Remember Me (49 page)

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Brian L. MacLearn

“Let me guess…Andrew and Tami Johnson, there on a geta-way celebration.”

“He sounded and spoke just like you. He also moved like

you—not as burdened though,” she said this apologetically.

“What did you learn?” I asked.

“That he had a sister he was proud of named, Stacy, who

had worked at E.M.J…part of the big time he said. There was something else too. When we shook hands, I felt an instant connection. I don’t know how else to explain it. He felt it too, I know he did. He started stammering and blushing. I can’t imagine what his wife thought about me. I apologized again for bumping into their car and made an excuse to leave. I drove away in a hurry.”

“I knew they went there, but I never heard the story about you or some strange woman hitting their car. If it makes you feel any better, they had a great time. I wouldn’t put too much emphasis into your encounter with him. It must have passed by them without thought or consequence.”

“Not exactly,” Amy replied, “it set into motion the nagging feelings I’d been carrying for a long time. I had no choice but to check you out. I also researched Andrew and his family…meaning Stacy. Him I could track, Stacy I could find lots of information on, and you—nothing came easy, except about your life at E.M.J. I did find some previous work and education records…they were cleverly concocted and without substance. Back when the company was just a concept, Tom commented on how your phone could only have been

teleported here from the future. I laughed when he said you were some sort of an alien. Don’t get me wrong, we both respected what you were doing for us, but when it came to the actual workings of electronics, you were in over your head. It seemed funny to us, that what you were trying to build, you didn’t really understand.”

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“Way over my head, but still ahead of my time,” I said with a pretense of humility.

“I could go on and on…Thurington…never liked that guy.

How about his background in time travel? And why he hung around Tom, asking him questions about what you might have said about upcoming sporting events or the stock market. And as far as I was concerned, it was how you always seemed to be one-step ahead in the economic climate. How you had an uncanny sense of what was going to happen. All of those little things took time to fester and pop before I was no longer blinded by my practical side and ready to really see the unbelievable possibilities. So…the woman in the picture with you is me, or should I say, me from the time you came from?”

I looked into those bright, beautiful blue eyes and said,

“Yes, but not anymore. I made sure of that.”

“The kids that were also in the picture…ours?”

I turned away, and the weight of the world crashed down

upon me. My sins had finally come home to roost. “No, but I loved them as if they were…and they loved me too.”

Amy sucked in her breath and I could see she knew the

answer already and was hoping it had been wrong. “Tom’s?”

“Yes.”

“The clincher was your story about how you lost your

family. It was exactly like the Corrigan family, last year in the Rockies. When you look at all the puzzle pieces it becomes obvious. I don’t need to know the “how;” I’m more interested in the “why.” I know enough to believe you are here by accident, not design. I’ve also measured the man you are…the one I know, and the one I’ve watched all these years…yes, I’ve been keeping tabs on you too.”

“In that respect, you are every bit the Amy I loved. Nothing much escaped her unless she let it.”

Amy chuckled at my comment. “I think knowing you

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was what caused the sensation I had when I met Andrew in Chicago. I need to know…am I… I mean…was I responsible

for what happened to you and Tami?”

Her voice began to falter, and I couldn’t have loved this Amy anymore than I did my own. “No, we met long after the both of us went through our divorces.” She was greatly relieved by my comment, and I saw the tears begin to run down her face. Amy was, and always would be, one of the caring souls of the world. She wasn’t a puritan, but her faith was firmly rooted in personal responsibility, a trait decisively centered at the heart of her character.

“Good,” was all she could manage to say. Choking out the next questions she asked, “How?”

“My fiftieth birthday; I was out mowing and fell through a wormhole…more like sucked through it.”

“Oh my God, I’m so sorry. I can’t imagine…” the tears fell freely, and she began to sob.

I started to move to get out of bed and go to her, IVs and all. She waved me back down and stepped back from the edge of the bed. “Amy, I want you to know it was pure coincidence that I ran into you and Tom. And in my desperation at loosing you, I made the choice to come into your life. I never wanted anything from you. I only wanted to make sure you were protected. I thought I could…fix…no…make your life better. I did what I did out of my love...”

Cutting me off sharply Amy asked, “And did you?”

“In a lot of ways I think so, but in the end I took away the most important thing. I can’t undo it yet, but with a little more time…I will!”

Amy’s head snapped up and she looked sharply at me, “Yet?

What did you take away?”

I didn’t want to answer, but I did, “children.”

It looked like I slapped her across the cheek. Her face got S 376 S

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red. “You forgot one other very important thing!”

My heart was aching, but I said what I didn’t want to know,

“What?”

“You, or did you forget the response I gave back to you at the wedding?”

I had no answer, no comment. The silence filled the room.

Amy took a handkerchief out of her purse and wiped her

cheeks and dabbed at her eyes. There would be nothing further to discuss today. Each of us was left with more questions to ponder. Amy looked at me and with a last declaration said, “I’ll see you when you get out of the hospital and after you have had some time to recover. This isn’t over. We have many things we still need to discuss. Give me a call in a couple of weeks.” She laid her card, with her personal cell phone number written on the back of it, on the sliding table by my bed.

She turned her back on me to avoid any further conversation. I watched her as she left. My heart was more tortured than ever, but mentally…I was better for feeling worse.

Unfortunately time was now a commodity that was running

out for me…

“Hey…snap out of it,” Stacy called out. I swam my way

back toward the present.

I was momentarily out of focus…at the table…at the hospital. I reached up with my left hand and rubbed the surgery scars, hidden away under my shirt. I looked across the table at Stacy, my eyes still blurred with visions from the past. “Here,”

I said…”for now,” and smiled weakly.

“Ok Little Brother, try to stay on target.”

“Roger that Houston!” I said as sarcastically as I could.

We both laughed, and I felt marginally better. I made an effort to get up from the chair, and Stacy instantly rose to come and help me, “Sit!” I said, “I’m capable of doing it myself.” Time had not been good to me or my health. I wondered if Andrew S 377 S

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would be better off when I was gone. I had to believe so. I also hoped that when I went through the wormhole the next Andrew would be reunited with his Amy. If I was successful, then I knew she would keep him young in spirit for the rest of his life. I prayed it would be a very long, long life. My life was on borrowed time. It was almost as if Time itself wanted me dead before I could go back one more time. Last year, I’d been struck by a drunk driver. I’d lived, but I broke my left hip, my right arm, and left leg in two places. The rehabilitation was going slowly, but at least it was going. From heart to body…

nothing came easy to me…absolutely nothing.

My heart by-pass surgery had been bad enough, but the

accident had put a major kink in my plans. I finally came to the conclusion that God…or destiny had a warped sense of humor. I was the affable brunt of their joke. I just couldn’t find it within myself to laugh along with them. I could now walk fairly well; it was the getting up and down that caused me the most pain. My heart was much stronger, and I took better care of it, something I should have been doing all along. My mind was slipping…I could tell. Sometimes, during the last year, I couldn’t tell if I was here or back where I came from.

Some if it was due to the drugs that I took to manage my pain and for my heart. A lot of it was simply because of time, in and of itself. The closer the day came to May twenty-first, two thousand-ten the more problems I had to contend with. It was becoming nearly impossible for me to differentiate between this time and my past time. It was like being asleep and dreaming, then waking up and not being sure of your surroundings.

The last two years had enabled me to realize one of my

lifetime goals, though not in the manner I once imagined that it would happen. I wrote a novel, something that I had always wanted to accomplish. Unfortunately, I only wrote it for me. I would never see it officially published. In it was a bibliography S 378 S

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of resources and dates, some of which could never be factually proven…not in this altered version of time. I struggled most with the title. Only two other people, besides me, have ever read it. Both of them were brought to tears by the story I had written. I have no doubt it could be a big seller, maybe even a blockbuster movie. It’s more than just a compelling story; it’s a reflection of human responsibility. And it’s also a guidebook for the occasional wayward time traveler. It was Stacy who came up with the appropriate name, and it was perfect, “Remember Me.” It said it all and all that should be said. It was a testament to all those who had been lost…physically and emotionally. It would go back with me and serve as a blueprint…a lesson in remembrance, and a reaffirmation of what I needed to do to find salvation.

As I stood facing my sister across the table, a terrific bolt of lightning scorched the sky to the west and briefly caused the lights to flicker on and off. I thought back to the conversation Stacy and I had after she read my initial draft of, “Remember Me.” The pivotal point in bringing us to this very day was in the question she asked me and how it later caused me to re-evaluate what I would attempt to do.

“Do you believe this is a parallel universe as Thurington suggests?”

I thought long and hard before I answered her. I had my

own personal belief, one that would not make anyone happy but me. “I honestly don’t know what I believe!” I stated, looking away from her.

“You’re lying…don’t even think of trying to shelter me…

spill it!”

“No, I don’t believe this is a parallel or multi-universe as Thurington suggests. I have nothing to base my conclusions on, other than my gut feelings.”

“And those feeling say what?” she commanded, drawing

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my attention to her face and the hesitant anger lurking in her eyes.“I honestly believe that time travel is something that was never meant to actually happen. I don’t see it as part of any great plan laid out by God. What happened to me is one of those freak…albeit extremely freak occurrences which will forever evade explanation. Think about it…God chose me to fall into a wormhole and relive the last twenty-five years…it just doesn’t ring true. Neither does a theory involving little green men.”

“Point taken, but with all that science has proven and

speculated on, isn’t it plausible that other realms or time lines might exist?”

“Your best guess is as good as mine,” I said shrugging my shoulders. “I am the only living proof that anyone is aware of.

In a short time we’ll finally get the answer to all our questions.”

“Such as?”

“For one thing—If this is a parallel universe, then the moment the wormhole closes you’ll still be standing there and everyone’s life will go on.”

“And if it isn’t?”

I shifted my weight from one foot to the other. I didn’t want to answer her, but I had to, “I’ll be living my second,

“Do-over.”

“What does that mean?”

“The wormhole acts like a reverse button on a DVD player.

You rewind the movie back to the beginning…or in this case, the middle of the movie. This time the story finishes differently, and only the person watching the DVD knows it. The actors in the movie tell the story as if it has always been that way, totally unaware of the new character introduced into the current story line. They go on as if he or she was always part of the original script.”

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“And what do you believe happens to the other characters introduced in the first rewrite? Do they become part of the new story?”

I knew exactly what she was trying to pull out of me. In this world she had come to love Carter, her nephew, and her two new nieces the original Andrew (me) never had. I had been so focused on my personal loss of Emily that I hadn’t given much pertinent thought to what other people might be feeling. For Stacy it was about who got to live and who didn’t.

For me, it was about doing my best to reset the script. I was going to do my best to make the third time around be as close as possible to its original format.

“Well?” she asked me again.

“It won’t matter, because no-one will know the difference—except for the one controlling the DVD player. It will happen instantaneously. Just like the movie, time is being re-wound. It stops where the new character is introduced into the story line. From there, it starts moving forward again, and the story is told as rewritten. Who knows? Maybe God does know where it is going and how it is supposed to end. I haven’t a clue, just this…this feeling. The new story can’t help but be a blend of the original story and the previous rewrite. Some people may not make it, others will survive, and new people are sure to be written into the plot. Every time you erase and re-copy on DVD the quality of the copy deteriorates. It can’t be helped. Just like wiping the hard-drive of your computer. It always leaves some residue. As you watch the movie you sometimes even see shadows of the past version, barely perceptible, but still there.”