories and a daily journal. The computer I had at the time was a desktop model with a monster screen. I used that for work, whether it was my college class work or at my first job as a technical writer. The thing is, I just always associated the computer with my job.

Over the years, story-writing became less and less frequent. The blank books I wrote my stories in were stacked in a closet somewhere. I never really had time to go back and edit them. I supposed I should clean them out sometime. No sense in exposing the kids to that mess. But I was getting ready to write another story and it felt right to use a pen and paper.

I was determined to be faithful to what Dad had told me, but I didn’t want to make him sound like a lunatic. He’d flat-out told me how he became a time traveler. There were a lot of things his story hadn’t covered, but I could make up details and change them later. The only way I could figure to record the story without sounding ridiculous but also be faithful to the story as much as possible was to approach it as if it was a new science fiction story that I was putting my father and mother in as characters.

My father. Eugene Wallace Holbrook…

Three (Eugene’s Story)

Eugene Wallace Holbrook was disgusted with himself. He had betrayed everything he held as true and holy. He was the scum of the earth and he knew it.

On June first, 1979, he woke up in his car—a 1964 Corvair Monza. The car was all he had left. He’d been so ashamed a month ago when his infidelity was exposed and he was fired that he’d slipped into the house without speaking to Mary, packed everything he could into the Corvair, and drove away. He’d driven to Flint where an old friend was an attorney and filed for divorce. It was the only thing he felt he could do. Now, after more than a month mostly living in his car or a couple of nights a week at the YMCA, his world had narrowed to what he saw around him.

Clothes—not much. He’d always worn a suit and occasionally dungarees. His bat, ball, and glove. He’d probably never need those again; they just happened to be in the car when he left. His days of coaching the church softball team were past. A box of books, his prized possessions. He’d always loved books, but he limited himself to packing a single box to overflowing with his most loved volumes. The box was open and stacked above the top, but no one was going to take his father’s poetry books from him. It was all he had of his father’s.

There were a few photos in a shoebox, a hat and gloves for cold weather, his typewriter and paper, his Bible, and a coffee cup. Basically, it was the detritus of a life misspent. This morning, he had to check in with his lawyer and then see his doctor. Then, if he had the energy, he’d stand at the home improvement store with a sign that said simply, “Will work.”

He reflexively clutched at a pendant he wore—had worn for the past year since he found out about the girl who made it for him. One more loss in his life.

He thought maybe he should register with a temp agency and see if he could find a job typing somewhere. Or maybe he could just find a place to curl up in a ball and die. He was tired. His world had come to an end. He’d left everything behind and had nowhere to go.

Except the lawyer’s office. There was only one reason he needed a lawyer. Even so, he waited for nearly an hour in the reception area before Ron called him into his office.

“You look like hell, Eugene,” Ron said.

“Thanks. You, too.”

“Nice. You know why we’re here. I was just waiting for the courier. I’ll need your signature on all three copies.”

Eugene took the papers, noting all three had been signed by Mary and witnessed the day before. He signed where directed and Ron witnessed them and stamped them with his notary seal. Ron’s secretary came in with a cup of coffee for each of them, which Eugene gratefully sipped. He hadn’t had anything to eat or drink this morning. Ron folded one copy and put it in an envelope to hand to Eugene.

“That’s all?” Eugene asked.

“That’s it,” Ron answered. “You’re officially divorced and are now a single man.”

Eugene stared at the envelope without seeing it.

“I’m sorry, Eugene,” Ron said. “You didn’t contest anything, just signed everything over to her. Do you even have any money?”

“A couple hundred dollars. I’ve been doing day labor. I need to find regular employment of some sort and a place to live. The car is getting cramped and beginning to smell a little,” Eugene said.

“No doubt. Hey, that pollster group just opened a phone office downstairs. You’ve got a good voice. You could try them.”

“Sure. I’ll go over to the Y and get a shower and shave first. I should wash my clothes, too.” He heaved a deep sigh.

“Eugene, it doesn’t have to be the end of your life, you know. People get divorced every day. It’s part of life,” Ron said.

“All those people don’t cause it. I couldn’t even look Mary in the face. I moved in the middle of the night and ran away. She has every right to hate me. I cheated on her. I broke our vows. I broke the vows I made to the church. What difference does it make if I live or die?”

“Don’t, Eugene. Don’t get suicidal on me. Look to a brighter future. One that is better than anything you had in the past. Stay with us,” Ron said intensely.

“Yeah. I’m not going to kill myself. I just won’t stop anyone else from killing me if the opportunity arises,” Eugene said. He swallowed the last of the coffee and stood to leave.

“Take care, Eugene,” Ron said. “And see those people downstairs about a job. It will help you get back on your feet.”

“Thanks for everything,” Eugene said.

He still had three hours to kill before his doctor’s appointment. He hadn’t eaten anything but didn’t figure he could keep anything down anyway. The pains in his gut had gotten steadily worse since he moved out of the house and into the car. ‘Guilt pangs,’ he thought. God’s punishment visited upon the wicked. He’d been to the doctor twice and they ran a battery of tests, extracting blood for analysis, fluid for a biopsy, and running him through an MRI.

He managed another cup of coffee from a vending machine at the clinic as he waited for Dr. Roberts to finally see him.

“Mr. Holbrook? The doctor will see you now. This way, please.”

The nurse led him to an exam room and told him to just sit and wait. No dressing in a backless gown this time. He was surprised the doctor even ran the number of tests he did. He’d paid twenty dollars the first time and hadn’t been asked for more. It was supposed to be a free clinic. He wasn’t really sure why he was back for this appointment. He couldn’t afford medication. Not that medication could help a guilty conscience.

“Eugene,” Dr. Roberts said when he came through the door and closed it tightly behind him. “Sorry it took me so long. We’ve had a rush of emergencies. You’d think people would be through with the holiday chaos by now. Apparently, some still think Memorial Day is on the 31st instead of the last Monday. Weird, isn’t it? We spent all our lives with the holiday on May 31st and then they just pass a law and suddenly the dates change every year.”

“Yeah. Sorry to interrupt your busy day,” Euguene said. Something else that was his fault. There were people who needed a doctor and he was taking up space.

“A bit dramatic, isn’t it?” Roberts said. “How are you feeling today?”

“No better. I haven’t been able to keep any food down lately. I guess that means I’m saving money,” Eugene said.

“It’s not going to get better, Eugene. I’m sorry to have to say that. There’s a tumor in the small intestine, right below the stomach. It’s malignant.”

“I can’t afford surgery,” Eugene said.

“I’m afraid it wouldn’t make a difference. It’s metastasized. We found cancer cells in your bloodstream with markers for your kidney, liver, and bladder. That probably means it’s other places we didn’t test, too.”

“What are you saying?” Eugene asked, trying to focus on the doctor’s words.

“It’s terminal, Eugene. You need to put your affairs in order.”

“How long?” He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. It was as if it was happening to someone else.

“Three months at best. If you can’t eat, it could be faster.”

Put his affairs in order. What an appropriate way to phrase it. It was his affair that caused the chaos in his life. If he’d kept his pants zipped, he’d be sharing this news with Mary and she’d comfort him. At least she didn’t have to put up with her husband dying on her. He missed most of what Dr. Roberts was saying to him as he plunged into self-pity.

“We can get you into hospice care,” the doctor said. “It will include pain management, but no real treatment for the cancer. It would give you a place to live. Not elaborate, but clean, with food. A TV. Friends could come and visit. We’ll make you as comfortable as possible.”

“Oh. I… don’t know. I’ll think about it.”

“Let’s make an appointment for two weeks from now, but if you make a decision before then, call and we’ll get you right in.”

“Thank you. I guess… I’ll see you in two weeks.”

He stopped at the reception desk for an appointment card for June 15. Maybe he could die by then.

He walked out of the clinic and got in his car. He was numb. Divorced, unemployed, homeless, and diagnosed with terminal cancer. His stomach wouldn’t stop hurting and he constantly felt like he was going to throw up. He drove sixty-five miles out to the overlook and watched the boats on the river for a while. He wasn’t paying attention to what he was seeing.

Barges, cruisers, pleasure craft. It looked like it would be a great weekend, and people were headed out to take advantage of the good weather. In the Detroit area, that could all change at a moment’s notice. The St. Clair River divided the United States and Canada. He’d crossed it once. His one big trip out of the United States. He’d thought one day he’d travel the world, but he guessed that was all a pipe dream. He’d travel wherever his casket took him. He supposed they’d find someplace to bury him. A potter’s field.

It was dark by the time Eugene returned to his senses. He turned the car to drive west, back to Flint. There was a place he’d driven past many times. This time, he pulled into the parking lot behind the bar. The entrance was in front and he needed to step around a smelly dumpster. There weren’t many people in the bar. The Friday night crowd hadn’t yet gotten started. That suited him just fine.

Eugene had never really been in a bar before. It smelled of smoke. The floor felt sticky. There were both men and women, so he figured it must be pretty safe, even though it was dimly lit. He walked up to the bar and leaned against it as if he knew what he was doing. Some women at a table with the remains of dinner on it started laughing. Eugene glanced at them but didn’t think they’d singled him out to laugh at. A bartender eventually made his way to Eugene.

“What’ll it be?” he asked.

“Do you sell bottles of liquor here?” Eugene asked.

“Of course. But only for consumption on the premises. What would you like?”

“What’s cheap?” he asked.

The bartender scowled, sizing him up. He turned away from the bar and grabbed a bottle that had already been opened and was about three-quarters full. He put it on the bar so Eugene could see it. Canadian Mist.

“Can I have a glass?”

The bartender pulled a short glass and filled it with ice.

“Ten bucks,” the bartender said before letting go of the glass.

“Oh.” Eugene dug in his wallet and pulled out a five and five ones to give him.

“That table where you’re out of the way,” the bartender said, pointing to a small table near a sign that said ‘restrooms.’

Eugene took the bottle and the glass of ice to the table and sat staring at it. He’d had a glass of wine on a couple of special occasions, but he’d never really had hard liquor. He filled the glass right up to the edge. After screwing the cap back on the bottle, he bent over the glass and slurped from it without picking it up. He didn’t want to spill any of it. It was too expensive to waste.

Instead, he choked and sprayed it out his nose. The women at the table turned to look at him and laughed. Definitely directed at him this time. Their laughter drew the attention of some of the men who had come in, and they started circling the women. Eugene ignored them.

Having gotten past the initial shock of the whiskey burning his throat and eyes and nose, he took another cautious sip. It still made his eyes water, but he managed to get it down without choking again. He waited to see if his stomach would reject it, but it seemed to stay down. He could only drink it slowly, but he approached it with determination.

It took a while. He’d been in the bar an hour before he’d finished his third glass. The fourth had no ice in it at all. He just sat there staring at it and took little sips, trying not to think about the shambles of his life. There was still a little left in the bottle, and he intended to get through it all.

The noise as the bar filled with people and music was turned up blended into a dull roar in Eugene’s mind. The smell of hopelessness. The memories. How his life of service became a self-centered quest for carnal pleasure. How he wanted so desperately to forget everything and just die.

Sometime into his fifth and final glass, a woman plopped in the seat across the table from him and reached out to take his hand. He squinted at her. He thought she was one of the women who had been eating and drinking at a nearby table. Now there was a different group there.

“Sorry I kept you waiting, honey,” she said. She looked a little tipsy herself. She leaned across the table. “Please help me. My friends abandoned me while I was in the restroom and those guys at the bar have been pestering me to leave with them. Could you just walk me out and to the bus stop?”

“Walk. Out.” Eugene parsed the statement, a glimmer of clarity crossing his mind. He decided to be polite. “I’m Eugene.”

“Yeah. Okay. I’m Lynn. Doesn’t make any difference. Just get me out of here and I’ll be out of your hair, okay?”

Eugene tipped back the rest of his drink and nodded. He didn’t feel all that well. He was sure his stomach was finally ready to rebel again. He couldn’t remember when he’d last eaten. He followed the woman toward the door, not really certain what she looked like, but she had a red jacket on.

Perhaps there was a crack in the floor or a loose floorboard or maybe someone tripped him. The next moment his nose smashed into the floor and he passed out.

“All right, pal. You were just leaving. Let’s get you on your feet and get out of here,” the bartender said. Eugene’s face was wet and he was in a puddle of water, dumped on him by the bartender, the pitcher still in his hand. The burly guy pulled Eugene to his feet and put the pitcher on the bar.

“I was…” Eugene tried to retrace his steps in his mind. He’d been drinking. That was right. He wiped at his face and saw blood from his nose on his hand.

“You was just about to leave,” the bartender said. “Don’t come back. I don’t need dead drunks on my floor.”

“I’m a paying customer!” Eugene managed to yell. People in the bar looked at him, shaking their heads.

“You paid. You drank. You’re done,” the bartender snarled, wadding Eugene’s shirt in his fist. “Now get out.”

Eugene stumbled all the way to the door as the bartender strongarmed him. He hit his knees just outside the bar. What had been pleasant June weather hit him with a blast of cold air after the heat of the bar. He struggled back to his feet and felt along the wall to the corner of the building. The parking lot was behind the bar and that was where his car was. He kept a hand against the wall to steady himself.

When he rounded the corner, the smell of the dumpster overwhelmed him and he doubled over vomiting. He felt his entire insides were coming out of his mouth and after there was nothing left to vomit, he continued to heave, spitting blood onto the mess. He stumbled around the dumpster to find two men in front of him. Beyond them, a third man was on top of a woman whose red jacket was torn from her still body. She was exposed to his groping hands and just lay there unmoving.

“Hey!” Eugene yelled. “Stop!”

“You didn’t see anything,” one of the men in front of him growled. With that, a fist hit him in the face. Eugene flailed back, but they were on him with a vengeance. They hit him in the face, the stomach, and the balls. When he doubled over, they hit him with their knees and then kicked him as he fell to the ground. His head hit the pavement, and he could feel his brain splitting. It had been so easy to pass out in the bar, but it seemed to take forever and a million punches and kicks before he finally lost consciousness in the parking lot.

“What a fuckup. All he had to do was delay them five minutes and she’d have made it to safety. Instead, he arrives five minutes too late. It wasn’t supposed to be that way. She has to live. I have to send him back.”

Eugene didn’t really think he was being spoken to. It was more like someone talking to himself. It smelled a little like he was in a hospital. Instead of a bed, though, he was strapped down in what felt like a barber’s or dentist’s chair. Only the area immediately around him was in a pool of light. He couldn’t move his head, but he could see a shadow of a man in his peripheral vision. His eyes were remarkably clear, even though his mouth was dry as a bone.

“That girl,” Eugene croaked.

A man in a white lab coat spun to look at him. He had the instant presence of a doctor.

“You’re awake. It’s about time. We don’t have a long window to make the change. The longer we wait, the more things get messed up.”

“Window? Change? What are you talking about? What happened to Lynn?” Eugene sputtered. He didn’t like the feeling of being strapped in place.

“She’s dead, you idiot. You were supposed to follow her out of the bar and distract her murderers long enough for her to get away. Instead, you arrived after she was already unconscious and being raped. She didn’t survive it,” the doctor said bitterly.

“Supposed to? I started out. Fell. Next thing I knew, I was being shoved out the door and then I threw up and they beat me until I was unconscious again,” Eugene tried to explain. He wasn’t completely clear about the details. He just remembered seeing Lynn with her red jacket stripped away.

“I’m not omniscient. I just know she needed to survive. It’s critical. You could have been the reason she lived,” the doctor said.

“How long have I been here?” Eugene asked.

“Here? A couple of hours. Long enough for me to drain the alcohol from your bloodstream, knit the broken bones together, and repair the hematoma on your brain.”

“Why? You should have let me die. It would be better.”

“For you, maybe. But you aren’t important. You are generally unimportant as a human being. If you’d stopped the attack, I’d have let you die. But what’s important is the woman. I’ve repaired your body enough so you can go back and make it right. Delay the rapists so she can get away.”

The straps were released from Eugene’s arms and the clamp from his head. He turned to look at the doctor more fully. He still couldn’t see much of the hospital room. Near the doctor was a table with unidentified instruments and a television on it.

“How?” he asked. “For that matter, where the hell am I?”

“You’re between—a place where I’m stuck, but I can manipulate where you are. I pulled you out of your timeline and brought you here so I could fix you and send you back. You need to stop the assault that cost Lynn Dorsey her life.”

Eugene tried to comprehend what the doctor was saying. It already happened. His slacks were torn where he hit the ground. There was dried vomit on his shirt sleeve. He’d been beaten half to death while he was drunk. Yet he felt clear-headed and at least as healthy as he’d been earlier in the day. How was he supposed to stop an attack that already happened?

“Send me back? In time? You can send me back to before those guys beat us?”

“Yes, but it’s tricky. Sending a person back to a time he’s already in can create a paradox if he encounters himself. You need to stop the attack, get Lynn free, and disappear before your drunk-ass-self comes around the edge of that dumpster. You’ve been gone only a couple of minutes in your timeline. I’ll send you back about ten minutes so you are there in time to stop them.”

Eleven minutes and twenty seconds.

“Eleven minutes and twenty seconds,” Eugene muttered.

“Is that what he said?”

“He who?”

“Galahad. He is the brain in the time-chip I implanted in you.”

Let’s get going.

“How am I supposed to stop them?”

“The same way you did the last time, but earlier. Rush in and distract them.”

“Get beat up? Again?”

“You’re sober this time. It should take them longer. Regardless, it doesn’t make a difference. If you had done it right the first time, you’d be dead and she’d be alive.”

“I don’t want to get beaten up again!”

“In your worthless life, when has what you wanted actually made a difference?” the doctor said. “Listen to me, Eugene Holbrook. It is vital to the survival of humanity that Lynn Dorsey survives. No one cares if you do. Go save her. If you are still alive afterward, I’ll bring you back here and patch you up again so you can go back to your insignificant and worthless life.”

“Shit!”

Shit with a bit of hope attached.

“Good luck.”

“But…”

Eugene felt a sudden disorientation and was no longer in the hospital.

Four (Eugene’s Story)

Eugene opened his eyes to find himself in his Corvair. He was a little disoriented but didn’t feel drunk any longer. His immediate thought was that he must have stumbled to the car and slept off the alcohol. He had no idea what time it was. Bits of a strange conversation crossed his mind and were quickly dismissed.

He put the key in the ignition and started the car.

Where are you going?

“I’m getting out of here. Nothing here is any of my business. I got drunk, had weird dreams, and now I’m leaving.” Somehow his voice didn’t assure him. It was too strange. He couldn’t possibly have been sent back in time. He looked up into the rearview mirror, ready to put the car in reverse. A flash of red caught his eye as Lynn rushed past the corner of the bar with three men close behind.

“Oh, shit! Shit! Shit! Shit!” Eugene declared, using the strongest language he was capable of. He frantically looked around the vehicle and grabbed his baseball bat. He jumped out of the car with it still running and dashed toward the men closing on Lynn.

The first was near enough to grab her arm and tear the red jacket off her shoulder. Eugene screamed a wordless epithet and swung the bat at the assailant. It was neither a well-timed nor well-aimed hit. He hit the assailant a glancing blow on the shoulder. He released Lynn’s arm and turned to face Eugene with a yell.

Strike one.

He needed to make the next swing count before the other two reached him. He couldn’t realign himself but swung in an upward arc. It slid between the attacker’s legs and he doubled over, nearly pulling the bat out of Eugene’s hands.

Foul balls!

The second guy was launching himself in a kick aimed at Eugene’s head. Eugene swung the bat back as the foot grazed his forehead. He connected solidly with the guy’s off knee. He heard and could feel the crack as the guy crumpled to the ground.

It’s a hit!

The third thug apparently assumed the other two could take care of the idiot with a bat. Instead, he grabbed Lynn before she could get out of the way. She struggled against him a few steps away from Eugene. Eugene jumped over the guy he’d just crippled. Lynn slapped her assailant just as Eugene swung the bat. He was afraid he’d hit her and pulled his swing slightly. Nonetheless, he smashed the bat into the side of the rapist’s head. He could feel the head cave in and blood spurt from the side.

Home run!

Lynn looked at the falling thug and then at her hand before she saw Eugene in front of her with the bat. She started to back away, but Eugene reached out and grabbed her hand, pulling her toward his car as the kneecapped thug and the neutered thug tried to get to their feet. He opened the passenger door and pushed Lynn into the car, right on top of the various papers, books, and the coffee mug on the seat. He wished he’d cleaned it.

Eugene jumped into the driver’s seat and pulled the door closed behind him as he put the car in reverse, floored the accelerator, and popped the clutch. The first guy he’d hit was headed toward them and Eugene backed into him as the tires squealed. Then he raced out of the parking lot and down the street.

“What? What are you doing?” Lynn shouted. “Who are you?”

“Taxi. Where to, lady?” Eugene quipped.

“Are you serious? I was just attacked in a parking lot, and a bat-swinging maniac kidnapped me!” she cried. She was panting and could hardly speak through her panting.

She could probably have you arrested.

“No! Really?” Eugene couldn’t believe his rotten luck. “Hospital? Are you hurt?”

“Hurt? I don’t know. My jacket is a wreck. I don’t think I have more than a bruise on my arm,” she said. Tears began to flow from her eyes. She was in shock. “I can’t believe they just left me while I was in the restroom.”

“Just tell me where to take you home. Maybe choose some better friends next time.”

“Right on Holmes,” she sobbed. “Are you going to… rape me?”

“No! God, no! Those guys in the parking lot… They’re the ones who followed you out of the bar. I’m Eugene. I’m not going to hurt you. I’m glad you’re okay,” Eugene said, the adrenaline beginning to bleed from his body. He could feel his heart still thumping in his ears.

Lynn sniffled and turned to look at him, pulling the coffee mug out from under her.

“The last guy who told me he wouldn’t hurt me broke my heart.”

“I’m afraid I’ve done that before. I’ve sworn to never do it again,” Eugene said. “I’ll never put a woman through that misery again so long as I live.”

“You mean you actually learned your lesson?” she asked, huffing a partial laugh. “The guy who broke my heart went on to break the heart of the girl he cheated on me with.”

“Learning my lesson came too late to do me any good. Just tell me where to take you, Lynn.”

“How do you know my name?” she said, crowding the door and looking for the handle.

Now you’ve done it.

“I… uh… I heard it in the bar. I’m sure that was where I heard it.”

She doesn’t remember you from the bar.

“Just let me off here. I can make it home by myself.”

“I’m not a stalker. The truth is…”

You can’t tell her the truth!

“An old guy tipped me off. I was just in my car, and this fellow came up in a panic and said somebody was going to rape Lynn. Please help. I didn’t have time to think because I saw the guys follow you toward the parking lot. I just ran to… um… you know. I’m not a stalker, I promise.”

“Right. Take the next left and I’m in the second building on the right,” Lynn said. She wasn’t sure why she trusted him, but it was true that he’d just saved her. He was just a little weird. What was new? She attracted weird guys. Apparently, she sought them out. That was certainly the case with Guru Ma Mahama.

Eugene pulled to the curb and jumped out of the car to run around and open her door. She slipped out of the car and edged away from him.

“I won’t follow you,” he said. “I mean, I just wanted to get you home safely. I’d like to see you again, though. You know, just to be sure you’re okay. Would you like to go to dinner next Saturday?”

“That was smooth,” she said, backing toward the door of the apartment building. “Thank you for coming to my rescue. I’m definitely going to find better friends who don’t abandon me in strange places.”

“Maybe even avoid strange places,” Eugene said. “Well, good… goodnight. I’m glad you’re safe.”

He headed back to the driver’s door as she walked up the steps. He wasn’t going to escort her to the door as skittish as she was, and there didn’t seem to be any additional dangers lurking around. He still waited by the car until she was at the door. She turned and looked at him.

“What time and where?” she called back. He almost missed what she was talking about.

“Six-thirty at La Paloma on Saturday,” he quickly called back.

“Clean your car!”

She went through the door as Eugene stared agape. He had a date.

Oh, Wells isn’t going to like this.

Eugene drove to a shopping center where he knew the police didn’t usually check overnight vehicles. He could spend the night there and then start trying to put his life together in the morning. He was going to need a place to stay and a job. He might only live a few weeks, but next week he had a date!

Once he leaned back in the seat, a sudden surge of disorientation hit him again.

Eugene’s disorientation lasted only a few seconds, and his eyes flashed open in the strange hospital laboratory he’d found himself in before. He was strapped down with his head once again in a clamp.

“Hey! What gives? Why am I strapped down like I’m in A Clockwork Orange? Are you that crazy doctor?” he screamed.

“Relax. I just didn’t want you jumping around while we’re downloading your data. That does it. We’ll release things now, but you might want to stay seated. This sometimes leaves people a little woozy,” the doctor said.

“People? How many have you brought here?” Eugene asked.

“It’s still experimental,” the doctor said.

Just you and him.

“You got woozy?”

“Every time. You’re doing well.”

“Who are you, anyway, doctor?”

“Wells. This is just a waypoint between times. I’ll get you back as soon as I patch you up.” Wells stopped and looked at a device Eugene could only catch a glimpse of. Wells turned and looked Eugene up and down. “You aren’t injured. Just a scrape on your forehead. Why not?”

“I didn’t let them get a solid hit in,” Eugene said. “I attacked them and rescued the girl.”

“Rescued?”

He’s mad now.

“You said she needed to live. She’s alive and whole,” Eugene said. “We’ve got a date next Saturday.”

“A date? You and Lynn Dorsey?” Wells exclaimed. “Let me get this straight. I tell you the woman is vital to the survival of the human race, so you decide you’d like to screw her? What makes you think you should ‘date’ the most important person in the world?”

“That’s not what I thought. She’s a sweet girl and I wanted to make sure she was okay.”

“You want to be her protector? Her guardian?”

“I’m not… Wouldn’t be…”

“Never mind. You want a bigger role. You did show remarkable initiative. You aren’t really stupid. You might have potential,” Wells mused. It seemed he was used to talking to himself. “I’ll make you a deal.”

“A deal?” Eugene said skeptically.

“You showed some ingenuity in saving Lynn. I need a time traveler.”

He’s got you now.

“A time traveler?” Eugene asked. “You mean someone to keep going back and fixing things?”

“Not so glamorous. I was going to try to find a strong athlete or military man, but maybe fate has given me an answer,” Wells said.

“An answer to what?”

“I need a time traveler who can be a genetic courier to the distant past. Humanity is facing a crisis,” Wells said.

“It is?”

“Not in your immediate time. A hundred years in the future—your future—we face extinction. I’ve been there and I’ve seen it.”

“Crap. They’re going to blow the world up, aren’t they? I knew it.”

“You can think of it that way if you wish. I shouldn’t give you too much information about what comes in the future. Not if you’re going back,” Wells said.

“So, you’re a time traveler,” Eugene said.

He was surprised at how easily he was taking the news, but he’d just had an experience that would live with him, even if it was all imaginary. He’d been drinking after all. Anything could have happened. If it was true, maybe he could go back in time and turn his camp co-counselor away, saving his marriage. Or go back further and save Rachel.

“Why aren’t you going back in time to save the world?”

“I’ve exceeded my limit.”

“How much is that?”

“Not sure. I wasn’t keeping track of how long I was gone each time. But when I got here the last time, I couldn’t return to the temporal world at all. There are limits to how long you can travel. It’s just as dangerous if you return to your own timeline, but you also take the risk of creating a temporal paradox by encountering yourself.”

“Why me?”

He couldn’t deny the idea of time travel intrigued him. He’d read Armageddon 2419 A.D. and Slaughterhouse-Five. Unfortunately, those had been among the hundreds of books he didn’t pack in his hurried departure.

Right. You could be the real ‘Buck Rogers in the Twenty-Fifth Century.’

“My experience has shown me that the time you spend time traveling comes off your lifespan,” Wells lectured. “That might not be the best way to explain it. Specifically, you age at the same rate when you are time traveling as you would in your own timeline.”

Wells was startled when Eugene started laughing. He was near hysterics.

“Beam me up, Scotty!” he said. “I’ve got three months that I could be exploring strange new worlds. Maybe. Unless I can’t eat.”

“What are you talking about?” Wells asked.

“Before this stupid day started, I was homeless, divorced, unemployed, and had just been told I have terminal cancer. Three months to live, tops.” Eugene continued to laugh. “Why not spend the time left beating thugs with a baseball bat and saving damsels in distress. What’s a few weeks more or less. I have nothing.”

“Cancer?” Wells sounded alarmed. “Sit back down in the chair. You might die in three months, but it won’t be because of cancer.”

“Why not?” he asked, settling down in the chair.

The straps and head clamp returned. The machine whirred and beeped as Wells looked at it.

“Ah, there it is. All over.”

“Are you watching me on TV?” Eugene asked.

“Just a display of your vitals. I didn’t do a full diagnostic scan when you arrived the first time. I was focused on repairing the immediate damage and getting you back into the fight, so to speak. I guess, from your perspective, you could call this a kind of TV. It’s just looking inside you instead of outside,” Wells said. “One of the things humans got right before their extinction was a cure for the longest living killer of people. I can cure your cancer.”

He wouldn’t even have known it was there if you hadn’t spoken up.

“You’re kidding, right?”

“No. I’m injecting nanobots into you now, that will seek out and destroy the cancer. I don’t know for sure if that will extend your lifespan. We don’t really know what controls that. It could be fated. The cure won’t be quite instant, but you should see positive results within a week or so.”

I’ll guide them.

“This is unreal.”

“Now,” Wells said as Eugene felt the medicine injected into his bloodstream, “how about becoming our genetic courier?”

“I have no idea what that means,” Eugene said, closing his eyes. He could feel things moving in his body, his bloodstream, his organs.

“People—scientists—developed a means of inoculating DNA near the end. If they’d managed it ten years earlier, the extinction event might have been averted. But they didn’t know what to use. That was the discovery. Over the ages, a nucleic acid evolved that accelerates healing from disease. That will enable humanity to resist the catastrophe. The more people who carry the RNA, the more people who will survive,” Wells said. “My intent, before I got trapped here, was to carry it into the past and plant it in enough people that it would be discoverable earlier than it was—will be. I can implant the genetic marker as a biobot—a kind of biological robot—that will edit your DNA in such a way it can be passed down through the generations.”

“Like a mutation?”

“No. It’s more of a natural evolution, however, there needs to be a critical mass of people carrying it in order to make a change in any significant population. You know, there is evidence that suggests homo sapiens began from a seed population of fewer than 5,000 specimens. Once there is a sufficient sample to be easily discovered, synthesizing it and distributing it widely as a vaccine will be comparably simple. We were just too late to stop the extinction event. I don’t think it would be helpful for you to know the specifics,” Wells said.

“So, how do I pass this on in the past?”

“The usual way,” Wells said, appearing a little nonplussed.

“Specifically?” Eugene asked.

“You travel into the past to intercept certain migratory patterns of the species. You will select females to breed with. Then we’ll move to another migratory hotspot.”

“I… You… What? Breed? How am I supposed to do that?”

“Eugene, you have shown yourself to have flexible morals when it comes to women, even though you have a high aptitude for the species. At least this way, you would be doing something good with your lasciviousness.”

“You can’t imagine it is that easy to simply pop into a woman’s life and impregnate her!” Eugene said.

“You didn’t have a difficult time in your previous life. At least not seducing her. You blocked impregnating her. I accept that you may need a little time to seduce her. That’s why the warning about how much time you spend traveling. I need you to be as efficient as possible. It’s for the good of humanity.”

“We… I’m just going to use innocent women to bear children they never wanted? That’s ridiculous,” Eugene said.

“You can try making transactions. Buy a wife. Even a slave. A prostitute. You’re going to go back centuries. Your current concepts of women’s rights won’t exist. Don’t try to impose them,” Wells said. “The process requires the transfer of genetic material. The most effective is through your children. Blood use is also possible, so you could transfer the genetic biobots to a man if you became blood brothers, so to speak. Saliva is also possible, but it would be the weakest transfer of the biobots.”

Eugene squinted his eyes closed. He could feel a new injection beginning.

“Why can’t we just send this magic serum back to my timeline and start injecting people?” he sighed.

“I’m afraid you would find that more difficult than finding women to sleep with,” Wells said.

I’ll be with you.

“What?” The clamp on Eugene’s head loosened and he looked over his shoulder.

“What what?”

“I keep hearing a voice in my head! Are you talking in my head?”

“Oh. No. Galahad is coming fully online. He needed some enhancements before you start traveling back centuries,” Wells said.

“Who is Galahad?”

“I’m sure I mentioned him the last time you were here. He’s an AI implanted in the device that controls your time travel.”

“AI? What the hell are you talking about?”

“Oh, yes. 1979. It’s an artificial intelligence. A kind of computer program.”

“Artificial intelligence? Is that supposed to make up for my natural stupidity?”

Ha ha.

Wells groaned.

“You may well be the first person in your timeline to make that joke,” Wells said. “Sadly, it is so well-worn by the time Galahad emerges that it is a cliché. Galahad is a computer program that runs in the time travel module I’ve implanted in your brain. His primary function is to compute the very complex temporal and spatial trajectory for your travel that will land you where you are needed. He is also a kind of companion, capable of communicating with you. He’ll be able to advise you, even feed you language and motor skills. Making this kind of jump could disorient you significantly. He’ll help guide you in your actions.”

“Like an artificial conscience?”

Since you don’t have one of your own.

“Right. He makes wise cracks, too. When I was beating the thugs who attacked Lynn, was it you who kept making baseball references?”

Full count!

“Just stay out when I don’t want you.”

“I take it you are having an interesting get acquainted conversation,” Wells said. “I think you can do that back in your own timeline.”

You don’t need to speak aloud for me to hear you.

“Here. I’ve set your life watch with your current age. From now on, it will advance according to your total time lived, not according to the lapsed time in your own timeline.”

Wells gave Eugene a pocket watch. Eugene opened the cover.

“What are all of these dials, hands, numbers, and symbols?” Eugene asked.

“Yes, well, it keeps track of many things for you, like what century you are in and even the exact date.” Wells said. “Galahad can explain it when it’s important. Just keep it with you. It’s tuned to your biorhythms.”

“When do I start traveling?” Eugene tried to remember when he had agreed to become this genetic courier, but it was better than dying of cancer in a hospice somewhere. He’d just need to get a job and find a place to live.

“I think we should wait until the cancer is verified in remission. You’ll have a few rocky days as the dead cancer cells are flushed from your body. Galahad will monitor the progress and make the transfer when you are ready. Probably about two weeks.”

“And I’ll just leave the… car and land someplace in the past?”

“Oh, no. You’ll need a bit of an orientation for each trip. It wouldn’t do for you to land in the twelfth century dressed as you are now. I’ll have appropriate clothing and props fabricated for you. Also, currency. Galahad will need to download languages sometimes. You might even need weaponry when you are traveling back that far. So, when you start each trip, you will come here to be outfitted. You’ll stop here on the way back so I can flush any new diseases you pick up from your system before you return to your own timeline.”

“Okay. I guess. A couple of weeks. I’m kind of tired now.”

“Galahad, take him home.”

Disorientation hit Eugene as he landed back in his car. He didn’t bother to move—just dropped his head and went to sleep.

Five (My Story)

Of course, when I showed my handwritten version of Dad’s story to Brenda on Monday afternoon, it wasn’t as complete as you’ve read it here. A lot of details were revealed to me later and I added them in when I typed the manuscript. Brenda nodded and clutched my hand as she read from the journal.

Brenda is one of the few people who can read my handwriting. We weren’t taught penmanship in school like our parents were. We were probably the last generation who could even read cursive writing. Our kids had been taught keyboard skills from kindergarten on. Even their printing was suspect. I was sure neither Lisa nor Zach could read my writing.

It felt really good to sit with a fountain pen and scrawl this stuff in the journal. I felt like a part of my life had been missing ever since college.

“This is really intense,” Brenda whispered when she’d finished reading it. “You are a really good writer.”

“It’s not supposed to be about my writing,” I laughed. “It’s Dad’s story. I just want to make it sound believable.”

“It is. What do you suppose happened to him that left him homeless when he met Mom?”

“Whatever it was, it hit him so hard that he still doesn’t want to talk about it. When I asked questions, it was like he didn’t even hear them,” I said. “When are the kids getting home?”

“It won’t be too long, I suppose. They have school tomorrow. Zach and his classmates are already in full-party mode,” Brenda said. “The school might as well hold graduation now and just mail out diplomas. I don’t think there’s a senior who has his head in school.”

“I’ll talk to Zach when we go out Wednesday,” I said.

“You’re getting him a car?”

“I promised. We set a budget and I’ll go with him to pick it out. I should call Loren Aisley and have him come along to evaluate the car. I’ve never been very good at used car shopping. Loren was the gearhead of my high school. And Zach likes him.”

“Zach is looking forward to the time with you, honey. Even if you don’t get the perfect car, he’ll be happy. He is more interested in something he can fix up than in having the perfect car.”

“He’s really going to go to that auto repair school, isn’t he?” I sighed. “I hope he’s making a good choice. I won’t complain, though, if it’s what makes him happy.”

“You don’t need to worry,” Brenda said. “Zach has a good head on his shoulders. He’s putting a lot of consideration into what he really loves. And we have always told the kids that they should do what they love, right?”

“They just haven’t realized that doing what they love for a living might not be as satisfying as just having a job and doing what they love because they love it,” I said.

Writing Dad’s story had just hammered that point home. It had been more satisfying to spend the past day writing because I loved it than all the hours I spent writing technical manuals and documentation. I loved to write, but writing for a living didn’t mean I was enjoying it. Not that I hated my job. It was good and I worked with good people. It’s just that writing Dad’s little story had awakened something inside me that left me feeling unfulfilled.

“Well, Lisa has decided she wants to learn all Mom’s recipes. We’ll see how that discovery sits with her academic aspirations,” Brenda said.

“They sure had fun baking Christmas cookies. My whole office gained five pounds,” I laughed.

“That’s just the tip of the iceberg. Mom and Lisa cooked up the idea that the kitchen gadgets that wouldn’t fit in their new kitchen should come here so she can show Lisa how to use them all.”

“Oh, my gosh. Mom has a gadget for everything! Didn’t she show Lisa how to use the pineapple slicer a couple of weeks ago? I didn’t even know Lisa liked pineapple,” I said.

“One of her favorite things right now. This morning, she sliced one and packaged all the slices to take to school in her lunches this week. I need to get her to clean the counters better afterward. That pineapple juice is so sticky I left part of my cookbook stuck to the counter last week.”

The aura of satisfaction that settled over me after my weekend of writing didn’t last the first hour of work on Tuesday morning. The high tech health industry is alive and well, even if its patients aren’t. Bad joke. We had a team meeting and by ten o’clock we were all feeling overwhelmed. Excited, but overwhelmed.