s3.e9

Homecoming Kids

           On the second Saturday after Jace’s return to 2020, he fell into a trance-like state while at the skate park, partially induced by the hypnotic movements of the skaters in action as they went up and down the ramps and basins. It wasn’t the first time. Strange things were happening to his memories that he couldn’t fully explain.

           “… Jace, wake up!” Warren’s voice snapped him out of it. “Stop spacing and look at this video, dude. I totally need to show it to my dad, when he… comes back.”

           Warren tried to get him to look at his phone as the two sat on a bench in the shade, but Jace kept his eyes on his friends a moment longer first. Laurie was running about on her rollerblades, while Chad tried to pull off stunts on his board in the basin—and Toby was actually succeeding at doing so. Nearby, Emiko and Jamie played a co-op game on another bench with their Nintendo Switches, and Austin was on his phone while eating an ice cream bar from the nearby snack stall. It was a very summery day at a park that was only around ten years old, and built so close to King Arcade that the shadows of the drop tower and coaster almost touched its pavement at sunset.

           Jace’s cousin was insistent with his phone and kept prodding it into his shoulder, until Jace finally looked down to see the half-watched YouTube video Warren really wanted him to check out. Upon seeing its title, Jace declined the right-side AirPod being offered so he could listen in, which was partially encrusted with old earwax.

           “I already saw that a few days ago,” Jace said. “I’ve been on a 90s kick, I guess.”

           “It gets worse, doesn’t it?” Warren replied and got back to watching on his own. “How much of this Super Mario 64 iceberg is true? Is every copy really personalized?”

           “No,” Jace sighed. “It’s just a meme. Sensationalized stuff.”

           “Oh. Well, I bet Dad’ll still think it’s cool… But maybe he’s seen it already, too.”

           “Warren…” Jace murmured. “What if he really is in some kind of trouble? He’s been gone over a week. It’s okay that you still think he’ll just turn up, but…”

           “He will,” Warren said assuredly. “He’s probably at some tech-detox camp or something and doesn’t have his phone… And forgot to call us first… That’s all.”

           “You’re not just trying to be brave for Sally’s sake, right? Your mom said she’s getting pretty upset. It’s okay to be worried, you know. You always bottle things up…”

           Warren paused the video and scoffed, “What should I do, Jace? Let it all out, like you used to? I can’t let the guys see me looking all sad and stuff! That’s not my style.”

           “Keeping it all inside, all the time, isn’t healthy, Warren. Or a ‘style.’”

           “You sound like Grandma. Look, it’ll work out, whatever it is. It always does. My dad always has a plan. He’ll come back, and he’ll be all ‘rejuvenated’ and crap.”

           Laurie came rolling over on her skates, stopped on a dime, then took off her helmet and wiped the sweat off her forehead to ask, “What are ya guys talkin’ about?”

           Warren deflected, “Lor, have you seen this Mario iceberg video? It’s crazy.”

           “Chad already sent me a link to that. It looked dumb, so I didn’t watch it. People are always trying to make old games and TV shows scarier than they ever really were. Buncha clickbait junk, that’s all it is. Hey, when are we gonna hit King Arcade? No one’s saving up! You all keep blowing allowances on game DLC or whatever.”

           “Can I ask you two something?” Jace spoke up before Laurie could head off to another skate session. “In all of the excitement on the last day of fifth grade, I kind of… forgot some of the details. I think there was a party of some sort that Toby threw, right?” he questioned, wanting to confirm some still-forming new memories.

           “Yeah, that’s right,” Warren replied. “He set up this distraction in the school to keep Mr. Webber busy, and we had the whole playground to ourselves.”

           “Didn’t Chad bring his speakers, and everyone was trying to connect to them to play their music?” Laurie added. “We only had time for one song by the end of recess.”

           “But I wasn’t, like… really angry about anything, right?” Jace wondered.

           They both looked at him, and Laurie laughed. “No? Why would you think that?”

           Jace did have good reason to do so. After all, the version of the day he first knew, which was thankfully fading from memory, went a little differently…

           In a world where Warren didn’t exist, events and personalities had played out in a way that ended up dampening the celebratory nature for every fifth-grader graduating in 2020. It was another hot day, and most kids were doing nothing but chatting.

           Following yet another argument about nearly nothing with Jamie on the way to recess, Jace found himself sulking on Desert Tree Elementary’s fort, where he had crammed himself into one of the plastic tubes. The conditions were miserable, but he figured that it was the only place he could be left alone. That hope didn’t last long.

           “Jace… Bro, get out of there,” Jamie said from outside the tube in an agitated sigh, only five minutes after recess had begun. “This is just embarrassing.”

           “I’m not talking to you, Jamie,” Jace fired back and looked away. “Leave me alone. I got nothing left to talk to any of you about. Not now, and not over summer.”

           “Are you still mad? Is this really how you want to spend your last day here?”

           “Jamie, give it up!” Chad could be heard shouting from the bottom of the slide. “Jace is being a total bitch, bruh. Mad about stuff no one even thinks about anymore.”

           Feeling anger welling up again, Jace suddenly tumbled himself out of the tube, pushed Jamie away, stood up, and yelled down, “Shut up, Chad. You try-hard poser. You both just want to make fun of me some more, don’t you? Hahaha, Jace is sooo lame.”

           “Jace, calm down, man…” Jamie tried to assuage the rage. “Look, I’m sorry. I made some jokes, but that’s all they were. You don’t have to take things so seriously.”

           Chad, who could get mean when he got into verbal fights with friends and foes alike, retorted, “Jace, when did you get so salty, bro? Is this about your dad? Is he not giving you enough attention or something? Get over it. He sucks. So what?”

           “Whoa, too far, C,” Austin said as he and Laurie came over and joined the group trying to talk Jace down from the fort. “You know how sensitive he is about that.”

           Laurie added, “Yeah, I thought we agreed to never bring parents into it.”

           Glowering, Chad fired back, “Who cares? It’s his fault we aren’t having a party right now! He totally freaked out on Toby and put him in a bad mood, and he cancelled everything and now all the fifth-graders have to have this last lame-ass nothing recess!”

           “Jace, don’t listen to him!” Laurie urged him. “Just… forget what happened the past few months, okay? Come down here, and let’s talk it out. It’ll be… Fire.”

           Confused, Jace murmured back, “ What?”

           “I said it’ll be fire, Jace. It’s okay to say goodbye, when you have fun doing it.”

           Jace looked up and across the playground. The monitor was nowhere in sight, and Toby was providing the Spotify tunes from his phone to get the crowd in a dancing mood, blasting The Weeknd’s Blinding Lights on the small pair of Bluetooth speakers.

           What was he just thinking about? Was it… something sad? Something that made him angry? He couldn’t remember. It was like an old, bad memory had disappeared, washed away by what had actually happened that last day of school. The playground even seemed to brighten up just a little as a mistaken daydream faded away, to let in a happy, final memory of his last hours at Desert Tree Elementary, 2020.

           “C’mon, bro,” Jamie said at his side. “Don’t be shy about dancing. You just go out there and… do it. See? Emiko’s not embarrassed,” he added as Jace looked at the reveling group of a hundred or so kids. “She’s down there flossing. She’s like, ‘so what?’”

           “Y-yeah…” Jace replied with a smile. “Maybe you’re right, Jamie…”

           Jamie grinned, bumped Jace’s shoulder, and then went down the slide, standing up the whole way like any cool kid would. Jace followed suit, joining Chad, Austin, and Laurie at the bottom, who reassured their sometimes-timid, height-challenged friend.

           “Jace, we’re graduating!” Chad said excitedly. “Middle school’s gonna be lit!”

           That, Jace wasn’t so sure about. But, egged on by buds, he went with them to the mass of flailing kids trying to prove that they had some moves. Toby was the only one who looked like he knew what he was doing, and a circle of classmates cheered him on, but everyone else was at least having fun making a fool of themselves, including Emiko, trying her hardest but only ending up looking like an even mixture of cute and cringe.

           “Jace!” she shouted. “Come on, dance with me! You used to play that Fortnite game, show me how you do this. I’m not sure if I’m getting the arms quite right…”

           “Yeah, Jace,” Austin scoffed in a friendly way. “I promise I won’t make a video.”

           “I… I dunno,” Jace said nervously and blushed. “I mean, I can’t really dance…”

           “Get in there, dummy.” Laurie laughed and pushed him closer to Emiko.

           For a moment, Jace simply felt stupid, awkward, and the blood in his cheeks. But then he looked back at his reliable pals, none of them with their phones out and ready to put out a video online. His cousin Warren was there, too, giving him a thumbs-up.

           So, he started dancing. And then the others joined in.

           “Why did I used to think I hated that memory…?” Jace asked himself quietly as he and his group got off of the bus near Desert Tree’s southern entrance.

           Did it replace something else? I know my memories are changing. It’s a little scary, but also exciting. The old timeline is disappearing. I just hope I don’t completely lose something important.

           Jace looked out towards where Mansion Street used to be. Those little houses were long gone now, replaced by a wide entrance, with the remaining space having been turned into a small playground for the younger kids bouncing off its equipment. Not too far into the past, Jace, Jamie, Laurie, and Chad were still paying it visits now and then with their parents. It was where they did their earliest bonding.

           “All right, see ya guys,” Toby said and headed off down his street with Austin.

           “Warren… Good luck with your dad,” Austin said and left with Toby.

           “Yeah…” Warren muttered as the rest of the gang turned onto their road.

           Chad finally got bored looking at stuff on his phone as they walked, pocketed it, and said with a sigh, “We’re running out of summer fast. We gotta get to the park.”

           “Then save up,” Laurie grumbled. “You buy too many game skins or whatever. I’ve had forty bucks burning a hole for months, waiting to be spent on a King Arcade ticket. Focus.” She checked the Fitbit on her wrist. “Dang… I’ll miss my step goal.”

           “It’s too hard! Gah… I want stuff when I see it. Anyway, this is me. See ya.”

           Chad headed off to his house, checking his phone again on the way. Jamie and Emiko were the next to break off, and then they got to Warren’s house a few blocks later. The dining room window was open, and he took a whiff of the odor wafting out.

           “Smells like Mom’s making her Greek stuff again. Guess I’m getting used to it, though… Jace, wanna come in for a quick bite?”

           He replied, “I actually have dinner plans. But let’s do fast food tomorrow.”

           After Warren affirmed the idea with a lukewarm fist bump and headed off, the usual spring in his step now gone, Laurie turned to Jace and asked, “… Plans?”

           “Yeah, uh… Millie actually…” Jace sighed. “She’s taking me to Mediterro for a slice. That’s how her generation used to talk about stuff. ‘Over a slice…’”

           Laurie swallowed a laugh and replied, “Why? I get that you’re on your own, since your mom’s doing dinner and a movie with my zari to get her mind off things, but why is Ms. Vanbusen your babysitter? Or date for the night, however you wanna put it.”

           “We just have some things to talk about,” Jace said as they started walking to his house. “You could say she’s doing some investigating on the side about… my uncle.”

           Laurie frowned and got back to looking serious. “Yeah, that’s been rough on your family, hasn’t it? Honestly, I’ve noticed it—the guy’s sad about something, Jace. He has been for a few years, I think. Those games he makes aren’t filling a space anymore.”

           “Mom calls his work his ‘creative outlet.’ But I don’t think it’s enough now.”

           “Why is it so hard for adults to just be happy, you know?” Laurie exclaimed a question for the ages. “I mean, maybe I sort of get it already. Routines get boring. Like, remember how exciting first grade was? Even though it was still school? But then, each new memory you make is a little less exciting… I hope that doesn’t go away completely.”

           “Me too…” Jace said wistfully.

           “All right. I better get home. But, Jace, real talk for a second? Never forget, you and me are besties. If you wanna talk, I’ll listen. All of that stuff my parents go on about, that I used to think was just psycho-babble? Some of it actually stuck, and I get it.”

           Jace smiled and replied, “Thanks, Laurie.”

           “You know… I think you kinda got a little happier in the last hour.”

           Like she had done since that time in first grade, she did her signature tongue click and threw a two-finger point his way before heading off. She had always kept going that legacy of cool confidence, that Desert Tree kids tended to respect.

           Less than an hour later, Jace and Millie stepped into Mediterro, Adult Wes’ favorite pizza place, which was on Main Street and not far from the apartment where he no longer lived. It wasn’t a very busy night, and they got into a booth without having to wait. It didn’t even feel that weird for Jace, that he was having dinner with someone his uncle’s age outside of the family. He still mostly saw the kid Millie sitting opposite him.

           “You okay?” Jace asked her, after noticing her fidgeting in her seat a bit.

           “Yeah, I just…” She looked around for the third time. “I’m hoping someone isn’t here. What about you? Have more memories come flooding back over the last week?”

           He nodded. “Uh-huh… And the memories of the old, ‘bad’ timeline are being replaced. I know they are, because I still have a few left before I went through the door that don’t match up with everything before them anymore. I used to be such a jerk.”

           “Fascinating…” Millie murmured and rubbed her chin. “It’s almost like new neural pathways are being formed in your head, adapting to a revised truth…”

           “But I’m worried that I might forget everything I did in the 90s, too…”

           “Well. That could happen. Especially if the very reason you went to the past to begin with gets erased. I should be immune, though, since I’m not a time-traveler myself and I’ve only known one reality. Good thing you have me here as a backup, right?”

           Jace glanced through the restaurant windows, towards Main Street, and added, “I still remember that Wes used to live, alone, in the apartment down at the corner.”

           “Yeah… I remember hearing about that a few times in the past. But now it’s hard to imagine him living like that. He and Sadie used to be so perfectly happy together, and he was just… he was crazy for little Warren when he came along.”

           “… Used to be?”

           “They’ve had a few problems. No wonder an alternate version of Wes, single and tired, would’ve been even worse off and chose the past over 2020. He… Ah, crap…”

           Millie suddenly looked embarrassed and poorly covered her face with her hand as the server, a thirty-something tall brunette, came over with the menus.

           “Millie?” she said with a chortle. “Is that you?” She looked at Jace, and then back at her. “Aw, that’s a cute date you have. A little young, though, don’t you think?”

           Millie dropped her hand, sighed, and slumped deeper into the booth. “He’s Lucy’s kid. You know… Wes’ sister? Old family friend? We don’t need the menus, by the way. A couple of Cokes and a small half pepperoni, half green pepper and shroom.” Millie looked back at Jace, who was curious, and sighed again. “Jace, this is Sandra, who I thought wasn’t working tonight. But the pizza’s so good here, I risked the trip.”

           “Oh, ‘risked,’ huh? We can still talk, Millie. Anyway, food will be out in fifteen.”

           Once Sandra had returned to the kitchen, Millie explained before Jace asked, “I don’t know why I’m talking to you about this, but we had one date together.”

           “I guess I just didn’t realize that you, um… You know…”

           “Oh—it’s not what you might be… Hm, how do I explain it…” Millie thought a moment. “Gender isn’t a barrier for me. It’s personalities I’m interested in. But it makes sense, don’t you think? When you look back on my old Harriet the Spy routine? Doesn’t mean I’m any good at any of it. I try, but I’m lucky if I ever get a second date.”

           “Hey, at least you are still trying, right? You just need to find the right person.”

           “Yeah, maybe. But I’m not even sure who they might be. Someone smart, and—”

           “Me and Ash kissed at the lake at camp,” Jace suddenly admitted, and blushed.

           Millie stared at him a moment, then chuckled. “Seriously? Jason Connor! You dog.”

           “I mean, she made it happen. But I… wanted to tell you, so someone else knows. I don’t want to forget that, but now if I do… You’re like the record keeper.”

           “Yeah, yeah—I get it. Geez, I can’t believe I didn’t pick up on that. I always wondered about Colin and December, but neither one ever admitted anything.”

           Once the hot pizza arrived, Millie finally got to summing up how the other classmates were doing between bites, at least to the best of her ability.

           “So, you already know about Brian, right? Working his dream job making game art for your uncle’s company? He’s single, but happy…” She scrolled through the notes on her phone with her non-greasy hand and continued, “Okay, Delilah. Coaches a girls’ football team in San Diego. Married to a short guy, an online therapist. Go figure. Spice went to a fashion design college, but she’s still waiting for her big break while working for Macy’s. She’s also in San Diego, so…” Millie laughed a little deviously. “I bet they totally run into each other sometimes. I wonder if the fireworks still fly.”

           “How about Felicity? She was the first one I helped,” Jace wondered.

           “Felicity, hm…” She scrolled some more. “Oh, yeah. Horror makeup for indie films and theater in LA. She looks fairly well-adjusted based off her social media posts. Good for her. Park runs a print shop in San Fran, following in his dad’s footsteps. He used to be more free-spirited and worked at a pawn shop for a while, but I guess he wanted more stability and set up a familiar business. He has a wife and an adorable four-year-old girl. I’ve seen the pictures. She likes to wear hoodies, just like he used to.

           “Robby’s a park ranger out at Yosemite, but still a big sci-fi nerd. He was actually in town recently, for a convention. Tammy and Trudy are both married—and, no, not to each other. Tammy helps manage a Barnes & Noble in town, and Trudy runs a gross celebrity gossip online magazine. I can’t approve of that. But, since they’re both locals, they still hang out with each other a lot. Now, as for Carson and Gerald… Well, they formed a band after college and tour across the state. Can you believe it?”

           “Sort of, yeah. I can picture it in my head…”

           “Gerald works the keys and writes most of the songs, and Carson can shred a guitar, while his wife does some vocals or plays the drums. I’ve seen them live when they pass through. They do rock covers and their own indie-alternative stuff, and they aren’t bad. Look ‘em up, they’re called The Desert Porters… Named after a favorite place and teacher, I assume. Oh, and Gerald married their manager. So, I hope that all works out for them, since if the band breaks up, then they might be in trouble, too.”

           “That just leaves Willa, Wright, and December… The ones I didn’t get to help.”

           “Yeah… Tell you what. I’ll get to the last three a little later, before you go back to save Wes. That way, ideas on how to help ‘em are still fresh in your mind, ya know?”

           “All right. But I hope I actually get that chance to go back at all.”

           “I’m sure you will. With both Arthur and Colin, we’ll get the door figured out.” Millie finished a slice, and after a sip of Coke, asked, “Did the book offer any answers?”

           “I’m going to try and finish it tonight. But, so far, not yet… And I’ve never read something so rambling and scientific. It might as well be in a different language.”

           Millie started on another slice, and smiled. “At least you’re still trying.”

           It was nearing eleven at night when Jace got to the last pages of Dr. Corathine’s book. His bedroom door was open, his bedside light was providing the warm LED glow for the pages, and on his TV, playing at a low volume for ambience, the TeenNick channel’s late-night block that had all the classic Nicktoons was playing a marathon of Hey Arnold!. Jace hadn’t quite gotten to the point where the show started airing in October of 1996, but he found that having era-appropriate TV on before bed, even just in the background, helped with the anxiety of suddenly being back in the noisy, busy, present. It was like an aid in acclimatizing to a quarter-century later.

           He paused in his reading briefly as his mom walked by his room, taking another nightly phone call from Sadie, interrupting her local news at eleven.

           “Sadie, what do you mean they found his car down there? Why would it have been sitting at those downtown apartments for a week? None of this makes any sense…” her voice faded as she walked off, leaving Jace feeling bad about his mom again.

           By this point, she had grown almost as concerned about her missing brother as Sadie was at the start, and her usual warm and optimistic demeanor was disappearing.

           “Don’t worry, Mom…” he whispered to himself. “Help is coming…”

           As he read the final pages of the book, he did find himself wondering about this latest update. If the door was inside his house now, then why was Wes’ car found at the apartment? Had some fragment of the other timeline carried over or merged with the present version of reality? Being a time-traveler himself, and able to observe the effects as someone aware of their existence, Jace seemed better suited to make theories than Malcolm ever could be. So far, his writing had proven to be a weird combo of new-age self-help and wellness and how it was woven together with a desire to go back and fix mistakes, rather than pure scientific theory and thoughts on possible ramifications of time travel. The fact that Malcolm made several references to certain “mind-altering” chemicals he “sampled” during the 1960s only reinforced the running themes.

           But, right on the last page, Jace found some ideas that may have been passed down to André and influenced his ambitions and methods that surrounded his creation of a time machine, even one designed to only view the past. Wanting to make sure he got it right, Jace quietly reread two paragraphs near the end out loud.

           “Finally, let us assume that, in time, humanity discovers and creates a mean to explore the past. What form would it take? Would there be multiple ways to do so? If so, would methods be compatible with each other, or would one supersede the others? Could we interact with the denizens of yesteryear, or merely observe? Could we affect, but not render any permanent change upon our departure, due to the timeline existing in a fixed state? When do we cause our original journey to the past to have never happened in the first place? Do we replace our own, younger bodies, or can we only send back our conscious minds? Can travel cause temporal interference? There are so many questions even before we arrive at quandaries like grandfather paradoxes and matter displacement.

           “Time travel, should it leave the realm of fiction, must be heavily regulated by a governing body. If the future is written, some form of autonomous system may already be in place to prevent disruption to our timeline, or at least the branch that we know, if each visit to the past causes a divergence. Thus, attempts to pioneer in this field should be done so with the utmost caution. It’s possible that we would not even be the first to venture into the void of time itself, as safeguards may already be in place. I recommend a means to simply see history before physically setting foot in any time not our own.”

           “Dr. Corathine predicted a lot of stuff,” Jace murmured. He then reread another one of Malcolm’s questions. “Wait a minute… Temporal interference…”

           He had heard of that before. In fact, it was at camp, during one of Mr. Jasper’s shorter stories. Jace thought back, and a clear image formed in his mind of Wessy, Colin, December, Millie, Felicity, Sadie, the twins, a very bored Spice, and himself being forced to listen to another tale from within the dusty confines of his home, the old museum.

           “Oh, and here’s a strange anecdote that no one else in this city would tell ya,” Mr. Jasper went on, his voice raspy by this point. “The clocks in Royal Valley—there’s somethin’ affecting ‘em, I tell ya. All clocks drift, slowly skip ahead. But clocks around here do so at least twice as fast. But it’s such a small difference, nearly no one notices.”

           “Neat…” Spice muttered. “Why do they do that? Aliens?”

           “No, young lady, of course not! At least… I don’t think so. Maybe an unusual magnetic field, a huge iron deposit under the whole valley… But I got a personal account. Before I took up this job, I worked at the old air base, see—where they got that big, noisy theme park now. And I think I know why the military packed up shop.”

           “Oh, did you fly fighter jets?” Wessy asked. “Did you go by Ice Man?”

           “No, boy! I was a janitor. It’s a good job, if you wanna hear things. The officers never notice you in the room when they let something slip. I learned they had constant problems with their timekeeping equipment, and it made precision navigation difficult, somethin’ like that. Always complainin’ about inaccurate satellite readings, too.”

           Felicity shrugged. “My mom says they closed the base because the city was getting too close to it, and people complained about all the loud engine noise.”

           “Maybe that played a part, but I’m tellin’ ya kids, the military knew something about the straaange time-related distortions in the valley.” Mr. Jasper looked up at the antique cuckoo clock in his home, ticking away, and added, “Yeah, I’m tellin’ ya… Used to travel all around the country, and I never found a place where timekeeping is such a chore. I bet the city airport has to take it into account, too… Well, anyway…”

           He looked at the campers, eager to get going. It almost sounded like he was finally done, but then he opened his mouth again and brought out instant groans and sighs.

           “Did ya know we used to think a gremlin lived in the San Baro standpipe? This one goes way back to the good old 40s. Hoo, boy, lemme tell ya…”

           Back in the present, around sunset the following day, Jace sat anxiously on one of the chairs in the waiting area for arrivals at Royal Valley International. He was a bit nervous about seeing Colin and Arthur as adults, as he had almost no idea what they would be like. While he had acquired some memories of adult Jared over the week, who had been a close family friend since before he was born, he so far only had a few vague recollections of Colin’s visits home, and had nothing at all involving Arthur.

           Aunt Sadie was the one picking them up, and Millie had come to greet them, as well. Both were checking their phones as Jace looked up at the screen full of arrival and departure times again. Colin was coming from Tokyo, and Arthur from Washington, D.C., but both had met up at LAX for their shared connecting flight back to the valley. And that plane had made it to the gate about five minutes ago.

           “Colin just texted, saying they’re starting to deboard…” Sadie reported, and moaned as she pocketed her phone. “Millie, I really wish you had told me about this sooner. Colin had no idea I didn’t even know until he texted me last night about having just arrived at Haneda. I mean, honestly…” she grumbled.

           “Sorry, Sadie,” Millie replied. “I didn’t want to worry you, thinking I was escalating things behind your back. Even if… maybe that’s exactly what I did.”

           “I just don’t know how they’re supposed to help us find Wes. Arthur hasn’t been home in two years as far as I know. How can they possibly find out where he went?”

           “Try to… trust me on this, okay?” Millie glanced at Jace. “Those two are our best shot at getting Wes back to us. There’s something… technical they can help us with.”

           “Well… At least, maybe a little reunion will help get my mind off of things.”

           “Um, Aunt Sadie?” Jace quietly spoke up. “This is going to sound like a random question, but that heavy red door in your kitchen, for the pantry… I’ve always wondered where it came from. It’s just so out of place, you know?”

           Sadie looked at her nephew, raised an eyebrow, and replied, “For some reason, it was installed in the house after we checked it out and bought it, but before we moved in. The realtor didn’t know anything about it when I asked. Why?”

           “Just something I always wondered about. Is there anything else you can tell me?”

           She thought a second and added, “I asked the neighbors, and one said they saw a delivery service bring it over and put it in, paid for and everything. Like it was scheduled.”

           “That’s really weird, Sadie,” Millie remarked. She then asked a follow-up question on Jace’s behalf, “You’ve never noticed anything strange about the door, right?”

           Sadie looked irritated. “Why do you want to know so much about my pantry door? I swear, something’s been going on with you two recently. I know Lucy’s noticed.”

           “Oh, look, it’s them!” Millie exclaimed before Sadie could grow more suspicious. “Uh, wow… Arthur shaved his beard… Maybe it wasn’t working for him.”

           Jace stood up and soon spotted the last two members of Wes’ old inner circle approaching in the arriving crowd of passengers. Arthur was tall, clean-cut, and well-dressed, looking like a proper government official. And like Millie, he had ditched his glasses at some point for lenses or corrective surgery. Colin, meanwhile, was still a bit of a scrawny guy and had ended up the shortest of the group. But he had a suave look of his own about him, and his rimless glasses made him look both wise and sophisticated. The two old friends were chatting and laughing as they passed through the security gate.

           Upon noticing Sadie and Millie waiting for them, everyone burst out into smiles and some quick hugs were exchanged, the two even sharing them with Millie, as well.

           “Hey, guys…” Sadie greeted them nostalgically. “Thank you for coming all this way, just because Wes did something stupid again. I hope it isn’t too much trouble.”

           “Aw, none at all, Said’,” Colin replied. “Good to be away from Tokyo. City’s flooded with tourists for the games.” He stretched out his back. “I bought something cool for Wes in Akihabara again. So, we’ll just have to find out where he went so I can give it to him.” He then looked at Jace. “Hey, bud! Wow, ya got tall! How’s your mom?”

           Jace gave him a placid smile in return, but didn’t know what to say.

           “H-hey, Arty…” Millie piped. “You, uh… You ditched the facial hair, huh?”

           Arthur grinned and stroked his smooth face. “Yeah. Keeping up on it always felt like such a time sink. I got enough on my plate already. How are you both holding up?”

           Sadie sighed. “We’ll get to that… I know you just arrived, but are you hungry?”

           Colin replied, “Starving. I didn’t have a chance to grab anything in Los Angeles. I mean, I did, but then me and Arty got to catching up at the gate, lost track of time…”

           “Then the plan was to meet the others at the Corny Cantina, if that’s okay.”

           Arthur picked up his rolling suitcase. “Yeah, sure. Man… that brings me back.”

           Colin looked at the nearby mural of the city and smiled. “Just like old times.”

           Sadie pulled her Tesla into one of the Supercharger lots near the restaurant, part of the big plaza that included the old megaplex theater. She got to charging her car’s battery, while Millie got out of the front and Jace, Arthur, and Colin all exited the back seats—Jace getting the squeeze between the adults, who chatted the whole way.

           He noticed it again once they stepped out under the dusk sky: Arthur would, every now and then, give him a curious glance. Jace still wasn’t sure yet just how much the adult version of Arthur had interacted with him, but he was starting to wonder if…

           “Sadie, we didn’t get around to asking—who else is here, exactly?” Colin piped.

           She replied, “Oh, just… Jared. And his wife, Mira. And Lucy and Lex…”

           “No Zach, huh?” Arthur said. “I mean, I know Ash and Celly are on vacation.”

           “Tch, I haven’t seen Zach in years,” Colin sighed.

           “Same here. I doubt even all of our government tracking tech could find him.”

           “You got so serious after college, dude…”

           They entered the restaurant, which Jace frequented with his mom, and still looked just as it did even from an alternate 1998 middle school era visit with the gang. Over in the corner, the four waiting for them waved from a pair of combined tables with seats for all nine of them—the chips and salsa already out, as well.

           Jace quickly grabbed a chair next to his mom while the adults did all the usual “it’s been too long” banter. There was some awkwardness at first, especially when it involved Arthur due to the long stretches between his visits home, but by the time the drinks arrived and orders were taken, they had settled in and were going on like the old friends they were. Except for Mira, quite pregnant and on her phone most of the time. A Mexican immigrant five years Jared’s junior, she likely didn’t know Wes very well, and Jace was concerned about revealing the big surprise with her around. Not because her reaction could be unpredictable, but because she might post about it on social media.

           “Jace, why did you bring your backpack?” Lucy asked him as the others cracked jokes about politics. “I didn’t know you took that with you to the airport…”

           “It’s full of stuff, Mom…” he whispered back, and took a breath. “You’ll see.”

           “Hey—hey guys, settle down a minute,” Colin spoke over the commotion. “I just realized something. Now, don’t get me wrong, it’s awesome that we’re all back together again. But this scene right here, with all of us? It kinda reminds me of something…”

           Jared looked around at the group, and seemed to have an idea of where Colin was heading, replying, “Colin, no, c’mon. We’ve been hearing this for years.”

           “But this is totally like It, you know? We’re two years early for the twenty-seven-year reunion, but still, we’re a group of friends coming home, because something happened to one of our own, and now we gotta, you know… make things right.”

           “Man, what is your obsession with the creepy monster clown story?”

           Sadie shrugged and said, “It’s just a metaphor for the fear we all have of moving past our childhood. Pennywise is the lingering dread of what we left behind and forgot.”

           “Deep, Sadie,” Lex said with a laugh. “But, yeah, Colin—what’s up with that?”

           Colin slumped a bit and explained, “I’ve said this before, but… I was terrified of clowns when I was really young. So, I did the stupidest thing you could imagine and tried to get braver by watching the original cable movie over and over. Like a form of exposure therapy, right? Well, I’m not afraid of clowns anymore, but now I have all of Tim Curry’s lines memorized and see some aspect of the story in, like, everything.”

           “Ugh, I could never watch any of those…” Lucy muttered. “Too scary.”

           “So, Jared, Mira…” Arthur changed the subject, “how long? Boy or girl?”

           His arm around Mira’s shoulder, Jared answered, “A few months yet, and we don’t know. Keeping it a surprise. No chance of burning down the house with a reveal party.”

           “Well, as you of course know, I already know. Working in the government and everything. We have nothing better to do than spy on and track every single person.”

           “Yeah, yeah, Arty. We all joke about it, but we know it’s probably true.”

           “That kind of thing would’ve been my dream job as a kid,” Millie interjected.

           “But… seriously, could you track Wes down?” Jared asked.

           “Guys, no, it’s not that easy,” Arthur replied. “I don’t even work in the part of intelligence that could begin to do that. We’re just going to have to use some combined old-fashioned detective work to find Wes. He probably simply ran off somewhere.”

           Mira finally put her phone down and chimed in, “I think it’s sweet that you all came together to find your old childhood friend. But, Colin… from so far away?”

           Colin smiled. “It’s not a big deal. I stop by a few weeks every summer, anyway. When I heard that my best friend was missing, I bumped up my plans. I know that some kind of melancholy has been hitting him the past few years, but he’s still worth the trip.”

           The nine meals soon arrived, with something different for everyone. Jace had gotten a combo platter with a taquito and a soft taco, but he found that he couldn’t eat, at least not yet. His stomach was in knots, and he knew he needed to get it all out. Millie had repeatedly glanced at him in the past few minutes, as well, pushing him to get to it.

           Speaking between bites, Jared began what he must’ve assumed would be a long planning session, “Well, we already… tried tracking him every way we could think… I say one of us tries to get… into his iPad… If it only has a four-digit passcode, it might be… the easiest way to see his emails and texts, see who he’s been talking to… Oh, yeah. That’s a good burrito… We still got places in town we should check out, too, and—”

           “You’re not going to find him,” Jace interrupted, and all eyes fell on him. “You never will. It’s impossible. My uncle… Right now, he doesn’t… exist like we do…”

           “Oh, Jace, you can’t give up hope,” his mom said and squeezed his shoulder.

           “Mom, please, just let me explain it. And I need all of you to try really hard to believe me. Millie can back me up, but first, I’ll… uh, put everything on the table.”

           Going literal, Jace stood up, opened his backpack, and tossed the “DANCIN’ J. CONNOR” special edition graduation button down where everyone could see it.

           Sadie glanced at it and crossed her arms. “Jace, please, not this again…”

           “This isn’t something Wes put me up to. Aunt Sadie… That red pantry door in your kitchen is…” He took a deep breath. “It’s a time machine. Wes stepped through it by accident, and it brought him to July, 1995. He lived out a year in the past, then came and got me, and dragged me into this… insane plan of his to ‘correct’ things that went wrong in his childhood. Jared,” Jace looked at him, who stopped mid-burrito bite and looked like he had no idea what to say, “part of that plan was to put you on the laser tag tournament team. To help keep you both friends. I was on your team, too. We came close to winning, but the blackout hit and shut everything down. Remember?”

           “Jace…” Sadie muttered. “I don’t care how long Wes coached you on all this—”

           “Aunt Sadie. You fainted behind Galaxy Hub. It was just us, and you told me to never tell anyone else, so how would I know that? And, I’m sorry for doing it now.”

           She fell back in her chair, her mouth agape as she tried to figure out how her nephew had just done that. By now, no one was chewing food other than Mira, who simply looked like she was enjoying a pleasant made-up kid story.

           “Look, I got more…” Jace took out the yearbook next, flipped to his picture, and swung his arms around so everyone could get a quick glance. “I know it doesn’t look like me, because Wes messed with the picture, but Jason Connor—that’s me. If you squint, you can see it. I hung out at The Dump with you guys. And here’s proof.”

           He took out the low-res printed image from Arthur’s old digital camera, showing them near Big Bertha. Jace had partially hidden behind Ash, but it was still the clearest picture of him that existed in the past—at least that someone in the gang had taken.

           “I was always trying to stay out of pictures, obviously,” Jace continued as the small photo was circulated among the adults. “But I know Zach ran the place. And he later told you it was Charlie before him. And he made Lex the new owner.”

           “This has to be a joke…” Lex said, eyes closed amid a nose pinch. “Jace, time travel isn’t real… Can’t you see that you’re upsetting your aunt and mother?”

           “Then how do you explain this?” Jace opened a picture on his phone of himself and Wes standing in their Luxor hotel room, the Vegas skyline behind them. “He told me Las Vegas is always changing, so you should be able to put a date on that selfie if you tried.” He handed the phone to his mom. “How would we fake that? It’s not Photoshop, it’s not a backdrop. Look, you can even see the old cars down on the street.”

           Lucy shook her head in disbelief. “Now I know this is all made-up. Wes would never take you out to Vegas, Jace. Especially without asking me first. Just what are—”

           “Mom, please! Uncle Wes is in a lot of trouble, and we’ll just be wasting time trying to find him, getting our hopes up for nothing. I need Arthur and Colin’s help to figure out how to get the door to take me, or all of us to a different time, just before… he got into that trouble. If I go in as it is now, I’ll just end up back in 1995.”

           “T-this is… all very impressive…” Colin stuttered a little. “It’s almost convincing.”

           “He really thinks he is a time traveler,” Mira said. “It’s cute. Oooh, I wish I could have experienced more of the 90s. I only got to see some of it, when I was very little.”

           “That’s okay, baby,” Jared said and kissed her cheek. “I can tell you all about it.”

           When it was his turn to look at his own old photo, Arthur nearly dropped the paper into his chili. With a trembling hand, he quietly passed it to Jared, who sighed.

           “I mean, I miss Jason, but… Jace, what is this, really? Has Wes been trying to find him? Did he insert a Jason Connor Easter egg into our new game?”

           “Jace,” Millie chimed in. “I think you need to go for the coup de grâce on this, like we discussed. At this point, it’s your best chance of convincing them.”

           He groaned, “Ah, man, really? Why can’t adults ever believe kids? Geez…”

           “You’re really in on this too, Millie?” Sadie scoffed. “This is just too much.”

           She went quiet as she and everyone else watched Jace get up and walk away, after having grabbed his phone back from Jared. Grumbling, he stepped out onto the floor between the table and the nearby booths, where, unfortunately, more patrons were seated and already looking at him curiously, wondering what he was about to do.

           He found the youthful hip-hop Playground song on YouTube, which Carson had once played all those years back, and turned up the volume. He then set the phone on the table, and regretting that it had come to this, he started dancing again—copying the same routine he had used to triumph over Jared in 1995, at least as best he could. The table watched, as speechless as everyone else in the restaurant nearby, including the server that had just stopped to see the spectacle, a tray of food in his hand.

           Showing mercy to himself, it was an abridged version of the dance, lasting only to the halfway point in the song. He flashed the peace sign over his head, letting it hang there for a moment as he actually received a smattering of applause from the other tables—and some laughter as well, including a throaty chortle from Mira. Jace then promptly broke his pose, apologized to the server, turned off his phone screen, and put both hands on the table so he could lean in, catch his breath, and look serious.

           “Oh, and I’m a few inches taller than I was a week ago, Mom. How do you explain that? Are you guys ready to believe me, or should I run through the whole story?”

           Sadie, Colin, Lucy, and Jared all looked back and forth at each other, their eyes wide as they tried to find a way to cast doubt on Jace again. But then Arthur stood with a jolt, pushing his chair back in the process. He took a deep breath, and was seemingly about to say something, but then just shook his head and stared down at the floor.

           “Arty… Don’t tell me you believe all this…” Jared murmured.

           Arthur mumbled and rubbed his forehead. “I… I didn’t see it when I last saw Jace, back when he was only four… He probably doesn’t even remember that…”

           “Arthur, this isn’t real…” Lex replied. “I mean, it can’t be… Right?”

           “Talk to us, big guy,” Colin said. “Tell us what’s on your mind.”

           Arthur calmly exhaled, and then averted his gaze towards the mural on the back wall, depicting a big, joyous fiesta in a small 19^th century Mexican town. He crossed his arms and muttered, “Unreal… There’s actually something to all the coincidences…”

           “Do you think he’s telling the truth, Arthur?” Millie asked him. “Guys, I’ve been holding this in for years. I knew. I found out who Jason Connor and his ‘dad’ were at the end of 1995. I helped them. Remember when they disappeared, right after Jason’s belated birthday party in the mall? That was just before Jace came back to the present.”

           At this point, the others had run out of things to say, and it seemed like they were ready to actually try and listen, becoming more open to the reality of things.

           Arthur stuck his hands in his pockets, sucked in air, and turned back to his old friends. “Royal Valley… has noticeable anomalies when it comes to time. It’s actually the reason that GPS navigation has always been spotty—why, every now and then, your car will jump around on your phone’s map as you’re driving. The satellites can briefly desync with the area. It’s not like we have the funding to dedicate research to it, but it’s something I became aware of years ago, when I first started at work; something I looked into during what little spare time I ever get at my… place of employment.”

           “Mr. Jasper’s story, at camp…” Jace said, and got looks from Sadie and Colin.

           “Yeah. I flashed back to that when I first found out. I’ve been wondering why, according to sensitive instruments, the entire valley would jump back or ahead a few microseconds once or twice a day. It’s almost as if the local spacetime suffers from some kind of interference. I’ve asked a few scientist buddies of mine, but they have no idea.”

           “But… what does that mean?” Jared asked.

           “It means that I’m more inclined to believe in the possibility of time travel, J. At least as it pertains to it having happened in this city. And if anyone would find himself in the 90s, and then want to give up his modern life to stay there a while, it would be Wes. Everything Jace just told us has only convinced me even more. But, still… How?”

           “I’m still trying to figure out the door…” Jace took the quartz from his pocket and showed it to everyone. “But this crystal is another way to time travel. Only, I can’t use it to go back to 1996. I think, maybe, the way the door works blocks out whenever I’ve already been by using it. André Corathine designed King Arcade to broadcast a sort of time-signal that makes door travel possible, and it stretches out to San Diego.”

           “André Corathine…” Arthur repeated thoughtfully. “The reclusive designer of the park. I read about him once. He made his early fortunes on… sports betting…”

           “You’re kidding,” Jared replied. “So, what, he’s the mastermind behind all this?”

           “Jared, are you believing all of this?” Colin asked him. “I mean… Maybe…”

           “Sadie, let’s see this door,” Arthur said. “It could be all the proof we need.”

           “Fine,” Sadie replied. “If you really think it will help somehow. But I still say all of this is ridiculous,” she argued, as Jace returned to his chair and finally started eating.

           For a few minutes, everyone munched their food in contemplative silence.

           Lex eventually spoke up again, “So, I know that when times are rough, we wax nostalgic, look back on a past that supposedly can’t change… But this is crazy.”

           “Are we really, really taking this seriously?” Lucy asked everyone. “Jace, you’re saying that you spent almost a year in the past, getting a grand tour, with your uncle?”

           “I know about Gemika and your old ‘friends,’ Mom. I met them at a sleepover.”

           “Oh. Wow, I haven’t thought about them in decades…”

           “Also, it pretty much was a year, because we spent time in a version of the city that got hit by an earthquake, that also destroyed King Arcade. But we fixed that.”

           “Yeah,” Millie affirmed. “He got to see a whole, alternate, dark timeline.”

           “This 90s nostalgia, I dunno…” Lex mumbled and leaned back. “I mean, I get it, it was a one-of-a-kind time to grow up, sure. But people like Wes just don’t see the good things about the modern age, even with all its problems. Like, all the social progress, ya know? For example, I can freely, just, be me. And Millie dated for a few months in high school, right? No one batted an eye. But if she had been seen with a girl back then…”

           Arthur replied with a laugh, “Actually, we did bat an eye, because it was her and Reynold Weichster. And it only lasted two weeks, not months.”

           “Hey…” Millie grumbled. “Mean. Don’t single me out. I thought he was cute.”

           “Lex makes a good point, though,” Jared added. “Some people still make a lot of noise, but there’s still more acceptance these days. Now, you usually don’t have to hide who you are to try and fit in. But,” he sighed, “I doubt all of that is even on Wes’ mind.”

           “Are… you really a time traveler?” Mira asked Jace. “You do seem to know all of these things you couldn’t know otherwise. What can you tell me about Jared?”

           Jace grinned wryly and replied, “He used to cheat at our water gun games.”

           Mira nudged her husband’s shoulder. “Tsk. Talk about a bad boy, Jared.”

           He groaned. “Man… I knew that’d come back to bite me.”

           “This is why that King Arcade graduation party never happened, isn’t it?” Colin suddenly realized. “Wes was the one paying for it. He wanted us to have a good time.”

           “That was so disappointing when it got cancelled,” Sadie replied. “But it sounds like something he’d do. One last big hurrah with all the fifth-graders…” She looked at Jace, with an expression suggesting she wanted to believe him. “Jace, please, tell me we have a good shot at saving him if we follow you. He drives me crazy sometimes, but then again… he has since we were kids, and I still love the big idiot anyway.”

           Jace felt his lip trembling, but shook it off and nodded confidently. The knot in his stomach gradually untied, and he was able to finish his dinner.

           “This is the big door, huh?” Arthur said as he and Colin examined it in the Colton household kitchen, Sadie and Jace keeping back nearby. “It’s certainly… red.”

           “I always thought it was out of place, whenever I visited,” Colin added, swinging the slab on its hinges. “And it’s much heavier than it’s supposed to be. Like, remember back when all doors were solid wood, Arty? This is even more than those.”

           Arthur looked back at Jace and asked, “So, if we just stick our hands through…”

           “The way to the past is from the inside half,” he explained. “But… I don’t want you to risk even sticking in a finger. Or tossing an object through it. I’m not sure what can cause a reset, and put us right back at July 18^th, 1995.”

           “Ah, look, Jace, I don’t want to wipe out our memory of you, and take away all of the good times and advice you gave our classmates, but we’re talking about your uncle’s life here. Wouldn’t he be right on the other side, having just arrived there?”

           Jace shook his head. “N-no. No… It works through time, not space. In fact, now that I think about it, we could create some kind of paradox doing that, because the door would move to a place where we didn’t even use it at the start. The Wes I knew, he…”

           The three adults all looked at him, Sadie asking, “What, Jace?”

           “I didn’t get around to saying this yet, but, Aunt Sadie… We came from another alternate timeline. You two weren’t married, Warren and Sally weren’t born, and Wes lived alone in the apartment where his car was found. That’s where the door used to be.”

           In response, Arthur and Colin glanced at each other, and Sadie gasped and covered her mouth. As she took in the new information, everyone looked towards the kitchen entrance to see Sally there, in her pajamas with an expression of concern.

           “Mommy, what’s Jace mean, saying I wasn’t born?”

           “N-nothing, sweetheart…” she replied, then went over and picked her up. “He’s just telling a weird joke, like Daddy does sometimes. Come on, let’s get you to bed.”

           “Is Daddy coming home soon?” Sally asked, bordering on tears.

           “Yes, of course he is. His business trip is almost done. Don’t worry…”

           Sadie gave Arthur and Colin a pleading, “please fix this” look, and headed off to put Sally to bed. The two sighed, scratched their heads, and stared at the door.

           “All right…” Colin huffed. “I remember where Sadie keeps her power tools.”

           “We’ll take it to my dad’s workshop at the park,” Arthur replied as Jace headed out into the living room. “We should put a tarp over it, make sure nothing goes in.”

           Jace went over to the couch, where Lex and Lucy were talking quietly, and plopped down, feeling exhausted from the long day—with still more to come.

           “Where did Warren go?” Jace asked them.

           His mom answered, “To his room. I think he’s finally starting to worry about his dad, too. But he doesn’t want to come out and talk about it… Jace, your uncle… He’d never admit it, but he’s been longing for something for a while, and I think it hurts.”

           He nodded. “Yeah. I’ve seen it. But I think he was starting to get better over our time in the past together, sort of like I did. And I’ve been thinking about something else. This will sound dumb, but I never would’ve figured it out if I hadn’t seen the place myself. I kind of my owe my entire existence… to a secret school club by a dumpster.”

           Lex let out a tiny laugh and asked, “How do you figure?”

           “I think my mom started admiring rebels and bad boys, like my dad, because she thought you were cool. And she probably only went to The Dump because you ran it. But, wait a minute… If Zach hadn’t picked you… If Charlie hadn’t made him an owner…”

           Lucy smiled, then reached over and brought her son close to say, “You could keep going all night, buddy. That’s just the miracle of being born, an unbroken chain.”

           “It’s pretty heady stuff, dude,” Lex added. “Like all this time-travel nonsense.”

           “Yeah…” Jace sighed, then thought, hang on, Uncle Wes. We’re on our way.