In Times Like These (17 page)

The dog doesn’t look that large, but I don’t wait to get a closer look. It barks loudly, and as I turn and leap for the fence, I hear it advancing. I ignore the jagged wooden tops of the fence boards this time and roll over top of the fence as fast as I
can. The dog catches the pant leg on my jump suit as I clamber over, but my momentum pulls me free and I manage to land on my feet on the other side. I’m short a shoe, but I have no intention of going back for it.

I make a beeline for the sidewalk and turn left, trying to get as far down the street as I can before the dog’s owners come out to investigate. My forearms are scratched and stinging. I don’t know if the scratches are from the roof or the fence but I suspect a combination of both. A couple of them are bleeding slightly, but I simply pull the sleeves on my jumpsuit down to cover them. A half a dozen houses down I make a left o
nto another street, and once I’m out of view, I stop and remove my one remaining flip-flop. I briefly consider putting it in one of the jumpsuit pockets but then realize that I’ll never have a use for it again without its mate. I deposit it in a trashcan in the next alley then walk to the closest streetlight to get a better look at my chronometer.

The last quarter of an hour has been a rush of stress, so I try to relax and concentrate. I count off the rings on the chronometer. The outside bezel is set to time jump and not a specific date jump.
That’s correct
. Scan to the center to the time interval. I was jumping half an hour, the minute ring should be advanced to thirty. The minute ring is still at zero.
Why is that not set right? How did I even go anywhere?
I look at the next ring up and realize my mistake. I had involuntarily moved the twenty-four hour ring by half instead of the minute ring.
I just jumped twelve hours
.

Looking at my chronometer in disbelief at my carelessness, I see something else amiss. The little slider on the side of
the chronometer that has been in the same position since our training began,has changed from the upper right to the lower right. I stare at it, trying to remember what it was for. I take the chronometer off my wrist and examine the side. I hold it up to the light and see inscribed in very small writing, the letter
s
FW
D
. The word above the slider now reads
,
Back
.

I haven’t jumped forward twelve hours. I jumped backward. I must have bumped the chronometer climbing the roof, or at some other point, and not noticed that I changed the slider’s position.
Great job, Ben. Twenty-three years wasn’t far enough. You had to go back farther.

I look around and take in my situation. This changes things. If I’ve arrived at last night, I can’t just go home to Mr. Cameron’s house. I could wake myself up and change my whole morning. That didn’t happen. I’m not really sure what would happen if I did that now. I’m not eager to fin
d out. I could try to jump forward again using another anchor, but given my recent double error I’m not feeling confident of getting it right.
I’m lucky I didn’t kill myself as it is.

I’m not far from Dr. Quickly’s house. If
there’s anyone whose help I can use right now, it would be him. I don’t know if meeting him twelve hours in the past will screw anything up for us, but he seems like he would be knowledgeable enough to figure out a way out of this mess. I decide to find his house and give it a try. The streets are quiet and I make next to no noise walking barefoot along the sidewalk. It’s a little cold on my feet, but other than the occasional acorn I step on, it’s an easy walk. Within fifteen minutes I’m standing in Quickly’s driveway. The house is dark. I pull back the screen door and knock a couple of times. Nothing stirs. I knock again but I get the sense the house is empty.
Quickly could be anywhere
. I try the doorknob, but it’s locked.

I’m getting cold and wouldn’t mind getting indoors. The one plus to arriving after midnight from noon is that I’m not the least bit tired for that hour of the night. I walk back out to the street to keep moving, and start walking east to get to a main road that might have some open businesses or gas stations. I don’t have any money, but I might be able to use a
payphone to call Quickly and leave a message. I rummage in the pockets of my jumpsuit and pull out the logbook and pen, the only two items I possess at the moment. I know I wrote Dr. Quickly’s and Mr. Cameron’s phone numbers in the back.

I forgot to log my jump.

I stop and open to my log page. I look at the time of arrival column and realize I’m just guessing at what time I arrived.
Sloppy work, Benjamin. Quickly would be appalled.
I fill in the columns as best I can with what I know about where I am. I check that the phone numbers are in the back of the book and then stuff it back into my pocket.
Where do I even find a payphone?
I make it out to a main road and see the lights of a gas station shining through some trees to the north.

When I get to the parking lot there are two other patrons gassing up. A blonde woman in a Toyota is leaning back into her car window for something, and a middle-aged man at the pump diagonal to her
is watching her backside. He inadvertently overflows a can of gas he’s filling on the ground and he swears as it gets all over the can. I stick to the sidewalk and walk past the station because I spot a pair of payphones on the far side near the street.

I enter the
phone booth on the street side, careful to keep my feet clear of the garbage that people have littered on the floor. As I pick up the receiver, the headlights of the Toyota sweep over me as the blonde pulls out of the station. The man with the gas cans is still following her with his eyes. I get my first good look at his face and something about him seems familiar.
Something about those glasses maybe?

The car turns right. The man’s eyes follow, and as it passes me, our eyes meet. He holds my gaze for a moment,
then turns back to the gas. I pull my logbook out of my pocket and flip to the back to the phone numbers. I glance back to the man with the gas cans. He caps the last one and straightens up to pull a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket. He taps the packet against the side of his pickup truck and then pulls out a cigarette and lights it.

I turn my attention to the payphone. I have the phone number in my hand, but no change for the phone.
Was 1-800-Collect around in the eighties?
I start to try the number to find out, but get distracted by the proprietor of the shop poking his head out of the door of the station and yelling at the man at the pump. I can see him gesturing at the cigarette.

“No smoking at the pumps!”

The man with the cans has finished setting the last one up in the truck bed and turns to look at the proprietor. He rests his left arm on the side of the truck, and staring blankly at the man, draws another long drag on the cigarette. He holds the smoke in, then blows it casually in the proprietors direction.

The proprietor is out of the doorway now, standing on the cement step with an indignant look on his face. He continues to gesture at the cigarette and I hear a couple more admonishments from him, but the customer ignores them. He closes the tailgate on the pickup and walks to the cab. Opening the door, he begins to climb in. The proprietor is off the step now and yelling.

“Hey! You haven’t paid for that! Where do you think you’re going?”

I lose sight of him as he crosses on the other side of the pumps. I can’t quite make out the details of what either is saying for a few moments but then I see the man with the cigarette walk briskly to the back of the truck and grab one of the gas cans.

“Is this what you want?” he yells. “You want it back?” He unscrews the top of the can and sloshes some of the gas toward the proprietor, the cigarette still dangling from his lips. The proprietor backs into view from behind the pumps again. He has his hands out in front of him, and the anger on his face has now turned to concern. The man with the gas cans advances past the pumps. “Go on and take it back!”

The proprietor is authentically frightened now. “Are you crazy or something? I’m going to call the police!”

“That’s not smart, to threaten your customers,” the man responds. He advances quicker now, still sloshing gas toward the proprietor, who’s trying unsuccessfully to get out of the way. His pant legs are soaked. The proprietor is taller and a good thirty pounds heavier than the medium-sized customer, but the man with the gas cans keeps advancing.

The proprietor turns and dashes for the door of the store. He opens it and tries to close it behind him, but the man with gas can grabs the handle and yanks the door out of his grip. The proprietor is frantic now. He searches the street, and for a moment, his eyes fall on me. I can see him yell something to me but I don’t hear it. The next moment he disappears into the store.

The man with the gas can turns and follows the man’s last glance and our eyes meet again. This time he smiles at me. It’s that crooked, leering smile that triggers his name in my brain.
Stenger. We were right. He is here.

I slam my thumb down on the receiver. I dial 911 as fast as I can and it feels like an eternity waiting for it to ring. I get a dial tone again.
Damn it. Don’t they have 911 invented here yet?
I push zero and wait for the operator. I can see nothing of either of the men inside the store now.

“Hello, Operator? I need the police.”

“What city?”

“Saint
Petersburg, Florida.”

“One moment.”

I hear a banging noise coming from the store. The phone rings four times before someone picks up. “Saint Petersburg Police. What is your emergency?”

“You need to get someone to the Minute Mart gas station on
Sixteenth Street right away. There’s a crazy guy throwing gas on the guy working here. He’s really dangerous.” I see the lights in the store flicker once and then go out. “Get here fast!”

“Okay sir, what is the—
”

I drop the phone, leaving it hanging from its cord and run toward the darkened store.
Please don’t be dead dude. Please don’t be dead.

I get to the doors and stop. I can see next to nothing inside, except a few dimly lit display cases on the far wall that are reflecting the streetlights outside.

I didn’t see any weapons on Stenger other than the gas can, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have any. I look back at his truck and the driver’s door is still ajar.

Where did you go, you psycho bastard?

I pull the right side glass door open slowly and peer inside. There’s a puddle on the floor just inside the door and I can smell the fumes. I poke my head inside and look to the left. The main counter is to that side, and in the light from the window I see the corner of a hallway leading to the back of the store. I slide into the doorway quietly, trying to keep my feet on the raised rubber doormat to stay out of the gas. My eyes adjust to the darkness and I can see signs of a scuffle behind the counter. A display of chewing tobacco has been knocked over and cans of Skoal and packets of Red Man litter the floor. The quiet is unnerving.

“Hey! Are you okay?” I yell into the void of the back hallway. My voice triggers some activity and I hear someone knock something over. I brace myself with one hand on the door to make a quick exit. I hear the sound of a door opening and slamming in the back.

“Get away from me, asshole!” comes a disembodied and somewhat muffled voice from the back.

Thank God he’s still alive.

I move cautiously toward the hallway. The floor is slick with gasoline under my bare feet. As I lean around the corner, I can see the exit sign glowing dimly over a back door past a pair of mop buckets and a horizontal freezer. There are two other interior doors along the right side wall.

“Hey
, man, it’s the guy from outside!” I yell. “What happened to the guy with the gas can?”

There’s a pause and then I hear the voice of the proprietor coming from the second doorway.

“He was right out there!”

I pick up a wooden mop and grip it with both hands as I eye the other door closest to me with suspicion. The roped end of the mop drips dirty water all over my right leg as
I slowly reach for the doorknob.

“Where’s this other door go to?” I yell.

“That’s the storage closet.” The proprietor sounds more optimistic now that I’m here talking to him. I yank the door open and swing the mop handle quickly around it but only make contact with some bottles of cleaner that go tumbling off a shelf. It’s a small storage space and I can see that it hasn’t been disturbed until my awkward mop attack. I shut the door again swiftly and move to the back door. It’s unlocked. I kick it with my foot but it doesn’t open.

My head is starting to swim a little from the gas fumes. I step up to the door and push with my shoulder. It moves a fraction of an inch but th
en stops. Something is wedged against the other side. I push my face up to the door and breathe from the crack for a moment.

“Hey, I think you can come out now,” I say, addressing the co-ed bathroom s
ign on the door. “I called the police. They should be on their way. I think that guy must have gone out the back.”