“Are you a Sere?” Kyle asked.
Allaire shook her head. “They took me in when my father was . . . When he died.”
“It sounds like you’re the one who’s protecting the timestream, not them,” Kyle said. “How many Seres are there? Can’t they help you?”
“There’s Ayers, and there’s Yalé,” she answered. “And Yalé can’t time weave.”
“So, you work for Yalé,” Kyle said.
“Not really,” Allaire said. “Haven’t you ever believed in something that you might not be able to see or touch?”
Ayers had been so convincing. And yet Allaire couldn’t even articulate what she was doing any of this for. “Not so much that I’d kill for it,” Kyle said. “How do you know that you’re not the reason the tunnel is getting shorter?”
She shrugged and looked away.
“You’re out there with your knives killing god knows who,” Kyle said, “Just like you did to those guys in the prison.”
“I did that for you!” she said, tears forming in her eyes.
“And you would still probably let those kids from the bus die if you could,” Kyle said.
“If it saved three hundred forty people? Yes,” she answered. “Don’t you think you would too?”
Kyle got close to her face now. “You want to know what I think? I think you have no clue what you can change, and what you can’t. And because of that, everything you do to try to stop Ayers from messing with your precious timestream is a shot in the dark. Everything you are doing sounds like bullshit to me.”
She sat down on her chair again, and buried her face in her hands.
“I don’t think you love me,” he said. “I think I was a nice little diversion from what sounds like a sad, sad life, Allaire.” Unloading on her felt cathartic. “You never should’ve saved me from the Tigres. I should’ve died that day, or rotted away in prison.”
Allaire sobbed into her hands.
Kyle felt dense that it had taken him so long to realize that his best option was the one he’d left. The boring life where no one was trying to kill him, where at least he knew where he stood. “You and Ayers can have each other,” he said. “I’m done. You’ll never have to pretend you love me again, or do that fake flirting bullshit when you want something.”
“I never pretended!” she said through her tears.
Kyle pulled out his silk blot. “If the world looks better in 2060 when I finally get there the right way, I’ll send you a ‘thank you’ card, all right?”
She picked her head up and looked at Kyle. “Stay here so I can protect you, at least. You have the mutation. He needs you, and he’ll make you do things you can’t imagine.”
“I’ve made up my mind,” he said.
“I’m scared, Kyle!” she said, hitting the table. “I feel like this is really going to be the end for us, but I don’t think it’s supposed to be.” He felt a pang of sympathy for her, as her words replayed in his head: sitting here alone at the end of fucking world, screaming for help.
The longer Kyle sat there the more chance she would say something to change his mind. He’d been on a string since he first learned about time weaving from Myrna Rachnowitz—one minute believing he’d found the greatest secret in the universe, the next thinking he’d discovered a curse.
“You’ll find him in 1989,” Kyle said, stepping into the silk blot like a pair of pants, the way he’d seen Ayers do it. “You be careful too . . . ”
He pulled the blot over his neck and then his head. This is the last time I’m ever doing this, he told himself.
CHAPTER 11
December 7, 2016
* * *
Forty-four years earlier
Even though Kyle was no longer affected physically in the same way by time weaving, it was always a difficult thing to jump back into the rhythm of his life in another time.
He had missed a shift at the Mega-Market this morning when he was too tired to do anything but sleep. Brady ruined his nap by calling to see where he was, and Kyle had to agree to work in the evening just to shut him up.
When Kyle finished getting dressed, he walked through the kitchen and shook his head at the mountain of dishes in the sink. Neither of them was great at keeping up with simple housekeeping chores, and dishes were frequently so backed up that the sides of the sink held stacks of dirty flatware, and dirty pans occupying the stovetop, caked with old food residue. On his way out, he spotted a note in an envelope on their small kitchen table. It was labeled: KYLE.
He quickly ripped the envelope open and pulled out a folded piece of notebook paper.
KYLE,
OUR RENT: $900/month
YOUR SHARE: $150/month
PLEASE TAKE CARE OF ALL DISHES TODAY.
-BRADY
Kyle rolled his eyes and crumpled the note, tossing it onto the mountain of dishes. He looked at the clock—half an hour until he had to head out to catch the bus to the Mega-Market. Definitely enough time to do a load. He knew he’d enjoy his night more if he didn’t have to hear a lecture from Brady—between the dishes and missing his shift, it was sure to be a doozy—but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Not after a bitchy note like that.
When he got off the bus a little later, Kyle took his time and strolled slowly to the Mega-Market, thinking about how Allaire was probably back in 1989 right now, which of course, wasn’t right now at all. He’d been tempted by Ayers’s offer of eternal life, but not enough to follow him through the tunnel.
Again, he felt bad about how he’d left things with Allaire. But this time he felt justified. Finding out that she had pretended their first meeting was a chance encounter gave him enough reason to doubt so many other things about her.
So, Kyle took the safe route and came back to 2016. According to Samyra, the woman who gave it to him, the silk blot under his bed right now would expire sometime this evening, disintegrating into thin air. After that, Kyle wouldn’t have the chance to go back again on his own, which was probably a good thing.
“I need you on the checkout line tonight,” Brady said to Kyle, thirty seconds after he’d clocked in. Kyle laughed to himself when he thought about Brady trying to comprehend everything he’d experienced since his last shift.
“‘Hey’ to you too,” Kyle said.
“That whole crew on register is struggling. Two drawers were short money already this afternoon. I don’t know who the cashiers think is making up that seven dollars. Sure as hell ain’t this guy,” he said, pointing to himself. “I need you to be the strong link, Kyle. The one who makes up for . . . the weak links. Can you do that?”
Kyle nodded, trying hard not to roll his eyes.
“Checkstand twelve,” Brady said. “On the double, soldier.”
He worked in a daze, making each minute of his shift feel like hours. He couldn’t help but think about the silk blot that was disintegrating underneath his bed right now. By the time he got back home tonight, his door to both the past and the future would be closed forever.
The hours of repetitive work gave him too much time to think. He missed the Allaire he’d fallen for. Whether it was a customer’s blond hair that made him remember the way her hair felt in his hand as he pulled her close for a kiss, or another customer who bought eggs and reminded Kyle of the morning after their first night together. She’d gone to the store and brought him back breakfast. It was a good thing the Mega-Market discouraged cashiers from too much extraneous conversation (“E.C.,” as Brady called it) with customers, because Kyle was barely present enough to muster the “Hello, and welcome to Mega-Market” he was required to give each shopper.
Her words kept playing in his head: “Do you have any clue how hard it is to track down someone who literally knows everything you’re going to do before you do it?” If Ayers did know Allaire was coming to find him in 1989, he’d be ready for her.
The thought of Allaire coming through her silk blot only to find Ayers waiting there, weapon in hand, danced through Kyle’s mind over
and over again as he scanned containers of apple juice, low-end patio furniture, four-packs of cheap picture frames, and anything else that came across his checkstand.
He recoiled for a moment as he saw blood pass right in front of his face, only to realize it was a bright red sweater moving over his conveyor belt. Startled out of his daydream, he looked up at the customer, scanned the item, and watched her swipe in her credit card.
“Hey,” someone said behind Kyle. He turned around and it was Brady, who walked around Kyle’s checkstand, pulled the red sweater from the belt and put it into a plastic bag. He handed it to the customer who walked off. “What are you doing? I’ve watched you with the last four customers. You’re not bagging anything. You look like a freakin’ zombie out here.”
“I’m not sure what’s wrong with me today,” Kyle said.
“You better get yourself right,” Brady said. “The house is a mess. You’re fucking up at work. I can’t cover for you forever, Kyle. I look at myself like . . . the head coach of a football team. Like that TV show . . . You’re one of the players who needs a little more support, so I bring you home, my family takes you in. We get you on your feet.”
“You don’t have a family,” Kyle said. “You lived alone before I moved in.”
“I’m just saying, if I had a family,” Brady said. “My point is that you’ve gotta meet me halfway, Kyle.”
Kyle knew he didn’t have a lot of options. He had very little money. His relationship with his mother was beyond strained in this version of the timestream, so living with her was not an option. Keeping Brady happy meant a job, and a place to live.
“You want a better life someday,” Brady said. “Don’t you? And I know you want to have a roof over your head.”
Kyle shrugged, then meekly nodded, wishing he was anywhere but here.
Brady leaned in toward Kyle, whispering loudly. “You wouldn’t believe it, but I used to be just like you.”
Kyle raised his hand for a backup checker, so he could use the restroom. He needed to take a few deep breaths and get away from Brady right away.
“I got you covered for five. Go get yourself straight,” Brady said, patting him on the shoulder. “Remember, I need warriors out here.”
CHAPTER 12
December 7, 2016
* * *
A few minutes later
Kyle exited the bathroom stall and walked to the sink. He looked in the mirror and saw the idling urinals behind him, as he turned on the cold water. He let it run until it was at its coldest, which was actually lukewarm, and then made a big cup with his hands, letting the water pool in them before dunking his face and rubbing his eyes extra hard. He did this twice more, flicked off the water, and then stumbled over to the paper towels with his eyes barely open. He pulled a few paper towels from the dispenser and blotted his face dry.
He took a deep breath and turned toward the door. Just fake it, he thought to himself. This is your life now. You aren’t special. Let it go.
Kyle walked through sporting goods, housewares, and then women’s athletic apparel on his way back to the front of the store. He didn’t realize anything was going on until he noticed a woman on all fours beneath a rack of sports bras to his left. She had her face pressed against the carpet in front of her. Kyle looked to his right and saw a mother and her teenage daughter kneeling near the entrance to the dressing rooms. The girl buried her head in her mother’s armpit, while the mother looked intently toward the front of the store, angling her back around to shield her daughter.
Walking up another few feet, Kyle saw someone standing on the conveyor belt of checkstand seventeen. When he turned, Kyle saw that it was Ayers, and he was holding a machine gun. Before Kyle could do anything but stop in his tracks, he saw three other cashiers, all kneeling, pointing in his direction. A large group of employees and customers were huddled on the floor of an area of the store they called “Action Station” right in front of the bank of checkstands.
“There he is!” Ayers yelled, smiling. “I’ve been looking for you! Come on over, Kyle. Join me.” Were it not for the gun, his demeanor could’ve passed for that of a game show host—warm, engaging, and clearly in charge.
Kyle walked cautiously toward Ayers and felt the eyes of everyone else in the store on him. As he moved closer, his heart raced. Kyle could see that the security gates in front were pulled down. The two security guards on duty were with the group of employees and customers kneeling. Ayers stood nonchalantly with the machine gun in one hand at his side.
Kyle put his hands in front of him as he spoke. “Ayers, whatever you want with me, we’ve got to leave these people out of it.”
Ayers smiled. “I’m just havin’ a little fun.”
Kyle saw a silk blot peeking out of the pocket of Ayers’s vest. “If you want to talk, Ayers, I’m here. You don’t need to do this.”
“We did talk,” Ayers said. “And you chose that bitch. That no-fun, stuck up bitch. I offered you immortality, no rules. And you went back to my babysitter and tattled.”
“You’re right,” Kyle said. “Let’s let these people go, and you do whatever you want to me.”
Ayers pointed the gun at the snack bar next to the Mega-Market exit. He brought the gun closer to his face, concentrating on his aim. “Red fruit punch or blue fruit punch?”
“What?” Kyle asked.
Ayers turned toward Kyle, inadvertently pointing the gun at him. Kyle instinctively brought his hands in front of his face. “Which one should I aim for? Red or blue?”
Kyle hesitated for a moment. “Ayers, I don’t—”
“Okay, both,” Ayers said as he started spraying bullets across the entire snack bar. The drink dispensers exploded—both red and blue liquid pouring out from them. After only a few seconds, the sign, counter, and back wall were pock marked with bullets.
“I’m a shitty shot anyway,” Ayers said as he looked back at Kyle and offered him the gun. “You wanna try? I bet you can’t hit that sign that says ‘Books and Magazines’ from here.”
He walked toward Ayers, who still stood perched on the belt of one of the checkstands. Kyle put his hand out to take the gun. At the last second, Ayers pulled it back. “Wait. First, I gotta trust that you and I are on the same page . . . Are you really ready to lighten up and realize that none of this matters?”
Kyle scanned the crowd—his coworkers and customers—all of them so scared and vulnerable. “You’re wrong, Ayers. It all matters.”
“When you control time,” Ayers said, “there’s no such thing as wrong.”
“I’m not coming with you,” Kyle said. “Allaire—”
“Allaire’s not going to get in our way again,” Ayers said, cutting him off.
Kyle grabbed hold of Ayers leg and squeezed the back of his calf, trying to pull him down. “What did you do?”
“You need to come with me,” Ayers said with a smile, nudging Kyle’s hand away from his leg with the nose of the machine gun.
The rage welling up in Kyle as he realized that by telling her where Ayers was going, he’d potentially led Allaire to her slaughter. “If you hurt her, I’ll kill you.”
“Stop being so dramatic,” Ayers said. “You act like any of this matters. The second we go back and start another timestream, you can’t come back to any of this anyway. It’ll all be different the next time you see 2016.”
“But what about these people? This world?” Kyle asked, raising his voice now. He saw that most of the people kneeling on the ground were looking up, following their conversation as best as they could hear it over the nineties rock playing over the store’s loudspeaker.
“Don’t know. And, don’t really care. If a tree falls in the forest, and there’s no one there to hear it, does it matter if I shot the tree’s sister?” Ayers asked. “We can do something that’s never been done before. Do you really want to work here for the rest of your life?”
Kyle looked around. Like it or not, these were his people. Flemming was his world, even i
f he’d been absent from it for a while . . . Sure, before the bus crash he’d been on track to go to college and always dreamt of leaving for somewhere with more opportunities. But these folks deserved better than dangling away in some lost and forgotten thread of the timestream.
“Hear me, Kyle. None of this matters,” Ayers continued. “The only thing that matters is that you come with me. We leave these sad ghosts to their boring lives, and we can go and be gods.”
Kyle looked up at him. “Is she dead?”
“No,” Ayers said, looking out toward the parking lot. “Okay, she probably is. But you have plenty of time to forgive me, Kyle. And if you come with me right now, none of these people will get hurt.”
Kyle took a deep breath. His conscience wasn’t ready to handle more dead bodies. But he was scared to follow this maniac anywhere. In his fear, he found a confidence and purpose he hadn’t felt for a long time, maybe ever. “You need to go, Ayers. Right now. Alone. I’m not going to let you hurt anyone else.”
Ayers looked at Kyle, for the first time without a smile, his mask finally gone. Ayers raised his gun toward the fluorescent lights lining the high ceiling of the Mega-Market and spewed bullets up toward the ceiling. “You still have the illusion that you have some control here, Kyle,” Ayers yelled over the sound of the gun.
It felt like things were moving in slow motion to Kyle as the rat-tat-tat-tat pounded his eardrums. At first, Kyle froze as Ayers sprayed the ceiling with bullets, but then he saw shards of glass and chunks of plaster falling on people as they covered their heads with their arms and knelt for cover.
The Mega-Market darkened as Ayers shot the lights out. “Say it with me, Kyle,” Ayers yelled over the bullets, as if he were speaking to a five-year-old. “None. Of. This. Matters.”
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