by Melissa Faye
My father, Clark.
The caption under the photo read “C and J, before taking over the world”.
The second picture showed Jasper and Felicity at a dining table with my dad and my mom, Alice. The picture looked like it could have been taken in my Present. Everything was familiar.
But Jasper abducted my parents nine years ago. How could this picture exist?
The third picture was one I’d seen before. My parents’ wedding day. I used to look at their wedding album after they died. But that was years ago, and now I had no idea where Ma kept it. They stood at an altar holding each other’s hands. I felt my eyes tear up seeing them there. But now I noticed other people in the picture. I thought I could make out the back of Rebecca and Felicity’s heads in the front row.
And Jasper was my father’s Best Man.
I rubbed my eyes and squinted again. There was no mistake. The man standing next to my father on the altar was the same man I saw pull my parents out of their car on my eighth birthday. I saw it for myself a few weeks ago when a traveler sent me back in time. His face was etched into my memory.
My mind whirled. Harrison admitted that his mother was friends with Jasper’s wife. He didn’t tell me his mother knew my parents. Or that my parents knew Jasper.
One or both of my parents had to be travelers. But Ma and Pops were definitely from this Present, and they were my mom’s parents. My dad could have met her on a trip to her time. I pictured it in my head: Dad came here with Jasper, jokingly planning to “take over the world,” and met my mother. They fell in love, he filled her in on the secret, and they decided to get married and live in this time period. When they had me, they were even further linked to this Present.
When I held the J-DAR up to myself, I saw brightly colored streaks of chronograms as if I myself was a traveler. Maybe it was because my dad was from a different time. Maybe they even traveled with me.
Somehow, everything had to connect. There was a fire, Felicity said, and it nearly tore them apart. After the fire, Harrison’s mom turned on Felicity. Felicity came back to my Present to try to fix her appearance – without fear of getting caught, I suspected – and now she was dead. Is that why Jasper stole my parents? As payback for what happened to Felicity only twelve hours ago?
But if Jasper was friends with my parents...why take them and not me? Couldn’t he go back in time and undo what I did to his wife?
Something good came out of Harrison’s lies. He had the information I needed to start looking for my parents. If he knew Jasper, then he knew when in time Jasper was. If his mother was friends with Jasper, maybe she could connect us. It was my first lead. I lay back on my bed and closed my eyes.
Thank you for reading!
DEAR READER,
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MELISSA FAYE IS A FORMER teacher who loves sci-fi, reading, and writing. She lives in Colorado with her small dog and likes yoga, rock climbing, and thinking about weird dystopian futures with snarky heroines who save the world.
Appendix A: June’s Rules for Time Travel
THE FOLLOWING RULES were written by June Moore starting when she was eight years and one month old. Rules have been added and revised over time.
Don’t try to take over the world.
Don’t try to change anything Don’t take anything from the Present or bring anything from your Present.
Don’t remove or add people or change genealogy in any way.
Don’t do anything noticeable that could change something else. (The Butterfly Effect)
Don’t introduced new technology before it’s invented.
Don’t do anything that could change the ecosystem.
Don’t mess with your ancestors or ancestors of people you know.
Don’t mess with politics or anything else major on a local, national, or international level.
Don’t use your knowledge for personal gain. Don’t do anything for financial gain.
Don’t change anything for financial gain.
Don’t use this Present to hide things from your Present.
The guardian doesn’t time travel. For her personal or financial gain.
Unless it’s very, very important.
The guardian can use technology from the future only for her work in guarding the Present.
