What If...You Accidentally Time Traveled?

Photo: Suren Manvelyan

What if you accidentally time traveled ? What year would it be? Do you remember how you looked or how you behaved? How would it work? What if you got caught? What if there were others like you, but they were hiding?

Birthdays are always meant to be special. Sometimes they turn out okay. Other times, not so much. The Kid wanted this birthday to be great. He figured that two 1.75 liter bottles of Jack Daniel's would do the trick. As he sent a text to his friend Clark from the corner liquor store, he knew that tonight would be one of those special birthdays. He tapped the Facebook app on his iPhone and sent out invites to his not-yet-planned birthday party. His giddy smirk (along with four 1.75 liter bottles) made the liquor store clerk feel extremely uneasy.  The Kid juggled, then sat the bottles near the cash register. He looked at the store clerk and smiled. "You want to come to the party of the summer?" The store clerk began to ring up the alcohol. "Well, I know that there's gonna be alcohol, so I'm guessing there's gonna be girls," the store clerk said as he brown-bagged the Jack Daniel's and swiped the Visa card. "You know it," the Kid said while he winked and shot a finger at the clerk. Looking like a fool, he wrangled the adult beverages into his black Range Rover HSE LUX. It was time for him to plan. After he shut his car door, he whipped out his iPhone and deleted almost every male invite. "Girls, girls, girls," the Kid mumbled as he turned up the music and drove out of the parking lot.

The Kid did not start out so shiny. In fact, his entire life was characterized by shortcomings and failed attempts to make something substantial out of his very short existence. To be fair, The Kid seemed to have the Universe as his sworn nemesis. Examine his nickname. Who, besides a young goat or an outlaw, would want to be called 'The Kid'? He, for one, did not.  It was a moniker given to him by his rich, sociopath parents. At birth, The Kid was given the same name as his father. As soon as it got too confusing as to whom his mother or two older sisters were calling upon, his father thought that it would be genius to give his son a nickname. His older sisters delighted in this fact and tortured him as often as possible. Whenever they wanted to make him feel less than human, they would yell in unison, "You're not our brother, you're just some kid!"

When high school approached, he decided to use his nickname as a gift, rather than a curse. The Kid was well liked (only among his five friends) and he had a nice girlfriend (for about two weeks). The Kid was virtually invisible to every other person at North Valley High School. This included the faculty members. The results that were gained from a socially awkward high school experience were introversion, self taught computer skills, and no desire to enter the realm of college.

As The Kid began to arrange his house for the party, he stopped thinking about the past and pulled out his iPhone. "I hope she stops by. At least give me that," he thought to himself as he nervously waited for his app to load up his invites. An obnoxiously loud knock shook his attention away from the mobile device.

"Let me in, bro!" Clark screamed from the other side of The Kid's front door. Clark was carrying a keg of Fat Tire with a handle of Jose Cuervo Tequila Gold, two cartons of Camel Crush cigarettes, sixty red Solo cups, and a case of condoms to balance it out. "Why do you always have to overdo it, Clark?" The Kid sighed and grabbed the stash from on top of the keg. "Overdo it!? Bro, you haven't been laid in years. You haven't been laid since Avatar's theatrical release, bro! The first one!" Clark dropped the keg and started to rip the plastic containing the Solo cups. "Well, tonight I might get lucky," The Kid said as he stared into the screen of his smartphone. She had accepted the invitation to his party.

    

Well, The Kid had had a few. As the whiskey, tequila, and beer swished around in his gut, The Kid quickly went from feeling euphoria to depression. This usually happened to him when he decided to drink himself silly in order to feel. He was never much of a casual drinker; the logic of ingesting doses of poison "casually" was downright baffling to him. When The Kid went drinking, he aimed high. This only occurred about twice in a four month span of time. Tonight, however, was different. 

His depression stemmed not from the alcohol, but from the absence of her. She was not included in the forty plus people that were packed haphazardly in his living room. Droning conversations and cackles from drunken swooning made The Kid's brain choke and spasm like an astronaut out of oxygen. He had to go outside.

Menthol cigarettes and marijuana stabbed The Kid's olfactory senses as he stepped out onto his front porch. Silhouettes, outlined by the gripped glow of buzzing and blinking technology, blew smoke in every direction around him. "Give me one of those," The Kid demanded from the nearest shadow. The shadow's hand opened and fingers held a thin, white cylinder. "Thanks," said The Kid, lighting the white stick. "No problem," the shadow exhaled with a puff of smoke. The night air was cool and calm. The music and laughter from inside was muffled by the thick front door. The Kid felt the wave of anxiety beginning to dissipate. Then he heard laughter coming from his right. There she was. Ten meters away. She was partially concealed in shadow, partially revealed by lunar light. He could never forget her flowing hair or her confident posture. She was laughing with a guy who was completely drowned in darkness. The Kid thought that they were standing awfully close to one another. Then, she leaned in and gave the shadow a long kiss. Suddenly, the front door opened. Clark stepped outside and started to sway as if the porch was a pirate ship. Grasping a Solo cup like a Kung Fu master, he said, "Dude...bro! You gotta come make a wish! I want cake, bro!" The Kid ashed and marched inside without saying a word.

The place was dim and the music was low. The centerpiece was a small, round cake with white icing and an arbitrary number of candles. Everyone was circled around the cake in ceremony. Even the porch shadows walked in, casting away dark veils for multicolored shirts and skin tones. The crowd parted as The Kid made his way towards the flickering flames. He hunched over the wooden table. "Make a wish," a female voice called out. "Yeah, make a wish." "Yeah!" "Wooo!" "Make a birthday wish, bro!" The pleads for The Kid to make a wish had rallied the drunk party guests into a frenzy. This filled him with nervousness and dread. He never liked to be the center of attention, but he could not help the feeling of being responsible for this. The look on his face resembled a king tasked with a great burden. As his stomach twisted with alcohol and soda, his mind was calculating something impossible. "Okay, I got it," The Kid said. He closed his eyes, inhaled a breath, and blew.

Photo: sprppl.com

His breath brought a cacophony of sounds and visions. The overlaying reality began to morph and change spectrum. The Kid felt as if he had fell through time and space. He felt the force of things around him contort in both shape and color. His eyes witnessed a dark room become a bright and open area with a kaleidoscope of technicolor. His retinas were stuffed with visuals. Blacks melted into yellows. Oranges melted into pinks. The scenery that accompanied the shifting pigments were also altered. Things began to look as if they were trying to escape their temporal boundaries. The Kid watched solid objects fluctuate like a mixture of oil and water. Everything was inconsistent and a little frightening. The Kid could not close his eyes. He was cursed by awestruck wonder.

Sounds of time stretched over his ears. The tone of atoms vibrating out of sync made the hairs on The Kid's skin spike like needles. The quantum jumps spooked him every second. Frequencies bounced all around him. He could even feel the sound altering his biology. Skin rippled and bones shrank while his eyes gained better clarity. Wrapped in the convulsion of hums and loud bangs, he let out a scream that was never heard. When he closed his mouth, he was there.

Skyscrapers stood like giant guardians protecting the park where The Kid had finished his journey. The temperature was a cool seventy-three degrees. He could see two owners throwing a flying disk with their black and white Border Collie. Closer in the foreground, he saw what he ultimately came for. She was sitting Indian style with her back turned to him. His heart jumped with excitement and unbelievability.

The Kid had a hard time rationalizing where he was. He did not understand how he had managed to return to this spot in time. Somehow, he had willed himself through time. Just thinking about the idea of time travel sent The Kid to a bad place emotionally. He brushed the thoughts aside and gathered enough strength to walk ten feet and place his right hand on her left shoulder. Her head turned slowly upward as her hair flowed furiously. The seriousness of her eyes caught The Kid off guard. She was smiling.

"I can't believe you made it," she said as she began to stand. She stood and reached out to give The Kid a hug. After going through what seemed like a lifetime, The Kid embraced her. After a long hug, she whispered in his ear. "I can't believe you did it. I can't believe you came back for me." This shot The Kid out of his womb of comfort. "What are you talking about?" The Kid pushed her away gently. She covered her face and started to laugh hysterically. "Don't be scared, boy. I knew you would come back here once I figured it all out. I'm glad that I pushed you over the edge. I was a little worried for a minute." The Kid backed up further. He did not know how to respond. How did she know he came from the future? How did she know that it was her future self that pushed him over the edge? She walked toward him and said, "Kid, I know you feel a little disoriented right now, but you have to hear me out. I am sorry that I kissed that guy at your birthday party, but I knew it would be enough to send you back here. I should know because, well, I'm you."

This sent The Kid into a figurative spiral. He was flabbergasted by every word that was coming out of her mouth. On the other hand, he could not formulate words to come out of his own. The last thing that seemed concrete to him was making that birthday wish. He wished for the opportunity to go back and save her from herself. What he really wanted was a second chance to make things "right". He did not want to lose her. Although their "relationship" only lasted a couple of weeks, he had never felt so welcome.Unfortunately, the speech that she gave him made that experience seem like a joke.

"No more. No. More," The Kid sternly said. He did not care how he got there. His greatest escapism had become a panopticon prison. The Kid was in a time that he remembered, but it was skewed by conversation. "Well, I'm glad you'll shut up so I can talk," she said as she walked in his direction. "Yes, you time traveled. There's more to it, though. How can I say this without blowing your mind?" She closed her eyes and tilted her head to the ground. "Okay, when I, you, first did this time jump, it messed me up. It separated my consciousness into two individuals." The Kid just listened. He was too broken to speak. "You kept a part of yourself in your body. The other part went into a female body. My body. It was around the time that you were in the seventh grade. It was when those little assholes started to bully you about your nickname, remember?" The electric memory jolted The Kid to his senses. "H- How did you-," he murmured. She opened her mouth wide. "Because I'm you, stupid! When I found you in North Valley High School, I wondered if you had the same gift as me. I had gotten a handle on the time travel thing. At least, I thought I did. It's tricky. Don't even get me started on how to correct things once you misjudge the migration season of birds or the pollination cycles. When I saw you, I wondered if you had traveled too. I pretended to 'like' you. It's weird hitting on yourself. You know exactly what you want to hear. To be honest, it was quite disgusting seeing myself grovel over my own words. That's when I realized that you didn't know how to travel. You were sickening and weak. It finally dawned on me that you were my less-evolved form. So, I have to dispose of the waste. I have to kill you."

Immediately, The Kid lunged for her throat. Sitting on top of her with his hands locked around her thin throat, he managed to speak. "Have you been messing with my life?" The question made her stop coughing and look up at him. "Heh. The curiosity got to me. I had to see if I could push you. I had to see if I could make your life miserable enough to travel. Unfortunately, you just took whatever I placed in your life. I made it so that your family actually hated your very essence. You never made an effort to take control of your life. You became nothing more than clutter-a smudged copy of something better." With her last gasp to live, he was overcome with emotion. He started to feel like he did at the birthday party, but it was intensified.

  Photo: Andre Arment

Cool breezes were replaced with still water. Fish and aquatic vegetation switched positions with birds and oak trees. The solid ground was converted from lush grass to a sandy seabed littered with algae. The Kid was underwater. The body that he held in his hands was gone. Only water remained. His lungs began to fill with muddy water and his survival instincts kicked in. He pushed off of the bottom with all of his might and rushed to the surface. With a burst, his head crowned the water's surface. Sunlight graced his stinging eyes and exotic bird calls filled his ears. The Kid was in a foreign body of water with no visible landmarks. To his left, there was a single boat carrying two people. He could not see what they looked like, but he could hear their voices. They were definitely speaking Japanese. Although he did not know it, The Kid was in the Heian period in Japanese history. Either way, his current location terrified him. His emotions plotted another course.

 Photo: Franz Schumacher

Like a raindrop, The Kid hit the ground. He lifted himself from jagged rocks and viewed his surroundings. Storm clouds billowed above his head with deliberate motion. Lightening tore through the sky, exposing the darkest regions of the celestial dome. Volcanoes vomited the Earth's center in radiant colors of red, orange, and brown. The atmosphere was robust with heat and gases that were not suitable for human habitation. The Kid was too close to the edge. In less than five seconds, he had traveled hundreds of thousands of years. One more second would have probably killed him. Feeling his soft skin peel and boil, The Kid stretched across time again.

   Photo: Remus Tiplea

A bed made of coils and cloth cushioned The Kid's spine. Wool blankets draped in dust and dead skin covered his body. He wanted to hop up from his resting position, but his body was paralyzed by deep pain. Something was wrong with his back. He slowly raised himself to the sitting position. The window next to his bed let sparkling sunlight through. "What have I done," The Kid thought to himself. At that moment, a young woman entered the room.

"Time for your check-up, young man." The bubbly voice of the nurse made his wrinkled skin crawl. He was no longer a young man. His thinning hair and brittle skeleton were proof that the nurse's opinion was patronizing at best. The Kid turned to her and said, "What year is it?" The nurse stopped displaying her medical instruments on the nightstand and looked into his eyes. "I don't know who keeps giving you the runaround, sweetie," she said patting him on the shoulder. "The year is 2043 and has been for the past nine months."

Alone in his room, The Kid began to experiment with his gift. After traveling vast distances via time, he wanted to master what his other self bragged about. He also wanted his youthful body back. It seemed that being old cut down the amount of time travel that he was capable of doing. After three months, The Kid was able to stabilize a place where he could always visit. He did not know where in time and space it existed, but it was peaceful.

  

In December of 2044, The Kid had managed to understand the nature of time. Once he understood that, he began to understand himself. The words from the female version of himself had infected his brain like cancer. He did not believe that he was the inferior copy. He was correct in thinking this. He was on the verge of something greater than anything he had ever dreamed. "I don't know how to travel, huh?" The Kid thought to himself, recalling the delusional words of his "other self" on a frigid winter morning. "This old man travels in style."

Photo: S. Vetter

The Kid was on a roll. He glided through time without much effort after a year of practice. He was able to see every historical event that ever graced a history class. His favorite places, however, were those that were never included in any text. He learned to escape dangerous situations by putting years of time in between himself and his ailments. The Kid figured out a way to keep a permanent body that was sprightly enough for any situation. He even learned to account for the migration of birds and the pollination cycles. He had gained supreme power, but there was a catch. He had to keep traveling. He could only stay in a certain place for a maximum of two years. This revelation took a while to accept and consider, but The Kid was adaptable. After a few years (or centuries) he had everything that had ever existed or will exist in his control. His sadness, like his power, knew no boundaries.

    Photo: lou.pe

   

-Terry