by Shawn Inmon
He picked it up and looked at it. Mostly, it asked for typical information—insurance, if any, allergies, who to contact in case of an emergency.
Who to contact in case of emergency? I don’t have anyone. Maybe that’s part of why I’m here. A big part.
Joe sat in an upholstered chair and quickly filled out the form. At the bottom of the page was a box that said, “What can we help you with?”
Don’t think you’ve got a box for what you can help me with.
There were large windows on both sides of the living room and a huge old oak tree in the front yard cast a shadow across the entire front of the house. A summer breeze blew through the windows, moving the curtains in a hypnotic rhythm.
His mind began to wander as he watched the leaves rustle in the wind. Without realizing he was even sleepy, Joe drifted off.
“Hello, you must be Joe.”
Joe jumped up with a start. The clipboard, which had been perched on his lap, clattered to the hardwood floor.
Abigail Green smiled. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to startle you. I’ll get this.” She kneeled and picked up the clipboard. As she stood, her eyes swept across Joe’s face. She noted the birthmark, but didn’t react beyond holding her smile steady.
She appeared to be in her mid-forties, a bit on the heavy side, with brown hair and a single streak of gray down one side. She wore half-glasses and a gentle expression.
Straight out of Central Casting for a shrink.
“Please, my office is back through here, if you’ll follow me.”
They wound through the house to a large room. Inside was a desk, another upholstered chair, and a plush loveseat. A small table sat in front of the loveseat with a tissue box on it.
Abigail sat in the upholstered chair and gestured toward the loveseat. When Joe sat down, he felt like he sank down to a slightly uncomfortable degree, like a hug from a soft pillow.
“Let’s get the business aspect of things out of the way first, shall we?” She glanced at the paperwork Joe had filled out. “I see that you left the insurance spot blank, which is just as well. Insurance likes to pay for treating many illnesses, but not for mental health. How do you plan on paying for your visits?”
“Will you take a check?”
“Of course. Each visit will be thirty dollars. Is that all right?”
Joe nodded. “I’ll pay for a month in advance, then if you’ll remind me when that runs out, I’ll do another month.”
“Good.” She slid the clipboard down and leaned it against the outside of her chair. She picked up a stenographer’s pad, opened a new page, and said, “So, Mr. Hart, why did you want to talk with me?”
Joe hesitated, pulled at the collar of his t-shirt. Now that I’m here, I kind of regret coming. Nothing for it, I suppose.
He cleared his throat, looked Abigail green squarely in the eyes and said, “Well, I’m a time traveler.”
Chapter Nine
“I see,” Abigail said, nodding and jotting a quick note before meeting Joe’s eyes again. There was no judgement in her gaze.
“That doesn’t seem to surprise you. Is Middle Falls filled with time travelers, and I just haven’t been let into the secret club yet?”
“We’re all time travelers in one way or another, aren’t we? Born on a day, then traversing time, one moment after another.”
“Yeah, that’s not what I mean, though. I mean, I’m from the future. I know it sounds like a hokey movie when I say it like that, but I don’t know how else to put it. I went to sleep in 2004, then woke up back here in 1978.”
“I see.” Another note on the pad. Another non-judgmental look. “Let’s start here. Tell me about your family. Do you have any brothers or sisters? Are you close to your parents?”
The therapist’s playbook. Start with the family and work out, looking for issues.
“No brothers or sisters. My parents are dead.”
Abigail’s eyebrows raised. “I’m sorry. Recently?”
“My dad died the day I was born. I never met him. My mom died...” When? A few weeks ago? Is that the best way to put it? Yes. “My mom died recently.”
“That must be very difficult for you.”
“You would think so, wouldn’t you? But, that’s what I want to talk to you about. In my memory, my mom died almost twenty-five years ago. She died, life went on, I lived until 2004, then went to sleep one night and woke up back here again.”
“Let’s table that discussion for the moment. How did your mother die?”
Joe shrugged. “The medical reason? Renal failure. The actual reason? When my dad died, she started drinking, and she never stopped until she killed herself. Not all suicides are quick. Hers took eighteen years.” He glanced up, saw Abigail’s face was still a practiced blank slate. “She was a good mom, though. I loved her.”
“Of course. I can see that. Situations like yours—losing your father at such an early age, watching your mother drink herself to death—can leave you with a lot of work to do.”
“Work to do? I don’t understand. There wasn’t much I could do about my father dying in a plane crash. I watched mom and learned from her. I don’t drink at all myself. So, what other work is there?”
Abigail took a deep breath and held it, looking up at the ceiling, contemplating. “You’re right, of course. The fact that you choose not to drink is admirable. It’s good that you are breaking the cycle. But, there’s more to it than that.”
“Really? Like what?”
“I see a few immediate issues. Having a parent leave us at such an early age can cause fear of abandonment in future relationships. It can even cause us to avoid having relationships at all. Having an alcoholic parent often results in other issues. We can talk about these things, but let’s save that for later. First, you say that you lived forward quite a few years before you woke up back here. Tell me about that life. What was it like?”
She’s good. She homes in on whatever I don’t really want to talk about and makes me say it out loud.
“My life wasn’t much of anything. Other than the fact that the mail and newspapers would pile up, I don’t think anyone would miss me in 2004. Here’s the thing. Mom and I got lucky, I guess. My dad wrote a song called When Christmas Comes Again.”
Abigail’s eyes lit up. She tilted her head slightly and hummed a little of the melody. “Oh, that’s so nice. I’ve always loved that song.”
“The thing is, the royalties from that song meant my mom never had to work. The same was true for me. I never worked. I just lived off those royalties.”
Abigail stood up and walked to a three-tiered shelf in the corner. She plucked a green sheet off the middle shelf and handed it to Joe. “This is the schedule for the local Al-Anon group. They meet twice a week in the Lutheran church on Travis Street. I think it might benefit you to attend a meeting or two there.”
“Really? I thought I had this handled by not drinking. There’s more to it than that?”
“There’s more to it than that. You don’t need to attend, of course, but I think it would be beneficial for you. Now, let’s move on a bit. Tell me about what your average day looks like.”
She means now. The sad thing is, there wasn’t much difference in my life in 1984, or 1994, or 2004. It’s getting easier to see the problem.
“Honestly, most of my days are just spent passing the time. I watch television, play video games—“
“Oh, yes! My sister just got a video game for my nephews. I was watching them play it few evenings ago. They were hitting an electric ball back and forth like a tennis match. I can’t imagine that’s too involving for you though, is it?”
“I think we’re running on two different tracks here. In the time I lived through, video games evolved and were highly involving. You’ve never seen anything like that, though, so you can’t accept it. I guess I’m glad you were one of the first people I told about this. I see now that it’s going to be impossible for anyone to believe, and I understand. If you told me you were fro
m the future, or an alien from planet Zork, I wouldn’t believe you, either.”
“All right. I see what you’re saying. For the moment, let’s put the idea of whether you lived into the future or not on hold. Whether you did or not isn’t really relevant to what we can accomplish together. So, let’s just focus on that. Agreed?”
Joe considered, saw the truth in what she said. “Agreed.”
“What you’re describing—simply passing the time—strikes me as an empty, unfulfilled life. However, what I think is irrelevant. What do you think?”
“I think you’re right.”
“Alright then, let’s see what we can do about changing that path. There are infinite possibilities open to a young man such as yourself. You have the freedom of time, and some assets behind you. That’s almost too much to take in, though, so let’s narrow our focus a bit.”
Abigail’s eyes flitted to a small clock sitting on a bookshelf. “We’re almost to the end of our time for today. I’d like to give you some homework, though, if I can.”
Joe nodded his assent.
“Consider if you’d like to attend one of the Al-Anon meetings between now and our next session. You’re certainly not obligated to go, but I believe it would benefit you. Second, I’d like you to think about finding a local organization where you could accomplish some good things by volunteering.”
Joe sat back in the plush couch. “Never really thought about that. Like what?”
“There are many organizations in town that can use a hand. Nursing homes, the animal shelter, the food bank—all have a constant need for good help.” She stood and retrieved another piece of paper from the shelf. “Here. There’s information on here, if you’d like to pursue something. In the interim, shall we plan on the same time next week?”
“Yes. I’ll be here.”
Abigail stood and led Joe through a different door than he had come in. “You can go out this way,” she said, pointing to an exterior door. “That way you won’t run into my next patient. Confidentiality is important to me.”
Joe’s head was swimming as he walked outside and blinked in the sunlight. “See you next week.”
Chapter Ten
Joe rolled the windows down in the Olds and cruised around town, enjoying the summer sunshine all the more since he felt like he had left winter behind so recently.
Not sure that was what I expected, but I’m not sure what I did expect. The secrets of the universe? If she had those, would she be hanging her shingle out in front of her own house in tiny little Middle Falls?
He pulled into the Safeway parking lot.
First things first. Gotta start eating better. I can’t expect to eat pizza, Top Ramen, and Hamburger Helper every night and feel good.
Joe grabbed a cart and wheeled it through the aisles, finding a lot of differences between this store and the one he remembered from 2004. The drink aisle had been narrowed down to one section of one side of an aisle. There weren’t dozens of different kinds of yogurt any more, and if you wanted water, there were a few gallons of distilled water you could buy to put in your iron, but none of the crystal-clear, mountain stream variety sold in twenty-four packs.
Still, the fruit and vegetable section was in the same place, as was the butcher at the back of the store. He loaded up on veggies and protein, skipped the snack aisle, and headed for the checkout.
In front of him, an older lady was putting her items up for the cashier, who was chatting away about a bake sale at church coming up that week. There were no beeps of a scanner, there was no belt moving the groceries along. When her total was rung up, the woman painstakingly wrote out a check, then scribbled a note into her register.
Joe smiled. No one’s upset at how long it’s taking to check out. Did everything move a little slower? I think so. Life sped up, but it happened a little at a time, so we didn’t really notice it. All these conveniences made life quicker, but everyone was more and more stressed out.
Joe chatted with the cashier, too. The young boy who bagged the groceries looked only a year or two younger than Joe. His eyes flitted from the groceries to Joe’s birthmark, over and over, as though he couldn’t help himself.
Finally Joe caught his eye, smiled at him and said, “How you doin’?”
The boy said, “Good,” and looked away.
Like everyone in front of him, Joe wrote a check, made a notation in the register and wheeled the groceries out to the Olds. He opened the massive trunk and saw dirt scattered across the bottom—another reminder of how recently his mother had died in this life.
He glanced over at the spot where Blockbuster Video should be, but Blockbuster wasn’t there. In its place was a store called “Newman’s” that featured the kind of clothes a successful businessman might wear.
When the heck did Blockbuster come to town? Must have been the mid-eighties, I guess. I’ll have to survive on whatever’s on the tube.
He climbed back in the car and headed for home while contemplating his future.
Maybe I should just sell the house and hit the road. There’s equity in the house. Between that and the royalties, I could probably travel forever. Be a professional bum. See the world. Even better, if I stop and think about it, I could time it so that I see some pretty cool things. In another ten or eleven years, the Berlin Wall’s going to fall. I’d love to see that. Or I could head to Florida to watch the Space Shuttles take off. Just not the Challenger. Don’t wanna see that.
A random thought occurred to him—the image of the shuttle exploding in mid-flight flashed across his mind.
Could I stop something like that?
He tapped his hand in rhythm to the song playing on the radio—Magnet and Steel—and contemplated that.
No. Not a damn thing. It’s too big. I could make a fuss, and get marked as a nutjob, but that’s about it. Nothing good would come of it. Just gotta let things happen the way they’re gonna happen.
He turned into his driveway, retrieved the grocery bags and went inside.
“Honey, I’m home!” he said to the empty house.
Yeah. I don’t want this life. I don’t know what I want to do, but I know what I don’t want to do. I don’t want to sit here and watch life pass me by like I did last time.
He put the groceries on the counter and turned to the fridge.
First things first.
He reached under the sink for a garbage bag, then opened the refrigerator door and started pulling out his mom’s food, dropping it in the bag. When he was done, he admired his handiwork.
Been a pretty good day. Got the house mostly cleaned up. Saw a shrink, and she shrunk my head a little. Getting things in order.
He walked the food out to the garage and dropped it in the garbage can, then remembered what day it was, opened the garage door and carried the can to the curb.
Some things never change. Trash day, for instance.
Back inside, he put the groceries away then made himself a steak and corn on the cob. He ate it sitting on the couch, watching Walter Cronkite read the news of the day on the CBS Evening News.
When he was done with the dishes, he remembered that he had stripped his bed before he left that morning, but hadn’t thrown the sheets in the dryer. After doing that, he turned the TV off and flipped through his old record albums. He pulled his copy of The Beatles’ Abbey Road out of its sleeve and dropped the needle. The opening notes of Come Together came through the speakers. Joe played air drums as he walked back to the couch.
Pretty damn good way to open an album.
He sat on the couch, letting the music flow over him. The songs faded, one into another, until the Beatles’ idea of heavy metal—She’s so Heavy—came on.
Joe sat up from his reverie with a start.
John. John Lennon is still alive. That’s something I can change. He wasn’t killed until December 1980. That gives me plenty of time to stop it.
The abrupt end of She’s So Heavy left a heavy silence in the room. After a few seconds, the needle
began playing the label, a rhythmic shhhk, shhhk, shhhk.
Absent-mindedly, Joe stood up, flipped the record over, and dropped the needle again. The more soothing sounds of Here Comes the Sun came on.
He reached under the coffee table and grabbed one of his school notebooks he had stuck under there. He pulled the pen out of the spiral and flipped to a blank page in the middle.
What else is there?
He tapped the pen against his cheek, then began to make a list.
Chapter Eleven
Everything that Joe could think of that he might be able to impact, was in the future at least a year or more. He didn’t want to slip back into the doldrums of his previous life—doing nothing, and plenty of it—so he resolved to take positive action steps.
He sat at his small kitchen table, designed for two, now destined for one, and smoothed out the paper that Abigail Green had given him the day before. He looked down the list of places that might be looking for volunteers.
Shady Grove Rest Home. Never been around old people. Don’t know if I would know what to do, or how to act.
Middle Falls Chamber of Commerce. I might scare away all the visitors.
Middle Falls Animal Shelter. Never had a dog or a cat, but I like them. They won’t get all freaked out when they see me. I guess that’s our winner.
He picked up the phone and dialed the number on the sheet. After two rings, a woman’s voice answered.
“Shelter.” There was a cacophony of barks, yips, and yowls behind her.
“Umm, hi, this is Joe Hart. I was wondering if you need any volunteers.”
“Honey, I’ve got thirty-two cages filled with pooping puppies, and another twelve filled with likewise pooping kittens. They all need to be fed, watered, played with, and cleaned up after. Yes, I can always use volunteers.”
“I think I’d like to help out.”
