Channel '63

by BRUCE EDWARDS

  A name was attached to each crib, identifying the baby inside.

  I saw Albert: 7 lbs, 6oz.

  Bernice: 8 lbs, 3oz.

  and Amy!

  What a coincidence. A baby with the same name as mine. Then I noticed that the crib was empty. She must be out for her evening feeding, I thought. No, that must be her being bottle-fed by that person in the corner.

  In a rocking chair sat a man, with a tiny baby in his arms. He rocked gently, back and forth, while bottle-feeding the precious infant. Such care.

  Wait a minute!

  I pressed my face to the glass. The pink blanket that covered the baby had rattles embroidered on it. I knew that blanket like I knew my own skin. That was my blanket!

  I banged on the glass. “Hey, you!” I yelled, but the man didn’t look up. I dashed around the corner to the nursery entrance and swung open the door.

  “What the hell’s going on here?” I shouted.

  But instead of hearing the sounds of crying babies, I entered to the shouts of “Happy Birthday!” Where the cribs had been was now a kitchen table. Helium balloons on ribbons rose from a colorful centerpiece, next to a birthday cake with five burning candles on top. A small group of people in party hats cheered as the same man I saw through the glass entered, with a little girl in a pink dress clinging to his shoulders.

  After a rousing chorus of “Happy Birthday to You,” the man sat the little girl down in front of the cake. “Happy birthday, Amy,” he said to her. The man was my father, 11 years younger, and I was the 5-year-old being honored.

  The scene played out exactly as I remembered it. I watched in stunned silence as my past was replayed before my eyes. No one seemed to be aware of my presence. I was Mr. Scrooge being shown his former life by the Ghost of Christmas Past.

  “Now make a wish, Amy, and blow out the candles,” said my dad, “but don’t tell anybody what it is, or it might not come true.”

  “Can I tell you?” asked little Amy, in a sweet voice.

  “Well, okay. I’ll make an exception this time.”

  Dad leaned down as the girl whispered softly in his ear. No one heard what she was saying, but I remember exactly what I told him that day: I wish we will always be together.

  The birthday girl in the pink dress blew out her candles, with a little help from her proud father.

  Everyone applauded, and I would have clapped along with them, had I not been wiping the tears from my eyes. Seeing my dad’s sweetness, knowing how horribly I had treated him that morning was more than I could stand.

  I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. I raced out the door, only to find myself in another room. The sounds of the party abruptly stopped the instant the door slammed shut behind me.

  The space was pitch black and dead quiet. Suddenly, a row of light panels on the wall came on, lighting up the empty room. The panels were those illuminated displays doctors use to look at x-rays. But these weren’t revealing some sick patient’s skeletal innards, they were playing old home videos from my past.

  Each panel showed a different stage of my life growing up with my parents. The deeply personal moments included me as a 3-year-old, climbing into bed with my dad during a lightning storm; baking oatmeal cookies with my mom when I was 7; getting kissed on the forehead by both of them at my junior high school graduation.

  The volume of the soundtracks steadily increased the longer I stayed in the room. I held my hands over my ears as the sound got louder, finally merging into a mish-mash of noise that I couldn’t bear to listen to.

  With my eardrums about to burst, I opened the door into another room. I was in a darkened hallway. Moonlight streamed in through a window, left open to a wintry night. I knew that window, having spent many hours gazing up at the stars through it. I was in the hall outside my bedroom, in the city apartment I knew as a child.

  I crept carefully into the familiar scene, as fond memories of those happy times came flooding back to me. Then I heard the latch of my bedroom door. Our family doctor was quietly closing it as he stepped into the hallway. He tip-toed right past me without saying a word, like I was invisible.

  Reaching for the doorknob, I opened it ever so slowly, and peered inside my room. Under the light of my nightstand lamp, I saw 10-year-old Amy, laying silently under the covers of her bed, with a damp washcloth across her forehead. Kneeling on the floor beside her was my dad, his hands clasped together in prayer. Tears ran down his cheeks as he bowed his head in silence.

  I remember that night, suffering with a raging fever, but through my delirium, had no memory of my dad being in the room with me. I had contracted a grave illness, that I later learned I had barely lived through.

  I never realized that the trials of parenting could be so profound. For sure, seeing these past events from a fresh point-of-view was eye-opening. But I was now filled with remorse for not being more understanding. If only I had known.

  I started to walk toward my grieving father with my outstretched hand, when the lamp suddenly went out, leaving the room in total darkness.

  A light faded up behind me. As I spun around, I was now in a hospital patient room. The walls were bare and the room was empty, save a single bedside curtain. I heard the faint beeping of a heart monitor and the mechanical noise of a breathing apparatus. The light behind the translucent partition projected the silhouette of someone lying in a hospital bed.

  I pulled back the curtain. There in the bed lay my dad, in a coma, an oxygen mask over his mouth. IV fluids dripped down narrow tubes to needles inserted in his arms.

  I walked around the side of the bed and stood over him, then took hold of his hand. I wanted to tell him how awful I felt, how I wish I could take back all the suffering I had caused him. But I was unable to speak. Even if I could, he probably wouldn’t hear me anyway.

  On the night table lay a copy of To Kill a Mockingbird. I picked it up and gently glided my fingers over the cover, like it was made of fine silk.

  I held the book close to my face.

  “Are you in there, Scout?” I said. “What do I tell him? I have so much to say, but can’t find the words. The funny thing is, I’ve never been at a loss for words before. That’s part of my problem, you see. I talk when I should be listening. You always listened to Atticus whenever there was a crisis. Now I’m facing the biggest crisis in my life. Tell me what to do.”

  The flashing lights of the machines were blurred through the tears in my eyes. My fingers tightened around the book.

  “What am I doing?” I cried, throwing the book down on the table. “Why am I talking to you, Scout? You’re nothing but a fictional character, hatched out of someone’s fantasy. This is reality. Go back! You don’t belong here!”

  I marched out of the room and slammed the door behind me, then leaned against it with my head in my hands. The bustling sounds of a busy hospital returned. Looking up, I was back in the hospital corridor.

  I was emotionally exhausted. Dragging myself back to the nurses station, I walked up to the same nurse I had spoken to earlier.

  She smiled at me. “How can I help you?”

  “I need a drink of water,” I said.

  “Why? Are you sick?”

  “I’m tired and I’m thirsty. No one should have to go through what I just did.”

  “Did you find your father?”

  “I found that I’m a terrible person who should be put away before she hurts anyone else.”

  “That’s good!” said the nurse, bubbling over with enthusiasm. She reached over and felt my forehead with the palm of her hand.

  “Yup,” she said. “The fever’s broken. I think you’re okay to go home now.”

  I pushed her hand away. “What’s the matter with you people?“ I shouted. The entire hospital staff stopped and stared at me from my outburst. “Everyone keeps asking me if I’m sick. I ask for simple directions, and instead you send me on a magical mystery tour. I came here to talk to my dad, and I couldn’t even do that. Now you tell me to go home. Wha
t kind of a hospital is this?”

  The nurse grabbed the base of her neck and lifted upward. A rubber mask rolled over her face to reveal the head of a sheep underneath it. The rest of the hospital workers pulled masks off of their heads, too. There were tiger doctors, panda interns, and monkey orderlies.

  “I knew it!” I said in a fit of anger. “Fritterz! This is a fake hospital!”

  “Not really,” said the sheep nurse. “Hospitals are institutions of healing. Sick and anguished people go there when they have nowhere else to turn. They beg for a cure, but sometimes the best medicine is already inside them. You came here to find a sick patient. You just didn’t know that patient was you.”

  “Where’s my dad!” I shouted.

  “In the hands of medical science—and God. Go home, Amy. There’s nothing more you can do for him.”

  I ran to the doors that led to the waiting area, then looked back at the Fritterz. They stared at me in silence, then slowly faded away like ghosts, as the human hospital staff faded in, going about their normal duties.

  I pushed through the doors, plopped down in a chair, and folded my arms. I was pissed!

  A woman seated next to me was reading a newspaper, with a large photo on the front page. It showed President Kennedy’s young son saluting a flag-draped casket, following his father’s assassination. The headline read Nation Prepares for Kennedy Remembrance. I felt little John, Jr.’s anguish, not knowing if my own father would survive the night.

  The woman saw me studying her paper. “A tragic day,” she said to me. “No one should lose their father at such a young age. But no one saw it coming.”

  I had to agree with her. How could anyone have predicted we would suffer our country’s greatest loss on that fateful day in 1963!

  Kennedy was shot on November 22nd. Today was November 20th.

  Maybe no one on that day 50 years ago could do anything to prevent it.

  But I could!

  Chapter 16

  Saving Kennedy

  The blast of the train’s steam whistle could be heard all over Theme Farm. The old train was a throwback to the ones from the 19th century that took presidential candidates on whistle-stop tours all over America. Red, white, and blue banners adorned the platform behind the rear passenger car. From there, ambitious candidates would address cheering crowds at station stopovers.

  Theme Farm’s train only circled the perimeter of the park. It was dubbed The Washington Express—so named because it just goes around and around, and never gets anywhere. It seemed appropriate that Hubert and I should be riding this presidential relic, since we were there to discuss preventing President Kennedy’s assassination.

  Since the day I first met Clifford, Hubert had respected my privacy, never once pressing me to include him in my Used-to-Be TV adventures. While I kept the personal side of my activities to myself, the plot to save Kennedy needed to be thoroughly thought out, and I welcomed Hubert’s input.

  He had compiled the historical facts of the event and organized them on his tablet. It showed all the pertinent information, along with news film footage. An animated map detailed the location and timing of everything that happened that day.

  The assassination occurred at 12:30 pm. President Kennedy was riding in a motorcade through downtown Dallas, when his assassin fired at him from the sixth-floor window of a building along the route.

  “I don’t know if saving Kennedy is possible,” said Hubert, “I’ve analyzed the data, and haven’t come up with a foolproof approach that won’t endanger Clifford. If he tells the police what’s going to happen, they’ll lock him up as a terrorist. Then when he fails to stop it, he’ll be implicated in the murder. Telling the cops who the gunman is won’t help, either, because the perpetrator can’t be arrested without probable cause. Even if he wants to physically protect the President, he’ll never get past the Secret Service. You got any ideas?”

  “Yes,” I said. “No weapon—no assassination.”

  “Huh?”

  “It’s simple. Kennedy was shot with a high-powered rifle. We know how and when his killer will smuggle his weapon into the building. All Clifford has to do is disarm him before he gets there.”

  “That’ll mean confronting a deranged and dangerous killer. Doesn’t that bother you?”

  “For sure. But Clifford’s a big time, political activist now. He won’t shy away from a chance like this.”

  Hubert closed his tablet. “I don’t know, Amy. Something feels wrong about this. If it works, you will have saved a great man and altered history, but you may be changing more than you know.”

  “I’ll be changing things for the better.”

  “Don’t be so sure. Lyndon Johnson only became president as a direct result of the assassination. He might never have been president had Kennedy lived. It was LBJ who signed the Civil Rights Act—not Kennedy. We might see separate “white” and “colored” drinking fountains at school if this works.”

  “But what about Vietnam? It was Johnson who escalated the war. Kennedy might have pulled our troops out had he not been killed. Clifford would like that.”

  The train bell rang as it rolled in to the station. The conductor called out: “Attention all passengers! Disembark here for these attractions: The Sweet Revenge Bakery, Hall of Wartime Presidents, and Used-to-Be TV.”

  The old locomotive came to a stop. “This is where I get off,” I said.

  I stepped off the train, then waved to Hubert as the engine’s big wheels started to turn.

  Hubert leaned out the window.

  “Don’t do this, Amy!” he begged me. “You’re messing with something more powerful than you know.”

  The train picked up speed and rounded the bend out of sight, on to its next stop.

  I knew exactly what Hubert was trying to tell me, but I didn’t care. How often have people debated what they would change if they could go back in time? The classic scenario is to go to 1930s Germany and take out Hitler. Who hasn’t wished that were possible? But I wasn’t trying to kill anybody. I wanted to save someone, and ensure that those Kennedy kids would live a long life with their father. What better motive could there be than that?

  I made sure that I had Hubert’s tablet with me as I locked the door to my cottage. If I was going to try to save Kennedy, I could immediately confirm my success or failure by searching online resources

  I turned on the tablet, then checked—and double-checked—the strength of the WiFi signal. This was no time for a technical glitch.

  While I waited for Clifford, I searched: Kennedy Assassination. The results showed the details as they currently existed. The images from that November were almost too hard to look at: the disbelief in the faces of those who witnessed the shooting; the throngs of mourners filing past the casket; Kennedy’s young family saying their final goodbyes. It all reinforced my commitment to reverse this brutal and unnecessary tragedy.

  One website showed the headlines from all the major newspapers on that sad day. All I had to do was refresh the tablet display, and if anything had changed, the headlines would reflect it.

  I heard someone enter the security office on the TV.

  “It’s about time,” I said. But it wasn’t Clifford sitting down in the chair, it was his dad, Earl! Sarah was with him.

  “Oh, hello Mr. and Mrs. Anderson,” I said. “I didn’t expect to see you.”

  “We’d like to speak with you alone,” said Earl.

  “Is everything okay? Is Clifford alright?”

  “That’s a matter of opinion,” said Sarah. “His health is fine, if that’s what you’re asking, but his head is a little messed up.”

  I knew right away why Sarah was upset. Clifford was not the same person I met three months earlier. His political views had put him at odds with his folks, and I feared he might have done something to turn his parents against him.

  “Is Clifford there?” I asked timidly.

  “Forget about Clifford for a moment,” grumbled Earl. “It’s you I’m
angry with. You see this?” He held up Clifford’s Selective Service papers, ripped to shreds. The little pieces had been taped back together. “Clifford did this right in front of us, just to make us mad. It’s not like him.”

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “Can I talk to Clifford, now?”

  “You may not!” shouted Earl. “I blame you for this. He used to be a sensible, patriotic young man before he met you. Now it’s, ‘Amy wouldn’t put up with your crap,’ or ‘Amy could teach you a thing or two.’

  “That’s not my fault.”

  “He skips school to go to protest rallies. His grades are so appalling that he won’t be graduating from high school this year.”

  “I had nothing to do with that.”

  “You’ve been a bad influence on him, Amy. You put ideas in his head and turned him into one of those radical troublemakers.”

  It was time I stood up for myself.

  “I didn’t do any such thing!” I yelled. “Just because you can’t control your own son is no fault of mine.”

  “You see?” said Sarah. “That’s just the attitude we’re talking about. No respect.”

  Arguing with Clifford’s parents felt just like fighting with my own, and I didn’t like it. I cooled down and took a deep breath.

  “I don’t mean to sound disrespectful,” I said. “You’re good parents. I knew that the first time I met you. But you have to accept part of the blame for Clifford’s rebelliousness. You question his patriotism because his love-of-country doesn’t include dying in a jungle war. You expect him to follow in your footsteps instead of letting him find his own path. Blame me if you want, but Clifford and his generation are already heading down that road, with no help from me.”

  Earl had calmed down by now, too. “There is some truth in what you say. Please understand. We’re only interested in Clifford’s well-being.”