The time traveler's wife (56 page)

"Who's there?" Kevin says, louder
than necessary. I imagine Kevin standing there, pasty and hung over in the dank
light of the stairwell. His voice bounces around, echoing off the concrete.
Kevin walks down the stairs and stands at the bottom, about ten feet away from me.
"How'd you get in there?" He walks around the Cage. I continue to
pretend to be unconscious. Since I can't explain, I might as well not be
bothered. "My God, it's DeTamble," I can feel him standing there,
gaping. Finally he remembers his radio. "Ah, ten-four, hey, Roy."
Unintelligible static. "Ah, yeah, Roy it's Kevin, ah, could you come on
down to A46? Yeah, at the bottom." Squawks. "Just come on down
here." He turns the radio off. "Lord, DeTamble, I don't know what you
think you're trying to prove, but you sure have done it now." I hear him
moving around. His shoes squeak and he makes a soft grunting noise. I imagine
he must be sitting on the stairs. After a few minutes a door opens upstairs and
Roy comes down. Roy is my favorite security guy. He's a huge African-American
gentleman who always has a beautiful smile on his face. He's the King of the
Main Desk, and I'm always glad to arrive at work and bask in his magnificent
good cheer. "Whoa," Roy says. "What have we here?"

"It's DeTamble. I can't figure out how he
got in there."

"DeTamble? My my. That boy sure has a
thing for airing out his john-son. I ever tell you 'bout the time I found him
running around the third-floor Link in his altogether?"

"Yeah, you did."

"Well, I guess we got to get him out of there."
"He's not moving."

"Well, he's breathing. You think he's
hurt? Maybe we should call an ambulance."

"We're gonna need the fire department, cut
him out with those Jaws of Life things they use on wrecks." Kevin sounds
excited. I don't want the fire department or paramedics. I groan and sit up.

"Good morning, Mr. DeTamble," Roy
croons. "You're here a bit early, aren't you?"

"Just a bit," I agree, pulling my
knees to my chin. I'm so cold my teeth hurt from being clenched. I contemplate
Kevin and Roy, and they return my gaze. "I don't suppose I could bribe you
gentlemen?"

They exchange glances. "Depends,"
Kevin says, "on what you have in mind. We can't keep our mouths shut about
this because we can't get you out by ourselves."

"No, no, I wouldn't expect that."
They look relieved, "Listen. I will give each of you one hundred dollars
if you will do two things for me. The first thing is, I would like one of you
to go out and get me a cup of coffee."

Roy's face breaks into his patented King of the
Main Desk smile. "Hell, Mr. DeTamble, I'll do that for free. 'Course, I
don't know how you're gonna drink it,"

"Bring a straw. And don't get it from the
machines in the lounge. Go out and get real coffee. Cream, no sugar."

"Will do," says Roy.

"What's the second thing?" asks
Kevin.

"I want you to go up to Special
Collections and grab some clothes out of my desk, lower right-hand drawer.
Bonus points if you can do it without anyone noticing what you're up to."

"No sweat," Kevin says, and I wonder
why I ever disliked the man.

"Better lock off this stairwell," Roy
says to Kevin, who nods and walks off to do it. Roy stands at the side of the
Cage and looks at me with pity. "So, how'd you get yourself in
there?"

I shrug. "I don't have a really good
answer for that."

Roy smiles, shakes his head. "Well, think
about it and I'll go get you that cup of coffee."

About twenty minutes pass. Finally, I hear a
door being unlocked and Kevin comes down the stairs, followed by Matt and
Roberto. Kevin catches my eye and shrugs as though to say, I tried. He feeds my
shirt through the mesh of the Cage, and I put it on while Roberto stands
regarding me coldly with his arms crossed. The pants are a little bulky and it
takes some effort to get them into the Cage. Matt is sitting on the stairs with
a doubtful expression. I hear the door opening again. It's Roy, bringing coffee
and a sweet roll. He places a straw in my coffee and sets it on the floor next
to the roll. I have to drag my eyes away from it to look at Roberto, who turns
to Roy and Kevin and asks, "May we have some privacy?"

"Certainly, Dr. Calle." The security
guards walk upstairs and out the first-floor door. Now I am alone, trapped, and
bereft of an explanation, before Roberto, whom I revere and whom I have lied to
repeatedly. Now there is only the truth, which is more outrageous than any of
my lies.

"All right, Henry," says Roberto.
"Let's have it."

Henry: It's a perfect September morning. I'm a
little late to work because of Alba (she refused to get dressed) and the El (it
refused to come) but not terribly late, by my standards, anyway. When I sign in
at the Main Desk there's no Roy, it's Marsha. I say, "Hey Marsha, where's
Roy?" and she says, "Oh, he's attending to some business." I
say, "Oh " and take the elevator to the fourth floor. When I walk
into Special Collections Isabelle says, "You're late," and I say,
"But not very." I walk into my office and Matt is standing at my
window, looking out over the park.

"Hi, Matt," I say, and Matt jumps a
mile.

"Henry!" he says, going white. "How
did you get out of the Cage?" I set my knapsack on my desk and stare at
him. "The Cage?"

"You—I just came from downstairs—you were
trapped in the Cage, and Roberto is down there—you told me to come up here and
wait, but you didn't say for what—"

"My god." I sit down on the desk.
"Oh, my god." Matt sits down in my chair and looks up at me.
"Look, I can explain... " I begin.

"You can?"

"Sure." I think about it. "I—you
see—oh, fuck," "It's something really weird, isn't it, Henry?"

"Yeah. Yeah, it is." We stare at each
other. "Look, Matt.. .let's go downstairs and see what's going on, and
I'll explain to you and Roberto together, okay?"

"Okay." We stand up, and we go
downstairs. As we walk down the east corridor I see Roy loitering near the
entrance to the stairs. He starts when he sees me, and just as he's about to
ask me the obvious, I hear Catherine say, "Hi, boys, what's up?" as
she breezes past us and tries to open the door to the stairs. "Hey, Roy,
how come no can open?"

"Hum, well, Ms. Mead," Roy glances at
me, "we've been having a problem with, uh..."

"It's okay, Roy," I say. "Come
on, Catherine. Roy, would you mind staying up here?" He nods, and lets us
into the stairwell. As we step inside I hear Roberto say, "Listen, I do
not appreciate you sitting in there telling me science fiction. If I wanted
science fiction I would borrow some from Amelia." He's sitting on the
bottom stairs and as we come down behind him he turns to see who it is.

"Hi, Roberto," I say softly.
Catherine says, "Oh my god. Oh my god." Roberto stands up and loses
his balance and Matt reaches over and steadies him. I look over at the Cage,
and there I am. I'm sitting on the floor, wearing my white shirt and khakis and
hugging my knees to my chest, obviously freezing and hungry. There's a cup of
coffee sitting outside the Cage. Roberto and Matt and Catherine watch us
silently.

"When are you from?" I ask.

"August, 2006." I pick up the coffee,
hold it at chin level, poke the straw through the side of the Cage. He sucks it
down. "You want this sweet roll?" He does. I break it into three
parts and push it in. I feel like I'm at the zoo. "You're hurt," I
say. "I hit my head on something," he says. "How much longer are
you going to be here?"

"Another half hour or so." He
gestures to Roberto. "You see?"

"What is going on?" Catherine asks. I
consult my self. "You want to explain?"

"I'm tired. Go ahead."

So I explain. I explain about being a time
traveler, the practical and genetic aspects of it. I explain about how the
whole thing is really a sort of disease, and I can't control it. I explain
about Kendrick, and about how Clare and I met, and met again. I explain about
causal loops, and quantum mechanics and photons and the speed of light. I
explain about how it feels to be living outside of the time constraints most
humans are subject to. I explain about the lying, and the stealing, and the
fear. I explain about trying to have a normal life. "And part of having a
normal life is having a normal job," I conclude.

"I wouldn't really call this a normal
job," Catherine says.

"I wouldn't call this a normal life,"
says my self, sitting inside the Cage. I look at Roberto, who is sitting on the
stairs, leaning his head against the wall. He looks exhausted, and wistful.
"So," I ask him. "Are you going to fire me?"

Roberto sighs. "No. No, Henry, I'm not
going to fire you." He stands up carefully, and brushes off the back of
his coat with his hand. "But I don't understand why you didn't tell me all
this a long time ago."

"You wouldn't have believed me," says
my self. "You didn't believe me just now, until you saw."

"Well, yes—" Roberto begins, but his
next words are lost in the odd noise vacuum that sometimes accompanies my
comings and goings. I turn and see a pile of clothes lying on the floor of the
Cage. I will come back later this afternoon and fish them out with a clothes
hanger. I turn back to Matt, Roberto, and Catherine. They look stunned.

"Gosh," says Catherine. "It's
like working with Clark Kent."

"I feel like Jimmy Olsen," says Matt.
"Ugh."

"That makes you Lois Lane," Roberto
teases Catherine.

"No, no, Clare is Lois Lane," she
replies. Matt says, "But Lois Lane was oblivious to the Clark
Kent/Superman connection, whereas Clare.

"Without Clare I would have given up a
long time ago," I say. "I never understood why Clark Kent was so hell
bent on keeping Lois Lane in the dark."

"It makes a better story," says Matt.

"Does it? I don't know," I reply.

Friday, July 7, 2006 (Henry is 43)

Henry: I'm sitting in Kendrick's office,
listening to him explain why it's not going to work. Outside the heat is
stifling, blazing hot wet wool mummification. In here it's air-conditioned
enough that I'm hunched gooseflesh in this chair. We are sitting across from
each other in the same chairs we always sit in. On the table is an ashtray full
of cigarette filters. Kendrick has been lighting each cigarette off the end of
the previous one. We're sitting with the lights off, and the air is heavy with
smoke and cold. I want a drink. I want to scream. I want Kendrick to stop talking
so I can ask him a question. I want to stand up and walk out. But I sit,
listening. When Kendrick stops talking the background noises of the building
are suddenly apparent.

"Henry? Did you hear me?"

I sit up and look at him like a schoolchild
caught daydreaming. "Um, no." "I asked you if you understood.
Why it won't work."

"Um, yeah." I try to pull my head
together. "It won't work because my immune system is all fucked up. And
because I'm old. And because there are too many genes involved."

"Right." Kendrick sighs and stubs out
his cigarette in the mound of stubs. Tendrils of smoke escape and die.
"I'm sorry." He leans back in his chair and clasps his soft pink
hands together in his lap. I think about the first time I saw him, here in this
office, eight years ago. Both of us were younger and cockier, confident in the
bounty of molecular genetics, ready to use science to confound nature. I think
about holding Kendrick's time-traveling mouse in my hands, about the surge of
hope I felt then, looking at my tiny white proxy. I think about the look on
Clare's face when I tell her it's not going to work. She never thought it would
work, though. I clear my throat. "What about Alba?"

Kendrick crosses his ankles and fidgets.
"What about Alba?" "Would it work for her?"

"We'll never know, will we? Unless Clare
changes her mind about letting me work with Alba's DNA. And we both know
perfectly well that Clare's terrified of gene therapy. She looks at me like I'm
Josef Mengele every time I try to discuss it with her."

"But if you had Alba's DNA" I say,
"you could make some mice and work on stuff for her and when she turns
eighteen if she wants she can try it."

"Yes."

"So even if I'm fucked at least Alba might
benefit someday."

"Yes."

"Okay, then." I stand and rub my
hands together, pluck my cotton shirt away from my body where it has been
adhered by now-cold sweat. "That's what we'll do."

Friday, July 14, 2006 (Clare is 35, Henry is
43)

Clare: I'm in the studio making gampi tissue.
It's a paper so thin and transparent you can see through it; I plunge the
su-ketta into the vat and bring it up, rolling the delicate slurry around until
it is perfectly distributed. I set it on the corner of the vat to drain, and I
hear Alba laughing, Alba running through the garden, Alba yelling, "Mama!
Look what Daddy got me!" She bursts through the door and clatters toward
me, Henry following more sedately. I look down to see why she is clattering and
I see: ruby slippers.