“Yeah I did. Do I look familiar to you at all?”
He squinted and stared at my face. “No, can’t say that you do. Well, if you’ll excuse me – it’s been a grueling day at the office and I need some relaxation time before I go to bed.”
“Does the name Nathan Enzo ring a bell?”
“No, should it? Oh wait, yes. That’s one of the missing persons who lived here.”
“Take a look again. I look familiar? You must have read all about it before you bought this place.”
He cocked his head like a bewildered mutt, stared at my face, and opened his eyes wide. “Oh my god. You’re Nathan Enzo. What the hell are you doing here? Go to the police or someone and tell them that you’re back.”
“I-I can’t do that exactly.”
“Why not? L-look, you want something. I can lend you some money. I-”
“I don’t need money. Well, yeah, I could use some money, but I’m not here to steal your money. I need answers and I have nowhere else to go.”
Jason Greene didn’t appear to be afraid – he was a big guy, and up close you could tell that his girth wasn’t jiggly or soft - muscle and not fat. But, he hesitated. We stared at each other for a few moments, and out of the corner of my eye I saw the blonde girl from yesterday.
“There’s someone else watching this house. A woman. It may be that girl who disappeared, also.” I gazed across the street.
Jason’s followed my gaze. “I don’t see anyone.”
“Behind the oak tree next to the pickup.” I walked down the steps and yelled across the street. “Hey, you, behind the tree. Come on over. It’s ok. I know you’re there. I see you, or at least I saw you. Amanda, right?”
The sound of her name brought the young woman out from behind the tree and into the light. “I know who you are, and I think I know why you’re here.” I yelled out. She slowly crossed the street, this time looking both ways before she crossed. Though her blonde hair was scraggly and matted, and she wore an oversized sweatshirt, she appeared almost as pretty and fit as the pictures I found online.
She approached cautiously. I reached out my hand and she hesitantly shook it.
“Amanda, this is Jason Greene. He bought this place from Mr. Delmatta. I assume you know Mr. Delmatta.” But when I turned, Jason had gone. I walked to the door and knocked. I tried the lock and it wouldn’t budge. I continued to knock until I saw a police cruiser turn the corner onto Oak St. I looked at Amanda. “He called the fucking cops on us. We gotta get out of here!”
We ran as fast as we could. With both of us fit and lean before our sudden displacement, our speed down the street, through an alley, and across an urban park, left the cops in the dust. When we were safely hidden in the dark recesses of the park, we took a break, the sound of our heavy breathing breaking the evening suburban silence.
“You got money?” I asked.
She hesitated.
“I don’t want your money. Well, I want to see about combining our monies. I have $87.36 and a credit card, but I doubt that works.”
“I have money. Um, a couple hundred bucks or so. I’ve been sleeping in this abandoned building a couple miles from here. Haven’t been bothered in a week. Old office building.”
“Well, let’s split the Motel 6. It’s close and it’s $59 plus tax.” I stared to walk away, but she made no move to come with me.
“Look. I’m not trying anything.” I spread my arms out in a familiar gesture of transparency. “All I want to know is what happened. The same thing happened to you, right?” She didn’t answer. “Right?” She suddenly burst out crying. I opened my arms and she buried her head in my chest. “It’s ok, Amanda. I’m not gonna hurt you.”
“How do you know who I am?”
“Library. Google. We both lived at 1245 Oak St and we are both missing and probably presumed dead.”
“All I had was a drivers’ license and some money. I can’t remember anything. When I got to Oak St, it looked familiar. I think familiar surroundings jogged my memory a bit.”
“Well, let’s get that Motel 6. Probably better than your abandoned building. I doubt that’s got a shower.”
She shook her head no.
“Two beds, of course, and we’ll try to figure out what to do. I have no idea why Jason Greene called the cops.”
I told Amanda everything I knew. Neither of us remembered much, but being on Oak St did conjure up some blurred images of faces, buildings, and things. We figured out a plan, as lame as it was, and decided to get a good night’s sleep. When Amanda stripped down to her bra and panties to go to bed, I did remember how much I liked half-naked pretty women, but I had to keep that memory to myself.
The next day we went to the offices of Baffin, Darret & Greene and confronted Jason Greene. Yes, that was our plan – I told you it wasn’t much of a plan.
“Is Jason Geene in?” I asked the receptionist on the fifth floor. We knew he was because we had followed him to work.
“Do you have an appointment?”
“No, but he’ll want to see us. Tell him it’s Nathan and Amanda.”
The receptionist called his office and told us he’d be out in a minute. When he came out to greet us, his face showed a strange mixture of fear and annoyance, but it was the fear that made his decision easy. “I’ll be home at seven or so this evening. Meet me then.” With that he walked away.
Jason Greene showed up at precisely 7 PM, according to the watch I had purchased for five bucks at the pawn shop. We approached cautiously, scanning the street for police cruisers. He let us in without a word, told us to make ourselves at home, and disappeared into the bedroom. I felt the gun in my pocket, the one I had purchased along with a few bullets for sixty bucks at the gun shop two doors down from the pawn shop. I don’t know if the used gun I purchased was a clunker or a good deal. Would it perform its intended task or would it have been better put to use as a paper weight? Hopefully I wouldn’t have to find out. It would be a relief if it stayed in my pocket and I could sell it back tomorrow for half the price.
“I’m getting nervous. What if he has a gun?” Amanda asked quietly. “What if he brought us here to kill us?”
“He’s not gonna kill us.” I tried to sound confident. “He’s a financial advisor with a good job and plenty of nice things. Look at this place. He’s got nice paintings and vases and fancy furniture. He’s an upstanding citizen.”
“Then why did we buy the gun?”
Before I could answer, Jason walked into the room. “A gun? I thought of calling the police again, but didn’t. Are you here to rob me, take my nice stuff? You can have it all. But please, no gun. Keep it in your pocket and don’t accidentally shoot me or yourself.” Though his words were controlled and measured, the higher register of his voice revealed his nervousness.
“I would much rather the gun stay safely in my pocket.” I replied.
“I have nice stuff because I have prospered as a stock trader.” He paused and looked around the nicely appointed room. “For ten years I messed around and goofed off. Worked as a bartender, surfed, chased women, did odd jobs. I took advantage of my parents – upper class home, loving parents who gave me the best. Finally, a year or so ago, I settled down and joined my father’s business. He gave me a chance because, well, I’m his son and he’s a good guy. But, you know what? I suck at stocks. I can’t sell, and you know a big part of that business is selling. I’m also not very good at selecting stocks or trading. I bought this place, with my dad’s help of course. But I was about to finally tell my dad and give up with the trading. I think my dad would have been happy as I was bringing the firm down. I mean, he could tell I was working hard and actually giving it a try. I just sucked at it. That was until about five months ago. You see, I suddenly got good at it. I could see what a stock was going to do in the future. It really wasn’t that I had finally learned any skills. It was, well, you can say, some type of magic.”
“Magic?”
“Yes, and this magic you both kn
ow all too well.”
He led us to this bedroom. We walked past the king bed covered with a seersucker striped tailored blue bedspread, and he opened the closet door. Things were beginning to look familiar – I remember my closet. It was packed with clothes, sports equipment, photos, and detritus of my life. I remember starting to clean it out on a Saturday, a day off. I can see myself putting some items in boxes and the rest in the big metal trash can.
“You most likely found this secret door back here at some point.” He said as he parted his neatly arranged line of suits jackets, shirts, and neatly pressed trousers. He pulled at a small indentation in the wall. “I didn’t see this the first month I was here, but one day when I was looking for a place to hide, um, a couple bags of weed, I found it.” He opened the door to reveal a small sub-closet.
“I remember opening that door.” I remarked. “I never saw it. Finally, after several months living here I decided to clean out my closet.”
“Yeah, me too.” Amanda offered. “I was trying to stack some boxes and I thought I had accidentally punched a hole in the wall. I pulled it open and walked in to a small room, and, and I remember everything shaking, or vibrating, and there was so much static electricity. I remember it all now.”
“Same with me. Like I was trapped in this electrical field.” I added.
“You were.” Jason confirmed. “I felt the same thing. But, I felt it as soon as I opened it. I didn’t walk in. I thought something was going to blow up or, well, I didn’t really know. So, I called a friend. In fact, the same guy who supplies me with the weed. He’s kind of a science genius, geek guy. He came over and did all sorts of testing and analyzing. It was kind of like a science project to him. He has all these gadgets he buys online but never has a chance to use. Well, he got to use them on my closet.”
“What did he find? Are we, um, radioactive or something now?” Amanda asked, only half-jokingly.
“He said it was some type of electromagnetic field. It was some kind of bioelectromagnetic space.”
“What the hell is a bio, um, electromagnetic field?” I asked.
“I don’t really know.”
“Noe of us are science geeks here.” Amanda noted. We all laughed.
“But bioelectromagnetics is the study of electromagnetic fields.” Jason continued. “And
biological entities, you know, us humans. He stuck one of my suits in there and nothing happened. Stuck a few other objects and same thing – nothing. But then he got this idea to find a stray cat and place it in the closet, and guess what? It frigin disappeared. Three, four seconds and poof! Gone. Jesus, it was like a magic show. Only it wasn’t deception; it was real.”
“So, is that what happened to us? I mean, where did we go? It’s the future. We’ve been missing for a while mow.” Amanda asked.
“Yes, you went into the future. This closet is a time machine. The electromagnetic field works on our bodies in some mysterious ways and not only transports up, it also sent us forward in time.” He waited for us to react, but all we did was stare. “But, my friend tore apart the closet and found metal and magnets lining the wood framing. Huge magnets. He took out a few of the magnets and the magnetic field was weaker according to his measurements. He had no idea what the metal was. Said it seemed super hard and of an unknown composition. But, he was smart enough to know that the objects were not being dissolved but being transported somewhere. He can’t function in normal society, you know, keep a job, pay his bills on time, but he understands science like no one I know. Of course, he didn’t know it was a time travel machine until he tried it himself.”
“Holy shit. He made a decision to step in there?”
“Yeah, he’s kind of nuts. You have no idea how many synthetic drugs he’s taken. He doesn’t know what’s in them – it’s kind of a drug roulette. So, this was no big deal to him.”
“So, what happened?”
“Since he thought he was probably being transported somewhere, he took a few things with him. He put his drivers’ license, credit cards, and some money in his pocket. He typed out a whole page of details about what he did just in case he didn’t remember what happened. And he wrote this address on his hand, his leg, and a piece of paper he put in his pocket.”
“I-I remember now. I was cleaning and I decided to take a break.” I was recalling everything now as I was speaking. “I wanted to walk over to Mr. Delmatta’s to hand him a hundred bucks or so. I was short on the rent a couple of weeks earlier. He was a good guy so I wanted to get it to him as soon as possible. That’s why I had money. But, I moved one more thing in the closet and I walked into that little room just to check it out before I went.”
“I didn’t have any money.” Amanda spoke. “I just walked in. My ID was in my pocket, but I didn’t have any money.”
I looked at her and asked without speaking – where did you get the money? She put her hands up with her palms facing toward the ceiling. “What can I say? A girl begging on the streets can probably make more than a guy., It took only a couple days and I had a pocketful of cash.”
“Your friend made it back I suppose.” I wondered.
“Two weeks later he showed up at my door. Looking like he’d been in a ten-round fight without much memory of the events. But, it took a week or so and he remembered everything. He did again. And again and again, and he’s still doing it. I think he’s losing some of his long-term memory and I asked him to stop, but he persists.”
“And why does he keep going?”
“Look around you? See that painting?” He pointed to a piece of modern art hanging above his bed. “See that one?” He pointed to a painting of a nude woman hanging above his dresser. “Both of those cost over $20,000. I’ve made a ton of money, most of which I’m saving. But more importantly, I’ve become the top trader at our firm. I have more clients and manage more money than the partners, even my dad. They’re all amazed. I tell them that it’s their guidance and help that has gotten me to become a great trader. My dad is proud and all is well.”
“You know the future.” I stated the obvious.
“I know what stocks are going to do a week ahead. My friend writes instructions each time on a piece of paper. Go to a library and print out what they major indices will do. Print out a copy of what the major stocks will do. And find some small companies that burst out during the week. And bring it to this address. I trade for me, I trade for him, and I trade for my clients. I’m a star and I have six-figures and growing in my bank account.”
“Wait, wait, wait. But, that doesn’t work. He goes to the future, but you don’t see him until the future. You can’t use his knowledge. There’s more to this story, isn’t there?”
“Yeah, there is. But, I can’t really explain it at all. He goes forward in time, writes down the stock info, comes back here, and reverses the effects of time travel. He has gone forward and then backward in time.”
“How the hell does he do that?”
“He reverses the energy in the closet. Don’t ask me how he does it. Something to do with the different magnetic poles. He told me that even the Earth reverses polarity from time to time – like every 500,000 years or something. But he did something with the magnets to change the direction of the time travel. All I know is that he can’t see me. I can’t be here. If he sees me, it causes some major hiccup in the time/space continuum. He has to get back to the closet without seeing anyone he knows or causing any changes in the world. It’s one of those strange paradoxes of time travel. It’s kind of like the butterfly effect, only it’s not quite that dramatic. He would have to see someone he knows, like me, or cause a major change in something. If he stepped on a different pebble or something, it wouldn’t have much of an effect. At least that is what he says. Otherwise, he comes back, reverses the energy flow, and voila, we have stocks picks in the future. To me, it’s like he’s gone a day or so. To him, he’s gone two weeks, then back two weeks minus a day, give or take a few hours.”
“How’d you figure that
all out?”
“Trial and error. And my friend’s brilliant mind. He came back once, opened the door and my cat tried to leave. He caught her before she escaped. But, when I came home that day, she was gone. And she has never come back. She was there when he came through the door two weeks later but she just disappeared after he went back in time, and she wasn’t there two weeks earlier. To me, she just disappeared. To him, she was there in the future, gone in the present, or past, or whatever you would call it. Whatever it is, a time loop, a paradox, or something else, he mostly figured it out and we’ve prospered ever since.”
“What about your friend? He worried about what this is doing to his brain and his memory.”
“I’m more worried about him than he is. I figured I could go forward in time here and there. Give him a rest.” He shrugged. “He still wants to go.” He shook his head and continued. “My dilemma now is what to do about you two. Now, if I were a tough guy or a real criminal, I guess I’d have a gun and could make you stay quiet permanently.” He laughed. “But, I’m not. I’m just some regular guy, more of a slacker than anything else, who lucked into an opportunity. A weird, inexplicable opportunity. So, who are you, Nathan and Amanda? What does your inner moral compasses tell you to do now?”
I wish I could tell you that we took the high road, but I’m not even sure I could tell you what the high road was. We formed an unorganized, undocumented, hand shake, wink-of-the-eye partnership. His friend, named Buzz, after Buzz Lightyear from Toy Story agreed to time travel a bit less frequently after we convinced him that what’s left of his sanity was at risk, and Amanda and I would take a consensual trip through time every month or so.
A year later I’m still wondering how this happened. How does this time machine work? Buzz tried to explain some of the basic mechanics of it, as far as he knew, but like high school physics, it was way over my head.
I’m also wondering if I took the right path, but then I look at my bank account.
I also realize how much trading profit Jason Greene is making and what a good relationship he has with his father. Then I glance over at the naked female body in my bed, her breasts soft against the satin sheets and know I made the right choice. I think I can confidently say Amanda feels the same way.
Altering the Apocalypse: and Other Short Stories About Humans and Time Travel Page 14
