by E W Barnes
“The Chestnut Covin is nothing to worry about - it’s all philosophy and semantics, there’s never been anything dangerous about it.
“Besides, if I am to correct these errors your grandmother warned you about, you don’t have to get involved in temporal politics.” He grinned at her.
“Now, tell me about these errors your grandmother found.”
Sharon and the man she called ‘Kevin’ in her thoughts, talked long into the afternoon. She told him about her analysis of the articles, looking for patterns or clues, and everything the articles described. He listened to her detailed descriptions of the articles, without interruption, until her voice grew hoarse.
“You have an excellent way of telling the who, what, where, when, how and why of things,” he said as she drank more water.
“Well, I used to be a journalist, and I got a lot of practice,” she responded.
“Used to be?”
“I left when the small paper I worked for was bought by a company that wanted to focus on sensationalism and gossip rather than thorough reporting on real stories.”
“Ah, you left for noble reasons. Not that I am surprised…. I think I have all the information I need to correct the errors your grandmother discovered. The only thing left is for me to see the articles, just to be certain.”
Sharon nodded. “They are at my apartment. We can go there now if you’d like.”
◆◆◆
On the walk back, Sharon chatted with him, telling him stories of her childhood in his home, the laughter and learning. He listened with a smile until they arrived at her door.
As they walked in, he looked around curiously.
“I like the lampshade,” he said.
“A friend gave me that after mine broke during the earthquake,” she said as she collected the books from the windows.
“What were you doing with the books on the windowsills?” he asked.
“Oh, I thought someone broke in a few days ago. I figured the windows couldn’t be opened without knocking the books down and then I would know if someone had been here.”
“Ingenious,” he said. Then his eyes fell on the bookcases.
“There is a temporal amplifier hidden there, isn’t there? I can feel it,” he moved closer to the bookcases.
“Yes, Grandmother said you helped her put it there after you built the bookcases.”
“Did I? Where would I have put the control panel, I wonder?”
There was a knock on the door and a pleasant voice called her name.
“Sharon, it’s Caelen.”
Kevin stopped his appraisal of the bookcases.
“Who is Caelen?” he asked.
“Oh, he’s a friend. The one who gave me the lampshade, and helped me move the bookcases,” she answered over her shoulder as she reached for the doorknob.
“Don’t!” Kevin said as Sharon opened the door and Caelen walked in.
“Hey! How’s the new baby?” he asked and then stopped when he saw Kevin.
“This man is not who you think he is,” Kevin growled, moving towards Caelen. “He is from the future, and he is deceiving you.”
“What are you talking about?” Sharon asked as she looked at Caelen in confusion.
“Who are you?” Caelen demanded.
“Like you don’t know,” Kevin sneered.
“No, I really don’t,” Caelen said, moving closer to Sharon who felt the tensions rising.
“He’s my grandfather,” Sharon said, trying to stop the fight she saw coming. “Or he will be. He’s here from the past.”
“And he’s here from the future,” Kevin said.
“What?” Sharon turned to Caelen. Caelen looked at the ceiling and then into her eyes, silently imploring her to understand. Time seemed to slow.
“Is that true?” she whispered.
“Yes, it is.”
“He has been deceiving you,” Kevin said.
“Everything… everything… it has all been a lie?” Sharon gasped as she realized the magnitude of the deception.
“Moving the bookcases, finding the strongbox, going through the articles, all a lie?”
“Please let me explain…” Caelen began, but Kevin cut him off. “There is no explanation. He can’t be trusted.”
“Get out now,” Kevin said to Caelen.
Caelen turned to Sharon.
“Sharon, I am sorry. Please listen…”
“Please leave,” she said on the verge of tears.
Caelen glared at Kevin and said nothing as he turned and left the apartment. Sharon stood staring at the closed door until Kevin handed her another glass of water.
“I’d make a good waiter,” he joked.
She sat at the table, under the beautiful lamp shade Caelen had given her. Kevin sat next to her.
“How did you know?” she asked.
“I have seen him before. I think… he may be part of the Chestnut Covin.”
“But you said the Chestnut Covin wasn’t dangerous.”
“It’s not,” Kevin replied hastily. “I just didn’t want a liar to hurt my granddaughter.”
Sharon sat in shock.
“Take your time,” he said again. “We are in no rush.”
“No, we need to get those articles for you, then you can correct the errors and my life can be normal again,” she stood up from the table and headed for the bookcases.
“The panel is in the back, yes?” Kevin said.
“Yes,” Sharon confirmed as she reached behind and activated the magnetic levitation device and swung the bookcase forward.
“Ah,” Kevin said as he inspected the panel. “An older model, and still in good shape.” He pushed a few buttons and then turned to her.
“Have you used it?” he asked her.
“No, I have not wanted to try.”
“According to this, it was used about six weeks ago.”
“That’s when you and Grandmother died,” Sharon said.
“We both died at the same time?”
“Yes, on the same day, within an hour of each other. She said she planned it that way.”
He looked at the panel and then back at her.
“Where are the articles?”
“Oh, I hid them under the bookcase,” she said getting on her knees to pull them out.
“That’s a good hiding place. Almost as good as the strong box your grandmother put them in,” he said as she straightened up.
Sharon stood up slowly, keeping the articles against her leg as she turned to face him.
“I didn’t tell you they were in a strong box. How did you know?”
He looked at her for a moment, and then a nasty smile spread across his face.
“I guessed I slipped up, didn’t I?” he said, and Sharon turned cold at the menace in his voice.
“You’re the one who is lying,” Sharon said in sudden realization, taking a step back. “Who are you? What do you want?”
“But for my mistake, this would have been so much easier. Now I will have to do it the hard way. What do I want? Your temporal amplifier, of course. And yes, I really am Kevin Bower, the man who would have become your grandfather. But I have no idea who you are and frankly, I don’t care.”
He touched something on the panel and then without warning he lunged for her, grabbing her by the throat with both hands, pressing down with his thumbs. There was a shocking flash of pain and she was gasping for breath, eyes wide, her fingers tearing at his, staggering backwards as she tried to pull away.
Through her panic she could hear a voice, a memory, a man showing her how to break a choke hold… her grandfather teaching her self-defense when she was a teen.
She stopped trying to pull his hands from her throat and grabbed his head, pushing her thumbs into his eyes. As he swung his head away to save his sight, he loosened his grip. She ducked under his arms, backing away towards the door until she struck the kitchen table, hitting her head on the lampshade.
There was a crash as he lost his balanc
e and fell against the coffee table, hands over his face. She ran for the door. Somehow, he was there again before she could open it, pulling her back. She jammed an elbow into his stomach, kicking against his legs and stomped on his feet, and he did not release his hold.
They fell against the bookcases, and she could hear books falling to the floor. Her ears were ringing, the light was flashing with the swinging lamp, and there was a muffled sound - shouting and banging? She wriggled half-way free and jabbed her fingers into his eyes again. Then she kneed him between the legs.
As he dropped to the floor in agony, the room seemed to flicker and warp like a mirage. The door was opening as she reached for it, a clean light in her eyes, and then everything went dark.
CHAPTER EIGHT
She was in a fragrant orchard. There were houses through the trees in the distance. The trees were shaking, soft white petals drifting to the ground. She had to get to the house, to get the people out. There was a sound like a gunshot.
“Shar! Sharon wake up! C’mon, you gotta wake up!”
She was in her bed and a man’s voice was calling to her through the bedroom door. Her head ached; no, her whole body ached. She swung her legs over the side of the bed and room swayed. Slowly she got up.
“Come on Shar, get up!” The voice said again, followed by an angry rap on the door. She knew that voice. Scott? What was he doing here?
She grabbed sweatpants, and a sweatshirt draped over a chair, ran her fingers through her hair, and opened the door. Scott was standing in her living room looking hung over. His hair was a mess, his t-shirt had three kinds of food stains, and he hadn’t shaved in days. He looked at her blearily.
“It’s about time. Some guy is here for you. He’s waiting on the step outside.”
“Scott, what are you doing here?” Sharon asked. “I thought you were in Albuquerque.”
“Albuquerque? Why on earth would I be in Albuquerque?”
“You were driving across country for a new job…?”
“A new job. Right. Like anyone would hire me, thanks for rubbing it in. You’re hilarious.”
He picked through a pile of clothes on the floor next to the couch, pulling out the cleanest items he could find.
“I’m getting in the shower, so I can be ready on time.”
“Ready for what?” Was she still dreaming?
“Olive’s funeral, what else? Don’t you remember? Jeez, you sound like Mom.”
“What do you mean Olive’s funeral? She’s fine! I saw her yesterday; she was beautiful and fine!”
“Maybe it wasn’t me that drank all that tequila last night,” Scott said nastily.
“I don’t understand…”
Scott spoke slowly and condescendingly.
“Olive was born stillborn two days ago. Holly is still in a coma and they are not sure she will make it. We’re going to the funeral today. Got it? Then we should get you an appointment to see Mom’s doctors. They say it’s hereditary you know….”
Sharon’s mouth dropped open as she watched him walk into the bathroom.
“Don’t forget the guy on the step, too,” he said as he closed the bathroom door behind him without looking at her.
Sharon looked through the peephole at the figure sitting outside her apartment door. It was Caelen.
She opened the door. He stood up and looked relieved to see her.
“Are you all right?” he asked, eyes full of concern.
“I think so,” She hesitated. It was coming back to her. Her grandmother. The fight. Time travel. Kevin said Caelen was from the future and that Caelen had lied to her. Caelen had admitted it was true. The man who was to be her grandfather Kevin had tried to kill her.
Not knowing what else to do, she went outside, closed the front door and sat down on the step.
Caelen sat down next to her. “What’s the last thing you remember?”
“You admitted lying, then Kevin attacked me, and we fought in my living room.”
Caelen winced. “I heard the fight. I was trying to help you, and I couldn't get through the door. Somehow the temporal amplifier activated.”
“What do you mean the temporal amplifier activated? Time travel is to the past and future, right? This is the present - but it’s different.”
“I think we’ve shifted to another timeline.”
“What does that mean?”
Caelen gestured toward the street in front of the apartment.
“Think of time like the horizontal axis on a graph - running in a straight line with points on it. At any of those points a change might happen that shifts us to another timeline running parallel to the first line, like a parallel street the next block over. Somehow the fight triggered a shift to a parallel line.”
“Why is it different?”
“A change may have happened on a point in the past that resulted in this present. The amplifier jumped us over from what was to what could have been.”
“If that is true, how can I remember the other… present, my present, the world the way it is supposed to be. Wouldn’t I have changed along with the timeline?”
Caelen nodded. “Yes, you would have except that you were near the temporal amplifier when it happened. The temporal amplifier generates what we call a temporal penumbra - a space around it in which the time traveler or multiple time travelers and sometimes even equipment transfers together. Think of it like a bubble. I was close enough that I was in the bubble, too, when the shift occurred.”
“Why didn’t the bubble bring Kevin along, too?”
“I think it must have, and it transported him to wherever he would be in this timeline, just like it transported you to where you would be - in this case, back to your apartment.”
“My grandfather’s dead in this present - at least I think he is…”
“And Kevin may not be.”
Sharon was silent for a minute before speaking again.
“My sister really is in a coma, dying, and my niece is dead.” Sharon saw the confirmation in Caelen’s eyes, and a brick of lead settled into her chest.
The door opened behind them.
“Are you wearing that to the funeral?” Scott still looked hung-over, though cleaner and neater, more like the brother she was used to seeing.
Sharon and Caelen stood up. “Caelen, this is my brother Scott. Scott, this is Caelen.”
“Yeah, hi,” Scott said with a perfunctory handshake. “Sharon, we’ve got to go,” he said walking back into the apartment, leaving the door open. Flutters of panic started in her stomach.
“How can I go to a funeral that’s not real to me? And with him, he’s not real, either. I don’t know who he is,” she whispered.
“Just go through the motions,” Caelen murmured. “I will be in the park waiting for you when you get back. Then we can figure out how to get out of this mess and set everything right again.”
Sharon walked into her apartment, stopping at the door to look back at Caelen. He nodded, his eyes saying It will be ok. She closed the door.
◆◆◆
There were only a few people at the funeral, focused on a sweet pink casket so small Sharon couldn’t stand to look at it. Scott seemed to feel the same way as he stood to one side staring off into some distance only, he saw. There was no sign of their parents.
Pete was there, looking grayer than she had ever seen anyone. It was if he was standing under a cloud where no light reached him and might not reach him ever again. He didn’t seem to focus on anyone as he shook hands and accepted hugs at the end of the service. He laid his hand on the casket, gray against the pink, and then left for his continued vigil at his wife’s side at the hospital.
Scott said nothing on the way back to the apartment which was fine with Sharon.
She was anxious to talk with Caelen, but she was not sure if she trusted him anymore. He had admitted that he lied to her. The rapport they had developed felt genuine.
In retrospect, there had been no real trust with Kevin. She had filled in
the blanks with him because she had missed her grandfather and wanted to see him in Kevin. Kevin was a stranger, and not her grandfather.
While Scott was in the bathroom, she changed into comfortable clothes and looked for the articles in their plastic sleeves. They were under the bookcases again. Tucking them in her bag she called to Scott.
“I’ll be in the park across the street.”
“Whatever,” came the reply through the bathroom door.
Caelen was sitting at a table, with two white paper bags.
“I thought you might be hungry,” he said as he pulled out sandwiches and bottled drinks. It was mid-afternoon, and Sharon’s stomach rumbled in response.
“Salami and cheese, right?” he smiled as he handed her a sandwich wrapped in paper.
“Yes, but I have never told you that.” She took a bite of the sandwich. “You should start with who you really are, why you are here, why you lied, and how you know I like salami. Then we can talk about how to fix things and get my life back.”
“I will tell you everything I can,” he promised.
“You had better,” she said. “You lied. I don’t really trust you, but right now I don’t have a choice. If you lie again, there will be no second chances. Are we clear?”
“Completely clear.” For a moment he looked as though he would apologize again and then changed his mind.
“My name really is Caelen, and I really did grow up helping in my parents’ auction house; just 150 years from now. I learned a lot about history working there when I became an adult, the Temporal Protection Corps recruited me to be an agent.”
“The TPC sent me here after the temporal mainframe detected unusual fluctuations in the timeline. They weren’t errors, more like ripples, centered on you and your grandparents.”
“The articles my grandmother left - she said they were related to errors in the timeline that would cause a… like a chain reaction and… impact the future.”
“Your grandmother? When did she tell you this?”
“I figured out what the list with the groups of numbers was.” She told him everything that the holographic image of her grandmother had told her.
“Wow, that was clever….”
