A Time Traveler's Theory of Relativity

by Nicole Valentine

  She pulled his desk chair out and took a seat. “I’m not here to ask any questions.” She nodded at Dad, who was leaning against the doorjamb with his arms crossed and a matching grin on his face. “I don’t even want to know. I’ve always preferred conjecture. I’m just here to say, if you ever need me, for anything”—she opened her eyes wide for emphasis—“I’ll be there. No questions asked. Understand?”

  “Yes, I do.” Finn smiled.

  Dad excused himself with an offer to whip up lunch. Aunt Ev thanked him and watched him go.

  “Good. Now that we’re alone, let me tell you some stories I’ve been dying to tell all these years.”

  She went on for at least an hour. Finn had to stop her several times because he was laughing so hard, it made his ribs hurt even more. It was so good to laugh, though—he almost didn’t mind the pain. She told him about her Travels within her own lifespan and even further back. Unlike Gran and Mom, she couldn’t move forward in time, so she made the most of her trips backward. She fired up his tablet and showed him how she’d been caught on film in a Charlie Chaplin movie talking into a cell phone. “That was stupid of me. I accidentally wandered into the shot. I wasn’t actually speaking to anyone of course, just recording some personal notes.” He looked at the grainy video carefully, and sure enough, there was Aunt Ev pausing in the background and speaking into what looked like an early model mobile phone. “Easy enough to explain away as an archaic hearing device and a mumbling old lady, but geez, was your gran mad at me!”

  He knew what she was doing. She was showing him the lighter side of what they were. That it wasn’t all the horrors of reliving your family’s worst days over and over again.

  “Aren’t you afraid you’ll change things?” he asked. “Isn’t that what you’re supposed to be avoiding?”

  “I’ve been around long enough to know that there’s a persistence to it, Finn. I’m not sure why, but it’s awfully hard to shift the overall arc of time. You make a change and things have a way of working out pretty much the same. Not always, mind you, but I’d say nine out of ten.”

  Finn did not like those odds. He had to agree with what Doc said: Aunt Ev seemed a little reckless. Still, she certainly made it sound fun.

  “How do you even know it’s turned out the same?”

  “Excellent question! Changing the past, it’s supposed to be the perfect crime, isn’t it? There are no witnesses. Once the past is changed, everyone accepts that as true history, right?”

  That sounded logical. Finn nodded.

  “Except your mother could see where things were altered from the prime imprint. She never would’ve let me get away with doing any lasting damage. She didn’t hesitate to sound the alarm when someone was changing the timeline—namely, Doc, Billie, and the Others. Most of ISTA didn’t believe her. That’s when your parents retreated into themselves. They became quiet and secretive, didn’t trust anyone.”

  “How much did they trust you with?”

  “Not much at all. But I like it that way. It makes for a much more comfortable existence.”

  “So what’s your opinion on—Faith?”

  “All I can say is, it’d be a shame for her talent to be put to the wrong use. The daughter . . .” She paused here and corrected herself with a knowing grin. “The child usually has what talents the mother had, and then some. My mother couldn’t travel backward beyond her own time of birth. I can. And your gran was the first one to go forward in time, only it was very sparingly. It cost her dearly, health-wise.”

  They both sat quietly for a moment, missing Gran.

  Then Ev looked around the room, clearly searching for a distraction, and fixed her gaze on the periodic table of elements on the wall behind him. “You know, I think they’re missing marble.”

  “Marble isn’t an element.”

  “Well, I can’t claim to know science the way you do. All I’m saying is maybe they should be studying it more closely.”

  Finn didn’t want to sound disrespectful, but he knew that marble was made up of ordinary elements like calcium and carbon. Aunt Ev must have read his mind, because she gave him a sly grin.

  “Did it help you at all? The grounding stone?”

  “I don’t know, maybe . . .” He thought about the pain of being thrown off the node completely. How he thought about the stone . . . but no. It was Gabi. He said her name over and over and somehow there was this great big ball of light . . . Gabi’s dream! It was Gabi’s dream in third grade that brought him home!

  “Well, I still say there’s no Traveling without Dorset marble. Where do you think it all went to back in the day, all that stone from the quarry?”

  Finn tried to focus. “Well, they sold it.”

  “Yep, up and down the east coast. Buildings that still stand till this day.”

  Now that he thought about it, Faith had mentioned it too—how in one timeline, she’d been far away from home but had used Dorset marble to Travel. “The Others! That would explain why they can Travel even though they’re not in Dorset.”

  “That’s my, what do you call it . . . hypothesis? That’s it.”

  So many new ideas floating around in his head—he could only half-grasp them at best. “It can’t be magic stone, Aunt Ev.”

  “Magic, science. Call it what you wish. You agree that there is still a lot that humans don’t know about the natural world?”

  “Sure . . . I think you may be on to something—”

  “Of course I am! Science may not be able to prove that magic exists, but I’m going to guess that it can’t prove it doesn’t.”

  “You know, that’s the kind of stuff Gabi says all the time.”

  She grinned. “Well now, I’m beginning to like that squawky little bird more and more.”

  °°°

  The next few days went by in a comforting blur of playing video games, reading, and sleeping. Finn’s thirteenth birthday was a quiet one, but he didn’t mind. He was used to it. Dad got him a cake and Aunt Ev stopped by to help celebrate. She gave Finn some new books on physics and his own vintage watch. Finn raised an eyebrow at her and she immediately put both hands up in surrender. “Got it online. I swear!”

  The best part of the day was chatting with Gabi online. She wasn’t able to visit yet, but she was doing much better. Finn kept the conversation light—they talked about books she was reading, and she poked fun at him for being a teenager. He was going back to school before her and promised to fill her in on what happened each day. It was as if they’d both agreed to discuss more important matters in person.

  Finn tried several times to Travel. He concentrated and hoped to see the threads of time, the glowing nodes. Each attempt was more disappointing than the last. He had somehow expected everything to fall into place after his birthday, but it didn’t. He kept this piece of information to himself.

  Dad barely left the house and continued his work researching Dorset residents in the late 1800s, looking for any other signs of Mom and Faith. He had already found a mention of a widow with a small child who was teaching at the one-room schoolhouse. Their name was one that he and Mom had agreed upon as a code if the worst were ever to happen. That was the only clue so far, though, and Dad was tirelessly searching for more.

  Dad didn’t tell Finn specifically what he was trying to find, but Finn saw the pages and pages of old Dorset death records. If Mom stayed and never came back, there would be a record of her death.

  Finn comforted himself with logic. She could still find a way out and come visit them, even if she had to return to the past. She could show up here any minute.

  She couldn’t ever be truly gone. Could she?

  He peeked in on Dad and asked how it was going. The office was still in shambles. Dad saw the look on Finn’s face and assured him he knew what was in each and every teetering pile.

  “Over there is information on the cheese factories. They were big in the late 1800s. In that pile is correspondence of summering residents. Dorset had already become a
summer boarding resort. Your mother picked a fine time to take up residence. Business booming! She’ll be okay.”

  Something about his tone told Finn he was trying to reassure himself more than Finn.

  Finn looked up at the shelf behind him for the photo. “Where’s the other picture you had?”

  “What picture?”

  “Um, never mind.” He wouldn’t press now. Maybe in this altered timeline it caused Dad too much pain to have it there. Finn’s head was beginning to throb.

  “You feeling okay? Can I get you something?”

  Finn couldn’t help but notice that Dad was making a huge effort. It took a lot to make Dad come out from behind the books, and now Finn understood why. It wasn’t history to him. It never was. Once you lived with a Traveler, everything was now.

  The concerned look on Dad’s face reminded him of the day at the quarry. How Dad had called him a man.

  Finn had been so wrong about Dad. His father loved him, loved him with his whole heart. Finn wanted to apologize for the way he’d acted, but he knew it would come out as a choked sob. He wasn’t ready to cry yet. He didn’t want to make Dad cry either. The air in the room became even more oppressive.

  “I just need some air. I’ll be fine.” He made for the door, pretending to feel much better than he actually did.

  “Okay then, I’ll stop and make us some dinner in a bit,” Dad called after him.

  “Yep.” Finn held on to the walls for support and made his way to the back door. He needed air, that was it.

  Chapter 34

  Out on the patio, Finn took a deep breath, and as the cold oxygen filled his lungs he felt better. He sat in the nearest lounge chair and pulled his sweatshirt sleeves over his hands for warmth. The air smelled of firewood and dead leaves.

  He could see the space in the tree line where Aunt Ev had led him and Gabi. It was a lifetime ago. For a moment, the memory of Faith striding through the trees and brush on the mountain surfaced in his mind. It sent chills through his body. No matter what Dad or Aunt Ev said, his mind played the fears in a loop. She could come after him anytime.

  He pushed the thought out of his head. He wasn’t going to let Faith make him afraid of his woods.

  Anyway, if Dad was right, he had other things to worry about. Dad and Aunt Ev were so sure he was going to develop some impressive Traveler powers. What if they were wrong? Nothing was happening for him. He touched the smooth stone Aunt Ev had given him, snug in his pocket.

  He hoped he wouldn’t suddenly wake up in another time by accident. Aunt Ev had told him that it was only the last three generations that were able to control it at all. Some of his ancestors didn’t even realize they were Travelers. They thought they were having terrible dreams or being haunted by ghosts. It made sense; if you suddenly woke up in a tavern one hundred years earlier and saw all these people milling about, a non-scientific mind could imagine they were ghostly visions. Okay, so maybe even a scientific mind would be fooled. Still, he planned to take notes of anything strange and keep his wits about him. Assuming anything would even happen at all.

  The truth was he couldn’t shake the feeling that someone else was responsible for the few battles he had won.

  He laid his head back and looked at the gray sky. It would be dark soon. He closed his eyes and thought about Gran. How much easier all this would be if she were here to guide him.

  “Hello, Finn.”

  He didn’t even have to open his eyes—he knew it was her. But his eyes wanted to see. She was there in front of him on the patio. As real and alive as if she had never gone.

  “Gran!”

  “I told you I’d see you again.”

  He swallowed a lump in his throat. “Why . . . why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

  She smiled weakly. “I honestly thought I had more time. How’s that for irony?”

  She cautiously laid herself in the lounge chair next to his, sighing deeply.

  “Are you okay?”

  “No. I’m dying, but you knew that already.”

  Finn sat up quickly in a panic. “Gran—”

  “Now you wait. Don’t speak. Tell me. You did it, didn’t you? You got Faith away from the quarry?”

  “Yes, but—”

  The skin around her eyes crinkled up as she smiled wide. She could smile two ways. He knew when she did it with her eyes, that she was truly happy.

  “Your mother, what a sharp one. I raised her right and she did good by you, too.”

  “There’s more, Gran.”

  She put up one slender hand to stop him.

  “Listen, you’re going to need to know some important things about talking to Travelers. You don’t say more than you need to. You don’t say much at all. You listen. You wait for the questions. You think about when the Traveler is from before you speak. You understand?”

  “I think so.” She was cautioning him not to tell her too much, but what did it matter now? “Where—I mean, when are you?”

  “For me, it’s the night I go. Late in the evening after you’ve gone to bed. I’ve arranged for a younger me to talk to you in the morning.”

  “Yes, we’ve met.”

  “It must seem strange to you, the way I talk to my past and future selves—we have a lot of loose ends to tie up, and we often recruit ourselves to help. In fact, I was talking to yet another Me when I sent you off to Gabi’s house that morning.”

  Finn remembered the hushed murmurs through the door.

  She took a deep, rattling breath and coughed. “I attempted far too many tricks tonight. You got me thinking, with that many-interacting-worlds theory. I thought maybe we keep failing because there is more than one Faith, that maybe she’s found a way to hop universes, like you said. If I could only check—well, I found it. It’s out there and it’s possible to make the jump.”

  “You found a next-door universe?”

  “All this time, we were operating on the basis of multiple timelines. We were short-sighted. There are multiple universes, each with multiple timelines. I only got a glimpse of what’s next door.” She sighed sadly. “I also got a glimpse of what Billie and Will were up to in ours.”

  “And then you left me the note.”

  “Yes.”

  Finn turned his head away from her, preferring to ask this question to the forest in front of him. “So then, this is the last time for us, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. This is the last time.”

  Finn reached over the space between their two lawn chairs and grabbed her hand. He held on tight. Gran squeezed back and swallowed hard before continuing.

  “Now,” she had that lecturing voice, “remember when we spoke about the butterfly theory the other night?”

  “Yes, Gran. It’s part of chaos theory.” He couldn’t help thinking she was still in “the other night.”

  “Right. In time travel, it’s the big, fat, scary warning. It’s the belief that one small change can create a disaster of epic proportions. Well, it’s hogwash. The most important thing you need to know is that time is persistent. She’s stubborn. Time is one stubborn—” She took a deep breath and pursed her lips like she was angry with some invisible creature standing before them on the patio. “Well, let’s just say she cannot be persuaded, shall we? It’s not about the beat of a wing or catching a later bus. You think you’ve shifted something, and then something else happens to bring about the original outcome.”

  He remembered Aunt Ev saying the same thing.

  “Then why even care? Why try and change anything?”

  “Here’s the key, here’s the only thing Time listens to, Finn. What matters is how people affect people.”

  Finn’s mind flashed back to his swelling stars. It was like the universe kept trying to tell him something in a language he didn’t understand.

  “I know the way you think,” Gran said gently. “You think you have a staggering mathematical problem in front of you. You’re thinking about all the permutations you’ll have to figure out. None of this can be
solved with equations or software. What I’m trying to tell you is, it’s not the data, it’s the people. It’s the choices they make—choices to be kind, choices to see and not look away. Those are the real factors. That’s what tilts the equation. It has never been the beat of a butterfly wing, it’s the beat of a human heart. If you want to change time, you must change hearts. Remember that, Finn.”

  She squeezed his hand again, weaker this time but with the same tenderness. Finn blinked hard, staring at her wristwatch.

  “People will tell you Faith needs to be stopped at all costs. That she’s a twisted, evil thing that needs to be erased.”

  “Have you met her lately, Gran?”

  “Oh, I’ve had many a glimpse. I know what she is and what she’s capable of. I have no doubt. I only ask you to remember what she once was—and know that you’ve already changed her. You’ve planted a seed in her that she can’t ignore.”

  Finn thought about Faith’s small trusting face, still smeared with tears and dirt, her piercing green eyes staring at him, connecting them.

  “How can you possibly know that?” he asked.

  “Because this time, when I’ve come here to check on you, you are alive.”

  Hearing that Faith had killed him in other timelines shouldn’t be a surprise. It didn’t even bother him so much. He knew the dangers that lay in wait for him now, and somehow he no longer felt afraid. What bothered him was that his loved ones had to keep witnessing it. His heart ached the most for Mom. The chess game she had been forced to play was no game at all.

  It wasn’t fun for him either.

  “There was no magic portal, Gran.” He wanted her to know. She had been so proud of Mom for making it. Deep down, in that selfish place that resides in all of us, he wanted some company in his disillusionment. “It’s just a tree.”

  “Oh, I’m not so sure about that. Your mother created it. We both believed in it and it worked. Sounds magical to me.”

  He was sure that was not solid evidence and was about to say so until he realized there was no point in looking for proof of magic.