Sweet Success

By John W. Burge

“Quarantine means no going outside, old man,” the guard growled beneath his face mask. Well over six feet with a viselike grip, he dragged me inside as his name tag bobbed in and out of my peripheral vision. Pickerman was clearly stamped in sparse utilitarian lettering.

“Just going for a walk, sonny,” I said, the modulation collar aging my voice to match my disguise. “It’s so nice today—”

“Then take a walk in the halls.” He shoved me toward an open corridor, then pointed a meaty finger at me. “Don’t go outside.” He turned and marched away.

Well. It was easier getting in than I thought. Getting out would be the problem.

I made a beeline for Room 56. I entered slowly. The lone occupant lay in front of a large bay window looking out to a sprawling green lawn. Silhouetted against the late afternoon sun, she appeared almost young again. Except for the distinct outline of a breathing mask hooked up to an oxygen tank.

She turned her head toward me. Her eyes widened. “Theo?”

“Eleanor.” It felt strange to call my ancestor by her first name.

I approached the bed and took her hand. It was cold, her skin paper-thin, and her grip may as well have been a baby’s.

“You’re better?” she wheezed. Her breath rattled as she inhaled. “They didn’t tell me.”

“A Thanksgiving miracle.” I smiled. Uncle Theo, Great-grandma’s brother, had been rushed to the hospital the night before. Pickerman didn’t know yet. It was the only reason my disguise worked.

I felt my smile fade. Great-grandma and old Uncle Theo would never see each other again.

“Eleanor,” I said gently, sitting in a sturdy wooden chair padded with hideous pink cushions. “The sickness got me thinking.”

We locked eyes.

“It’s time.”

She stared at me so long, I started to worry she hadn’t heard. Then she released my hand and held hers out, quavering. “Pen and paper.”

I nodded, extracting both from my breast pocket.

She began to write. As she did, I regaled her with every family legend I picked up over the years, things she’d never live to see, framed as elaborate what-ifs. Half of them were unbelievable anyway, even to me. More than once, she let out a wheezy laugh that quickly degraded into a coughing fit.

I don’t know how long we talked before she returned the paper.

“Family only,” she coughed out.

I tucked it into my pocket and placed my hand on my heart. “Promise.” I frowned. “Except I need to get past Pickerman.”

She lay back and nodded weakly at the window. “Fresh air,” she breathed out slowly.

“That doesn’t open.”

She stared right at me. “Open it.” A mischievous glint shone from somewhere deep in her wizened eyes, echoing all the pictures I’d seen of the horse-riding, catfish-wrangling, utterly fearless tomboy she had been in her youth.

Then it clicked. “You’re serious.”

She nodded, smiling under the mask.

It was my turn to laugh.

I stood and picked up the padded chair. Then I ran and swung it at the bay window.

The glass exploded outward. Alarms shattered the empty air.

I cleared broken glass from the bottom sill with the chair, then leaped out and dashed across the lawn, following the back side of the building. I careened around the corner. Over another lawn and across the parking lot was the appalling brown-and-tan 1985 Chevy S-10 pickup, driver window down for added derelict effect. Right where I’d left it.

Someone shouted behind me. I looked back. Pickerman sprang over the sill of Great-grandma’s room like he was clearing a hurdle.

I sprinted with everything in me.

Pickerman’s hard footfalls were getting closer when I dove through the open window, gracelessly half-crumpling on the torn bench seat. I scrambled into an upright position, slamming my left foot onto the primer key, disguised as a clutch. I entered the access code by maneuvering the four-speed stick: 4-1-2-4-3-4-1-2.

Thick arms shot through the window and seized my collar. Pickerman was panting, his breath muffled by the mask. His eyes blazed with a sinister gleam.

“You… will… kill… people,” he wheezed.

I punched the ignition button.

The pre-launch repeller sequence flung Pickerman back. Abruptly, the world through the open window seemed to rush toward me and away at the same time. My stomach dropped to my feet.

Several long seconds later, my stomach slammed back into place like a punch in the solar plexus. I gasped, sucking in air.

Slowly, the beaten-up, yellowing tan interior of the S-10 faded back into smooth, charcoal gray chrono-cloth. The floor pedals and shifter returned to their normal positions, flush with the floor of the cab. The cool-down operation finished. I got out, my feet shaky.

“Welcome back, Mr. Thorpe,” chirped Allie, the bubbly service girl. “Oh, you had the window rolled down. We don’t recommend that. It can cause temporal vertigo.” She ran her finger along the back of the modulation collar. My Theo disguise dissolved back into a standard chrono-cloth jumpsuit.

“Now just a few final checks… No changes to bedrock events. Very good… No disguise malfunctions. Excellent. How was your trip overall?”

I reached into the breast pocket of my jumpsuit and extracted the paper. I unfolded it and double-checked the title, written in a shaky but distinct hand: “Eleanor Thorpe’s Thanksgiving Pecan Pie.” Her most closely-guarded secret. Family lore said she planned to write it down only on her deathbed.

But she’d died, isolated from her family, and the recipe was forgotten for two generations.

Not anymore.

I refolded the paper. “Worth it.”

“Excellent,” Allie said with a bright grin. “Then how would you rate your destination year?” She turned her tablet toward me. The year was pre-selected, along with the first of five stars.

“You have anything lower than one?”

Her smile vanished. She sighed. “You wouldn’t believe how often we get that question for 2020.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

John W. Burge writes code by day. He also writes stories by day, just a lot earlier in the morning. Both are made possible by copious amounts of coffee. When he isn’t reading five books at a time or writing science fiction and fantasy at a snail’s pace, he enjoys walks with his family, barbecue, and artfully crafted memes. In his mind, the Star Wars Expanded Universe is still canon.

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