Timekeeper (19 page)

I hear voices inside my room, and I quickly switch on the lights. My legs nearly buckle from what I see.

A tall beige armoire stands opposite the bed, its shelves
open, revealing a black-framed screen inside. And there are real, live
shrunken people
within the screen, people speaking to me and laughing loudly, their clothes and hair and faces all in color.

I race up to the screen. “Who’s there? Who are you? What is it you want?”

But the miniature people inside the box, a family of some sort, don’t seem to hear me. They continue their chatter, while booms of laughter echo from somewhere unseen. I gingerly reach up to touch the screen and gasp as I feel nothing more than a shiny, hard surface. A book is propped up against it, with the title
Television Manual
, and I let out a long sigh of relief. Television. Celeste mentioned something about it. Yet nothing could have quite prepared me.

I slowly wander the room, which is ablaze with blinking objects that seem somehow alive. A dark gray box underneath the television is marked with the letters VCR while beside it sits a lighter gray box that calls itself Super Nintendo. A sleek white desk holds an unusual sort of typewriter with a built-in screen. I venture toward it, pressing one of the keys, and then I jump back, startled, as the screen fills with the picture of an apple. “
Macintosh
,” I whisper, reading the words below the image. What does that mean? The machine is now buzzing and whirring, and I back away from it.

Instead of artwork decorating the room, the walls are covered with huge color photographs. One depicts a scantily clad redheaded woman standing back-to-back with a gentleman, the words
Pretty Woman
running down the side of the image.

Another photograph shows five young men in matching jackets, with the phrase
Boyz II Men Cooleyhighharmony
written at the bottom.

I look around wildly, feeling dizzy at the sights and sounds within the room.
I don’t belong in 1991
, I panic.
What am I doing
?

Just as I’m about to retreat, my father’s face fills my mind. Father, who was powerful enough to travel through time even without his key, had believed me a worthy successor. Now is my chance to prove him right.

“I’ll learn all I can about the 1990s right here. This room has all the knowledge I need,” I tell myself. “And in a few days, my journey to the future will begin.”

E
ven if my memory were to fail me in the future, I would still be able to retrace, with certainty, the footsteps of my soul
.

—
YE SI

11

As Philip Walker drew closer to the Windsor Mansion on Sunday evening, it was with the sensation of returning to a place that had once meant a great deal to him.
What’s happening to me?
He’d asked himself that question countless times since the day he’d arrived in New York, but he still had no clear answers, only pieces to a puzzle that he couldn’t seem to solve.

Philip stood up straighter as he approached the tall entrance gates, his heartbeat picking up speed. The apartment building next door to the Windsor Mansion drew his attention, and as he glanced at it, his face paled. Somehow, he knew that building—just like he seemed to know the Windsor Mansion, without ever having stepped inside.

He shakily pressed the intercom button on the gate. A
woman’s friendly voice answered and he cleared his throat before speaking.

“This is Philip Walker. I’m here to see Michele.”

Michele knocked over her glass of water in surprise when Annaleigh informed her that Philip Walker was there. She hastily changed out of pajamas and threw on a pair of jeans and a cable-knit sweater, running a brush through her hair and dabbing on some lip gloss before hurrying down the stairs to meet him. The sight of Philip standing in the middle of the Grand Hall, ridiculously handsome in jeans and a black sweater, sent a buzz of electricity through her.

“Hi,” she said, hoping her voice sounded a lot calmer than she felt.

“Hey. Sorry to just show up, I know it’s late. I would have called, but I realized I don’t have your number. Luckily your address is well-known.” He grinned sheepishly.

“It’s totally cool. What’s up?” As she asked the question, Michele had a feeling she already knew the reason why he was there.

Philip glanced around uneasily then lowered his voice. “I … we need to talk about last night.”

Michele spotted Annaleigh heading in their direction, and she gestured for Philip to follow her to the front door. “Want to go for a walk?”

“Sure.”

He seemed to visibly relax at the idea of leaving the house, but his shoulders tensed when they stepped through the mansion
gates, with Caissie’s apartment building looming next door. Philip stared intently at it.

“It’s funny—I could swear I know that place, but it looks all wrong. There was a house there, a mansion made of red brick and white stone. And I knew your house, too, before I ever went inside.” He looked at Michele, and there was fear in his eyes. “Then last night, one minute we were talking in the lobby and everything was somewhat normal—and then it felt like I was this whole other person, this guy from another time and place who … who was crazy about you.” A flush crept up Philip’s cheeks.

All other thoughts were driven out of Michele’s mind as she stared at him, amazement mingling with relief.

“You remember, then? You remember us at the dance together … in 1910?”

“I remember telling you the date was 1910,” Philip said, in disbelief. “And I remember other things too—how it felt to miss you and wait for you. I felt how much he cared about you … like it was happening to me. And then this morning, I woke up earlier than usual. I was awake, but it was like I was sleepwalking.” His voice sounded dazed as he recounted the story. “I felt older and heavier, like I wasn’t seventeen anymore. I found myself at the piano, and then … I don’t know how, but I started playing this song that I had never even
heard
. My mom came into the room while I was playing, and she said she knew the song. It’s an old classical piece … called
Michele
.”

Michele’s throat was thick with tears.

“That piece was written by Phoenix Warren,” she said
softly. “Whose real name was Philip Walker. He wrote that song for me … and then fifty years later, my mom named me after it.”

Philip shook his head as if he weren’t hearing correctly.

“And you’re right,” Michele continued. “There was a house here. It was the Walker Mansion, and you lived there a hundred years ago, decades before it was converted into this apartment building. And you
have
been inside my house, countless times. That’s where we met.”

Philip halted, staring at her. “What are you trying to say?”

“I’m saying that what the world considers impossible
is
possible—at least it is for us.” She took a deep breath, a question suddenly occurring to her. “When’s your birthday?”

“I’ll be eighteen on December twelfth,” he answered, giving her a quizzical look. “But I really don’t understand—”

He broke off at Michele’s expression.

“What is it?”

“He did it,” Michele whispered. “Philip promised he’d find a way back to me. And he did.”

“I am so completely lost here,” Philip groaned.

“Just humor me. Do you know who else lived at the Osborne, later in his life?” Michele asked. “The same person who looks exactly like you, who played piano just the way you do. Phoenix Warren, aka Philip James Walker. And you were born on the
exact same day
that he died.” Michele looked at Philip in awe.
Elizabeth was right
.

“It’s almost as if his spirit left one body on December twelfth, 1992, and was … reborn in another,” she continued. “Like reincarnation.”

The color drained from Philip’s face.

“This—this is getting even crazier than before,” he stammered. “Me, the reincarnation of Phoenix Warren? What are you going to tell me next, that you were the real Billie Holiday and we were in a traveling music troupe together?”

Michele smiled grimly. “If you can believe it, the real story is maybe even more out there. Do you think you’re ready to hear it?”

Philip took a deep breath. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”

They found themselves walking down Fifth Avenue, just as they had done the first time Michele confessed her true identity to him in 1910.

“I never knew my father, but when I moved to New York two months ago, I found something that belonged to him. It was a key. A special key … one that sends you back in time. I later found out that my dad was a time traveler from the nineteenth century who went into the future and fell in love with my mom. But he disappeared before he even knew she was pregnant.”

Michele sucked in her breath as she realized she’d just told him her biggest secret. Now he knew the truth: that she was a freak of nature, a “time-crossed” daughter.

“Long story short, the key sent me back to the Windsor Mansion—in 1910. Only a couple people could see me while I was there, and Philip was one of them. We fell in love,” she said quietly. “It was like something out of a movie, the type of relationship that I assumed was just a fantasy. But it was real for us. We even wrote music together. ‘Bring The Colors Back’ was our first song.”

Philip swallowed hard, as a light seemed to dawn in his eyes.

“But our difference in Time was too big a hurdle,” Michele continued, sadness creeping into her voice. “I couldn’t control my time traveling, so sometimes he had to wait for weeks on end to see me, only to have me in 1910 for just a couple of hours. I couldn’t exist fully in 1910, and I tried and failed to bring him into the twenty-first century with me. We couldn’t go on like that, with a century between us. But even after, we never stopped loving each other. We exchanged letters when I traveled into the 1920s, and he left me a ring—the ring you’re wearing right now.”

Philip glanced down at his hand in shock. “This? My dad gave it to me. He said it was a family heirloom.”

“Well, are you related to the same Walkers?” Michele asked with a faint smile.

Philip nodded. “I remember my dad telling me stories about visiting their Newport house as a kid, just before it was donated to the Preservation Society. It had a French-sounding name, Palais de la Mer or something.”

“That’s it!” Michele cried. “I was there. So then what your dad said was true. The ring is a family heirloom.”

“But how would it get back into the family if your whole story is true and it was given to
you
all those years ago?” Philip challenged her.

“I don’t know. But one of the last time periods I traveled to was 1944, and when I came back to the present, the ring was gone,” Michele told him. “It was also in 1944 when I finally saw Philip again. This time he was all grown up, and he had
changed his identity to Phoenix Warren. Faking the death of Philip Walker and taking on this new persona was the only way he could pursue his music and live in freedom from his oppressive mom and uncle. That was the night he told me he had written the symphony
Michele
for me.” Philip stared at her, speechless.

“That was the last time I saw him—before you showed up at school.”

“So let me get this straight.” Philip let out an incredulous laugh. “I’m supposed to believe that you’re a time traveler and I’m a reincarnation of my great-great-great-uncle who also happens to be a famous musician who dated you a hundred years ago?”

Michele bit her lip. “Um. Yes. In a nutshell.”

“Then either the world has gone insane, or we both have.” Philip took a shaky breath. “I wish I could tell you no part of me identified with that unbelievable story you just told, but … well, I don’t remember the events you mentioned, but it was weird—when you were talking, I felt like … like I knew what you were going to say before you said it. That déjà vu feeling.” Philip was silent a moment. “
Home
—that’s what I thought of when I saw you that first day in class. I felt like I’d come home again, and it confused the hell out of me. I’ve been feeling that way again since last night when we were—wherever that was—and I don’t think I can fight it anymore.”

He reached for her hand. As their fingers laced together, Michele felt a warm glow spreading through her, a happiness that she was almost afraid to trust.

“I’ve been so hopeful that you would remember—it’s hard
to believe this moment is real,” Michele blurted out. “How do I know you won’t forget again, that things won’t go back to the way they were before?”

“Because now that I’ve come out of this—this fog, I don’t want to waste another second. I need to be in your life,” he said firmly. “I can’t stay away from you anymore.”

His face was so sincere that Michele knew she could believe him. She didn’t know who initiated it, but suddenly she found herself in his arms, her head nestled against his chest as he stroked her hair. Nothing had ever felt so perfect.
Philip is right
, she thought.
It does feel like coming home
.