Authors: N. W. Fidler
The moment I touched a dial we were falling from the sky, the ground quickly approaching us. I’m positive was screaming and peeing at the same time. Grandpa just was laughing his head off.
There was a ding and the growing detail ground became the dusty old basement. He had set the timer for me and was still laughing even after I got as far away from the machine as I could before collapsing on the floor. When he was done making fun of me he just told me he made the same mistake his first time.
Him took him a good hour before he could coax me back into the old rust bucket. He pointed to the dial I touched. “Never let it change from this setting. It may be a time machine but it can’t escape earth’s atmosphere.”
He then took me to May 1945.
He had clothes prepared for us and I have no idea how to describe it.
Confetti was in the streets and everyone was drinking to each other’s health. It (was/is/already?) a great time of celebration. We couldn’t help be swept up in it all!
Everyone was always dressed up in suits or dresses, everything was dirty and smelled horrible (guess Grandpa was right), people building tall impossible things, everyone on the street just doing….what everyone now does. Just being people. No phones but people gossiped, people ate at restaurants but they acknowledged each other.
How could I put all this into words?
Everyone was smoking, it was hard to breath at times but I got over it.
He took me to a nightclub where he not only bought me a drink but a few women hit on me! Heck even the show girl dancing on stage liked the way I looked. Grandpa allowed me to mingle around and I even got some alone time with the girl after her set was finished. Her name was Patricia. Too bad I couldn’t see her the next day.
It may have been only a few hours but it was the most amazing thing I ever saw. Grandpa tried his best to slowly mess with the controls so I could see what did what but I don’t think it helped too much.
We returned to my backyard where I could smell my parents cooking on the grill. It had to be my mom cause Dad always burnt everything. They had no idea what Grandpa had done by this point. Grandpa waved goodbye, tossing me his necklace. “Keep it close.”
Like that he was gone.
School came up on me after that. Mom and Dad got fined. And Grandpa was nowhere to be found to this day. I wonder where he went next?
I think I’m going to find a better spot for this. Not only do I need to lay low but I need a break. There’s also a girl in my class that looks too familiar.
9/13/16
Grandpa picked me up at school. I was just leaving my Math class when he grabbed my arm and yanked me into an empty class room. “They know. They Know. They know.” He repeated over and over.
His Time Machine and all its twisted wired, rusty glory shoved between tipped over desks and the white board. He was already hitting buttons by the time the door latched shut.
BAM. We were in 1948.
A lot has changed. Even the night clubs were better managed and in full swing. Homeless people were a lot more obvious but everyone was happier?
Besides Grandpa who was racing from the Machine, I could barely keep up!
We bounced from apartment building to apartment building, Grandpa checking all the numbers or people’s names on the doors.
Until he found who he was looking for.
Patricia wasn’t at the night club anymore. She was pregnant with three kids, alone in some hole in the wall. She remembered me and let us in. Grandpa spun some wild story about owing money before locking himself in the tiny bathroom.
She did miss me. Told me there was no one like me.
She isn’t wrong. I was wearing my Thrasher Band muscle shirt. I asked how far she was along and she just looked at me with wide eyes. Said I had some nerve!
Yet, she said only a few months.
There was a knock on the door, she went to get it but I stopped her. I held my hand to my lips to shush her. A man started yelling on the other side that she owed this month’s rent but I kept her silent. “I KNOW YOUR IN THERE!! You and some pair of MOOKS!”
I’ve never been called a mook before.
He jiggled the knob a few times but he ultimately left saying he’d get the keys if she didn’t open up. He never came back. Out the window I saw a bald man put a black fedora back on and left with another black suited man.
Grandpa has been in there for hours now. Patricia was caring for her kids too much to ask too many questions. Maybe she’s scared of the mob coming after us and didn’t want to know too much.
Might be a good fear to have.
6/7/1948
Been two days. Haven’t left the apartment.
It’s so HOT.
And everything tastes like ash.
Patricia just smokes one cigarette after the other. I’ve told her she could get sick off of them but she doesn’t believe me.
Patricia was shocked to see me just in my shorts without a shirt. I’ve helped a little with the kids when she makes food, what little she has. I actually had to tell her I’m full from the previous meal just so she’d have a little more for herself.
Grandpa finally came out of the bathroom. His journal death gripped in his hands.
He’s been reading it again and apparently he DOES owe the mob money and hasn’t paid it back yet.
He doesn’t remember why he grabbed me but he said it was important. He tried to laugh it off. I didn’t find it funny. Patricia was with me on this.
After lunch he left the apartment while we were distracted with the kids and only noticed he had left when he tried to get back in. That door is loud. “Don’t need to worry about paying the rent. It’s been taken care of.” He told Patricia.
She shook in fear wanting to know what he did.
She kicked him out.
Locking the door behind him.
She cried into my arms until she fell asleep on her bed. I put all the kids to bed, wasn’t hard they were all sleepy anyway.
Had to lite a candle just to get this all down. Candles are a good thing to have.
I hope Grandpa’s okay.
6/8/1948
I hate it here.
Haven’t slept.
It’s too hot!
I don’t have any clean clothes.
Patricia’s kid won’t stop crying.
I’m starting to think Grandpa got it off easy.
6/10/1948
Left early this morning, sometime after midnight. I like Patricia. I do. But we really don’t have anything in common.
She started talking about some gossip she had at the store about other people in the apartment building. I listened. Can’t remember any of it but I listened.
What else is there to do??
All she does is complain she can’t find the right man. After I left her (according to her I guess we were dating for one night??? What?) she and the owner got it on. Until the place closed then he dumped her with his kid. Hasn’t seen him since.
It’s SO BORING here. There is literally NOTHING to do. All I do is sit all day and listen to some broken record player from someplace else in the apartment building. Yeah, those walls are paper thin. You hear EVERYTHING.
She must have had another guy with her at some point. There was some military uniforms shoved in a cabinet. I barrowed a few to wear as I got out of there.
I don’t know where Grandpa went but I made it back to the Time machine. It was still there so I know he hadn’t left me behind. I’m worried.
Does he even remember where he touched down?
6/11/1948
Finally found him!
He was sleeping in a theater with three tickets in his hand. Been wondering around the area all night and all day. I had to dump a cola on him to snap him out of his slumbering stupor. He screamed like a little girl, which was funny cause a man on the movie almost fell off a building at that moment.
Everyone in the theater was laughing at us as we got out of there.
Aaaand it’s starting to rain. Great.
2/24/1852
Still raining.
A lot less noise on the street. A lot less vehicles. There was talk of a fire engine testing going on in a few months. A lot of people talk funny here. I have a hard time understanding them. Grandpa sort of gets the gist of their funny sounding accents.
We’re lucky we came in under an overhang so the water wouldn’t get into the machine.
Man, people are a lot shorter. Am I considered a giant in this era? They do keep staring at us.
“It’s not so bad.” Grandpa reassured me. “At least we’re not in 2060. The people there are a LOT less with it.” He added, pointing to his forehead.
We sat just inside the doorway eating vanilla ice cream as the rain splashed around us. “That why you were bartering for scrap in 2077?”
He had no idea what I was talking about.
Instead he informed me of some documents he stole. They dated back to before World War 2 and several more modern calculations added on top of it. Most of it was still in code but he had it stashed somewhere just in case he could find someone.
Unless he already has it done.
“I’m still reading through.” Showing me his journal. “They’ve been on to me since before I took them. It was during the break in. I got a tip on where to find the passcodes to get into the research facility with the Hadron Collider. I saw them with several test subjects. Human test subjects. Jason they were testing time travel like it was a dart board! With each subject the code on the paper I had changed. Every. Time. It was like I was watching time rewrite itself right before my eyes!”
Whatever happened next he doesn’t recall but he escaped by the skin of his teeth. That was the first time he met Kip. Some squirrelly guy with bright blue and white hair. “Either he was tripping on drugs or he was a very bad shot. Fired two whole clips over my head or just in my general direction.”
He sounded like death just speaking the guy’s name.
After the ice cream we found a place to sleep. Only one bed that we have to share but by this point I don’t care. He’s snoring right now. Sounds like an elephant trying to roar like a lion.
6/29/1863
Been wondering around the area.
Grandpa was messing with the dials and sparks were flying as we made the jump to this time. I guess we’re trapped here for now?
Grandpa has been talking with a so called ‘photographer’. Apparently his camera is this giant box pulled by a horse. He said he was following the Potomac around to cover their exploits. When he mentioned Gettysburg I nearly flipped!
Yeah, Grandpa got us in Gettysburg. Freak’n GETTYSBURG. During the flipping CIVIL WAR! When the guy was out of ear shot Grandpa grabbed me by the shoulders and sat me down. “Clam yourself. The battle won’t take place for a few days from now. We’ll have enough time to repair and get out of here.”
The photographer wanted to know what that device we were standing in a while ago was.
Grandpa explained to the photographer the time machine was a new camera idea he had. Sadly, it’s not getting many results. The photographer thought it was funny and moved on as the soldiers were.
One of the soldiers, said his name was J-something (he was VERY hard to understand. I don’t know what accent that is.), even shared a little bit of tobacco with me. No idea what to do with it but I thanked him. He wanted to know what regiment I was part of, noting my green uniform. I quickly told him scout, to blend in with the trees.
He then asked if I’ve seen anything.
“The north? I believe.” I pointed east, and he just patted me on the back, telling me to rest up.
Grandpa said he’d try someone in town to see if he can find something remotely similar to the part he needs.
He’s been gone for a few hours and everyone who asks about the time machine I just told them the same lie Grandpa told the photographer.
It’s getting dark now.
What’s-his-name invited me over to the fire for some moldy rations. The fire does look warm and I am hungry.