The Grapevine

Always at the pass the car would go silent. They’d been chattering, commiserating, and wondering at life. The pass was where all commenced in pondering internally, their heads hurting a bit from all of the talking.

On the way, she marveled at the gigantic rock formations. Rolling hills covered in green tall grass. She’d never seen anything like it. Velvety and cozy.

            The incline became so steep that even the big strong engines of today chugged up the highway slowly. She thought of the settlers in their covered wagons. The women in their stifling garb. 

She wondered if the Indians foresaw it all. Physically and spiritually.

Physically, she picked out which mountain peaks they would have placed themselves on, to keep a lookout for the packs of wagons coming in.

Spiritually, she wondered if they could feel the fear from afar. If the most they could hope for was to die with some humility.

The car reached the tipping point of the incline on the highway. Down into the valley they went. And like a roller coaster the milk and honey fantasy came flying at them. Fields and fields. After all the concrete and asphalt.

They only stayed one night in a small mining town on the other side of the Sierras. It snowed in the morning. Just a dusting. She inhaled the air when she awoke with delight. They’d slept on the porch. After all they weren’t wed; so he slept on the floor at her feet and she slept on the couch. She awoke to find him gone and took a deep breath of the air and could see the trees surrounding his grandfather’s property without lifting her head from where she lay.

            She missed the East coast, but mainly for the humidity, and for the possibility of snow. Or rain, something other than the dry, unforgiving heat that pervaded southern California where she now lived.

On the way back, again silence at the pass. This time after many hours of soul-searching talk. Tears welled in her eyes. They’d been talking about orphans because they all had some in their respective families.

            All of the lives and stories had parallels. Parallels that seemed like messages from beyond—or at least that’s how it seemed to these three in the car while driving through the valley.

               

She thought again of the Indians, and the pain that seemed to hang like a disgusting smog-filled bog of despair. Just beyond the south side of the pass.

            All that drama and this is what they did with it. An asphalt trail smack dab in the middle of the thing. Forget Dead Man’s Curve. That was past at the pass. The least they could’ve done was keep it all beautiful. Instead there was such misery that they had to name it the happiest place on earth.

            What would the Indians have thought about the concept of happiness?

His father interrupted the silence as they approached Dead Man’s Curve.

            “You see that abandoned water tower?” he pointed toward it, “Used to be a restaurant, right at the top of that hill.

            Back then, cars overheated from the pass and they had to stop to take a break.”

Revenge of the Scriveners

A customary greeting card was passed around my office that day. The card was for me. The occasion was my last day at the investment bank I’d been working for a little over a year. It was an easy choice to leave. In fact I was surprised I’d slipped into the comfort of the easy commute and ignored the reasons it was the wrong place for me to be working. For me work always panned out to being another year another job, and finally I was getting the hell out of this one. I perused the greeting card. There were a few funny jokes, some nice personal well-wishers, and many generic good luck’s followed by signatures. I looked a bit closer and saw that someone had written, Best of Luck to you, Bartleby!

                There wasn’t a signature, but I knew the handwriting very well. She was on my team in our department. We were close friends at some point, but no longer. She didn’t speak to me anymore, so I was surprised. At first I was excited that she’d written what seemed a nicety. But then I realized she was making a reference to, “Bartleby, the Scrivener.” I swiveled in my chair to draft an e-mail to her. A coworker interrupted my thoughts,

                “Come on let’s get out of here and go to the bar!!” I ignored him, distracted trying to think of the nastiest, clever thing I could come up with. Of course it was so silly, she wanted to light a fire under me and she succeeded. I got her message loud and clear. Bartleby’s catchphrase was, “I would prefer not to.” And that was her gripe with me: I never did work for her only the other people on our team. The insinuation in her brilliant, cowardly unsigned epithet was that I was lax on the job. The implication incensed me and I came up with a reply in the five minutes I had. The best I came up with was, The saying goes, everyone hates most what they see inside themselves. So best of luck to YOU, Bartleby.

I hit Send as another coworker came over saying,

                “What the hell are you doing, working??? Let’s get outta here.”

                “Okay,” I stood and caught my last glimpse of her, opening the e-mail as I left with a group of people to the bar.

The bar was very close and before I had my first drink in hand, I regretted sending the e-mail. I should’ve given her the last laugh. We used to be friends, but she’d begun to isolate herself. It was what I thought great about her at first. But at some point her anxiety led her to wearing a gas mask in her cubicle, a protest which amounted to nothing more than massive amounts of office gossip about the crazy lady in the Legal department. 
       When we were still friendly she often told me the truth about banking, she’d been in and out of it for twenty years. The more I learned the more I was disturbed. She was far from being compartmentalized or ignorant to the world of banking, like myself and many of my young coworkers. She was simply indifferent to it. She was super sarcastic and often had me laughing out loud at her snide remarks. She also many times unloaded paranoid thoughts about New York; about the subways and anthrax. All of which I suspect was aggravated by our locale which offered a prime view of the financial district's ghostly empty spots where the twin towers once stood. She moved on to worrying she was getting a respiratory disease from the office we spent forty hours a week in. Hence her wearing a gas mask. This was the kind of stir she’d cause. Our office was ridiculous with conservative rules and silence, so her insanity was delighted in by many. I never understood why she didn’t just leave to another place. I couldn’t get why anyone would want to stir up so much shit at age forty-five. 

I felt awful as I pondered over this at the bar.  It seemed horrible to say that anyone is like Bartleby and have it be true. I had focused on the I’d Prefer Not To aspect of Bartleby and forgotten the end of the tale when Bartleby refuses to leave the office. Somehow that confirmed everything I’d said in my response to her, which I then regretted even more.

I never spoke to her again. Odd that we would turn on each other considering we had the most in common at that conservative corporation—although one of her theories included the office spiking the cafeteria’s food.

I hear she went so crazy they had to fire her. Supposedly she made a real scene on her way out, one that people only daydream of making when they hate their jobs.

Teacher, Teach her.

I walked into the classroom late, by a minute. But late, nonetheless. I caught the eyes of a fellow instigator who caused Mrs. Polanka an endless amount of stress. He flashed a smirk at me, and I could see Mrs. Polanka was already flustered, no doubt because of this young man. But upon seeing my bloodshot eyes, his countenance changed. As did my favorite audience, Lauren and Bonnie. Other students whose giggling prompted me to be the ultimate instigator. Each one of their stifled laughs pushed me to a new limit. They too, were smiling, excited I had arrived, and then upon seeing my red, red eyes, became scared for me.

            Bonnie’s eyes grew wide, she leaned back to whisper,

            “Sarah, you’re eyes are so red!” They were afraid it may not just be the usual high jinks with me getting kicked out. This could get me sent out of school completely. I took my seat and averted my eyes down as Mrs. Polanka interjected,

            “Bonnie! Please, no talking.” Mrs. Polanka and I were at a point where, I didn’t exist in the classroom until the moment I became a problem, at which time I was to take my desk into the hallway, until the bell rang. At some point the "moment" occurred each day within a few minutes of class beginning. But lately I'd lost some steam and complied with the teacher in glaring silences.

The school had begun a new program where classes were longer and met every other day, instead of each day. But in order to fit in seven classes there had to be one that met everyday. The school had made the mistake of placing it at the end of the day, a volatile time of day for hormonal teenagers. Perhaps, Mrs. Polanka and I would’ve gotten along swimmingly if the class met each morning instead. No such luck for the feeble Mrs. Polanka, who on a daily basis lost her cool and emitted hysterics. Energy that a smart, bored teenager could sink their teeth into with ease.

            The best part of it all, was that it was an English class, and I read all the books assigned. I hated A Midsummer Night’s Dream, felt it to be nonsense. I also read every word of To Kill a Mockingbird, and really loved it. But at that point, the war between us had begun, so if I tried to contribute in a serious way Mrs. Polanka shot me down, in a panic, assuming she was being made fun of. I took up the habit of keeping my analyses to myself. If she had paid the slightest bit of attention she would’ve noticed that I liked to read. Clearly a fan of Holden Caulfield. But she was more interested in control, she had no inkling of how to connect or be human. All she cared about was order. It was evident in the way she spoke, every word so carefully articulated. In a few weeks we gathered that we were in purgatorial public schooling, she'd tell us daily,

            “I taught in a private school and in private school this would be completely unacceptable behavior,” which again was a point of entry for predatory instigating teenagers.

Mrs. Polanka spoke in her rehearsed sing-songy voice,

            “Okay, class. Today we’re going to an assembly. We get the special privilege of seeing a sneak preview of The Madrigals. And featured will be Nancy Ross, who I have in one of my classes and she is just a model student, perfect in every way. So come on kids, let’s gather our things.”

As we began our approach to the auditorium Bonnie and Lauren caught up with me,

            “Holy shit! Sarah! You got so lucky.” I smirked and nodded. I found pot took the piss right out of me and this seemed to make both me and Mrs. Polanka happy.

Once the kids settled in their seats, the performance began and in the audience the snickering and gibing began. Almost every kid I knew in school was pretty creative but while at school there were confines. Only musicals made the stage. Not even a normal play, but definitely not any of the kids who were in a band outside of school. Only sports and musicals. 

            After the group of performers sang a few, the aforementioned Nancy Ross took center stage and began to sing an old standard made recently popular by Kathie Lee Gifford:

            If they could see me now

            That little gang of mine

            I’m eatin’ fancy chow and drinkin’ fancy wine…

I couldn’t even laugh with Lauren and Bonnie anymore. I focused in on Nancy with the tireless smile pasted, as her face contorted the vengeful words into a happy show tune. The girl seemed she would literally explode into pieces. A combustion of enthusiasm.
          I craned my head back to see Mrs. Polanka. She too, had a perma-smile. She'd put on a special scarf and lipstick and appeared to be enthused. Except for the moment she saw me and her face immediately contracted to the taciturn frown I was accustomed to.

I was surprised that she was so supportive of this. It seemed so soulless and ridiculous. Even though we were enemies, I could always detect the passion she spoke with when she went over certain passages. But she could only tolerate a character like Scout Finch, in a book, because it was deemed worthy. She couldn’t see the real-live human forms of Scout sitting in her classes each day.

The Revolution Will Not Be Re-run, The Revolution Will Be Live

 I didn’t leave my apartment that day. I knew, no matter what, there’d be a strong reaction.

I decided not to vote.

Lofty promises were tossed around for months. Rhetoric and mythos used to sum up humanity’s problems like a beautiful mist veiling intentions. I believed in the words and their meaning, but I always somehow snapped out of my reverie.

The fact that someone directly addressed something sensible and humane tipped me off. All I saw was a parent making empty promises to a child. The child will go with it, imagine infinite possibilities, and then forget them. Or even worse, the child will remember and remind the parent who will simply reply, “That’s life, kid.” And continue to barrage the child with their ambivalent terms like, Hope and Change.

I hope the president understands his promised children. And I hope the children don’t forget his promises.

Nine o’clock came rolling around and I didn’t even have to turn on my TV. You could hear the sounds of cheering and exhilaration coming up Broadway like a tidal wave.  A crescendo of sound enveloping you with joy.

In that moment, I felt sure I was wrong about everything. I wanted so badly to be. Please let me be a cynical bitter bitch who is proven wrong. I was overwhelmed. Millions upon millions of us were in this city and we could all agree. Yes! No more war! Please. Keep your promises.

Cars began an impromptu parade down Broadway. Tenants with kazoos or horned instruments wailed out into the streets.

I decided to go down to the street. See what was happening. It was just after 10. As soon as I stepped out I found that all the celebrating was on the balconies and roofs. The streets, at least on 151 and Broadway were eerily quiet. I walked just to my street corner to the bodega.

I passed a twenty-something kid, expecting to say some niceties but he shot me a vehement look. The clerk from the bodega came out, a goofy Yemenese guy named, Mo, he came out cheering, “Yes! Yes! We won.” The kid pounced on this,

            “What you mean, we?

            You from fuckin, Yemen, Mo.” The clerk seemed to already know the boy and laughed himself nervously back in the bodega.

            “Yeah,” the kid said, “Obama’s bringin our brothas back from Afghanistan.” He was looking at me poignantly. His tone made it sound like a bad thing.

I could see the kid was mad, but he didn’t know why. Like me, he was poised for negativity. For a riot. He was used to bad news all the time.

How could either of us, in Harlem, be angry or suspicious on this symbolic night of all nights?

I returned to my apartment feeling dejected of relief, suspicions returning.

All of this effort, to vote. Of all things, to vote. To pick a person based on the town they grew up in, and the color of their skin. To vote on things that the candidate has no control over, desirous that he we will control them. To ask this one man to do it all. For us. Why?

The sheer force of the energy that night was so powerful. Proof to me that all of our energies are being misdirected. I could only wonder what we could do for ourselves if we didn’t rely on a system.

Thebox IV

This month's story could probably be read alone but if you'd like to catch up, the prequels are, "Thebox," posted 5/1/11, "Thebox II," posted 9/1/11, and "Thebox III," posted 1/1/12. 


Tam awoke with a start. A few days had passed since he’d officially met Agent Kalarni. Any reassurances Tam felt had faded since their meeting.   

            He couldn’t shake the night's frustrating dream. It took place in the hotel’s dining room. Tam walked in excited to meet with Kalarni, he was assured in his mind. Thinking about home, yes it was home, and his sister. Until he turned the corner and saw Kalarni and Nina kissing passionately. Both stoic people were making out like a couple of teenagers. Tam’s heart pounded out of his chest and he rushed out of the dining area frantic. Up to his room. The phone rang with a blaring ting ting. On the other end was Nina. She played his mind like a harp, her voice on the phone hypnotic as she informed him there was nothing strange happening at all. The truth was never verbalized, it hung like a fume between them on the phone. She conned him into dinner and Tam spent the rest of the dream trying to get to the dining room to meet her. But obstacles kept coming. He always almost, almost got there, then he snapped out of the dream.

            When he awoke the dream felt so real that he restrained from calling Nina to their usual breakfast together in the dining room. Instead he dressed and strode to dine alone. As he turned the corner he saw the dining room empty of either Kalarni or Nina. It was the first time he’d felt upset about anything since he’d come to India. Only half a week had elapsed, since meeting Kalarni, and he found himself constantly looking over his shoulder, checking. There could be others, after all. Tam knew for sure that Kalarni had observed him at a teashop for weeks before approaching him. A strange move for a friendly agent to make. Tam had been briefed on a considerable prevalence of rogue agents traveling back in time. Perhaps Kalarni was with another agency who’d hacked the HSA’s security code and verification.

Tam picked at his plate of English breakfast with such paranoid thoughts. Thoughts much heavier after weeks of relief. He’d been happier, more than anything, to board a capsule that would place him out of the agency’s watchful eyes. He’d grown tired of the surveillance required of him for the two years prior to this mission. He found himself abysmally conscious of the cameras, until the very end, when he’d stupidly spoke candidly with his sister Rosemary at dinner. Actually, she’d said enough in the first few sentences she spoke that it was useless and more suspicious for him to stop her from talking. Plus, that night way back when he last saw his sister, he felt he had nothing to lose. Unfortunately, he’d been consumed with the thirty percent chance that he might die during time travel. He was living that night, which was a simple dinner with his sister, like it was his last.

            Here he was in India, back in time, where the agency’s cameras could not record his every move only to meet Kalarni and find he still had to watch his back.

Tam had become friendly with all the dining staff during his extended stay at the hotel. It went noticed amongst the busboys that two tomato slices, one egg and the country beans had gone completely untouched on Tam’s plate. They muttered with concern. He left his usual generous tip and walked in an anxious daze through the hotel’s lobby. He passed right by Nina. She stopped, assuming he would see her but he barely brushed past her. She scowled, half-thinking he was putting her on. She called after him,

            “Tam!” No response.

“TAM!” He disappeared into a crowd of guests arriving for a wedding being held at the hotel that day. She raised her eyebrows in surprise, perching her head back before spinning on her heel toward the dining room.

Tam managed to mechanically hop the bus in a rush and take a seat. It would’ve have taken him five minutes to walk there but he wasn’t thinking. He was on his way to the University of Mumbai. He had to get some real research. He felt obligated to it, after disposing of the chemical testing materials.

He tried to research, a few days before, at the Asiatic Society with a pass the agency had created for him to enter. The guard at the library furrowed his brows right off when Tam presented his pass. It was the first agency imperfection, yet. Just trying to enter became a huge production, four additional guards appeared and a manager of some sort came to speak with him. Tam was very nervous, but he played the overly confident part and mixed in dull threats and it got him through. Once through, he found virtually nothing of use as far as information.

He almost gave himself away by speaking to Nina about his humiliation.

 She raised her eyebrows in surprise when he’d suggested he’d gone there for some research. She was very inquisitive as to how in the world he was granted permission in to such a guarded collection. Tam had to quickly utilize some acting skills again, and gloss past what he’d said before,

“Oh no! Of course I didn’t get any research, I have a colleague with a very important father and after a lot of begging we were granted a very short tour.”

“Ah,” Nina said and laughed, “that sounds more like it. They’re very secretive, kind of cabalistic, really.” She hinted that they were very limited in what information they chose to make available.

Tam arose and prepared to hop off the bus which never fully stopped in Mumbai. It only slowed to a slight roll before charging off again. He approached the library's entrance and a man began harassing him,

            “Sir, sir. Please take me as your guide for touring.” Tam did what Nina expressly forbade him to do. Made hard eye contact with the guide.

            “Sir! Pleased to be at your service I can tell you all the details of this place. Come, sir.” Tam was despondent and followed him even though he did not want the tour. His head felt heavy and sore, he could tell he’d been grinding his teeth heavily the night before. The man’s voice bellowed so much that Tam almost objected, but once inside the beautiful edifice he couldn’t make out anything the guide said. He always directed his voice in the wrong direction. The guide didn’t seem to register this and went into a lyrical that he’d no doubt said over and over again thousands of times. He was rushing Tam through the tour trying to make his money as quickly as possible. Tam interjected just as they approached the Rajabai clocktower.

            “That’ll be all then. How much?”

            “Hah sir, okay, it is 200 rupees.” Tam knew if Nina were here she would declare the guide, besharam and haggle the price down. But again, Tam paid without argument and the guide scurried off.

Tam had come to the university library with Nina, once. Her tour was much better than the guide’s. She insisted Tam return here to continue his research when he told her about his visit to the Asiatic Society. She’d taken a random class at the university and gave him her pin code to access the brand new electronic database. But Tam was more excited by the print materials. In about fifty years, most libraries and with them print materials and texts would be destroyed by wars.

While in the future, Tam had been granted access to secret reserves of literature and print materials via the agency. And although he didn’t have access to them he’d become aware that there were others around the world. He hadn’t considered the vast amounts that had been destroyed. He took for granted that the agency had all the answers and complete information. During the time that the libraries would get destroyed, there would be wars everywhere. So much history and craftsmanship would be in ruins or under water. The beautiful Nestor Hall would be gone to smithereens. In a fog of missiles and bombs all over the world, covert agencies would make exorbitant amounts of oversights and sack their most vital of resources, libraries, before they could make copies. Hence missions like the one Tam was now on.

Around mid-afternoon Tam finally eased in to study-mode and forgot his anxieties about Kalarni and the agency. He’d found quite a few articles about the group he was sent to research and perform tests on. They were a harmless bunch and he felt very confused as to why any time would be wasted on them. Not even remotely worth spending money on time-travel to destroy them. In his notes, he wrote, They appear to be absolutely harmless. Their mission to promote love, wasn’t a false front. They were essientially modern Gandiites. There's no evidence of ties with any enemy groups.

Before leaving the library, Tam wanted to check on two newspaper clippings that had been cited under one of his searches. They were both in Marathi newspapers. He had to ask for help on this, as he was fluent in Hindi but not Marathi. He approached a clerk who helped him. Both newspapers made very brief mention of the activist group, and suggested attending meetings. The last few lines the clerk read to Tam from the second article, sent his heart beating fast again.

            One of the members was once a part of an anti-imperialist activist group. They are remarked to have gotten the most word out amongst voters about a law banning the presence of pharmaceutical companies from the state of Maharashtra.

But this law was overturned a few years later.

            “What was that member’s name?” Tam demanded. The clerk reread the article, searching.

            “Ah, it says, R. Pandey.”

            “R. Pandey! Can you query that name please?” he demanded again. The clerk abided and helped him, although he could’ve done it himself.

            “Hmm,” the clerk said after some time, “nothing comes sir. There are matches but they are for others with the same initial.”

            “What? How can this be? If he was so revolutionary. There must be a match there.” The clerk looked surprised at his determination.

            “This kind of protesting was very common in the 60s, sir. Perhaps so common it wasn't a priority in the news.” Tam thanked him and gathered up his things to leave.

 He was sensible enough to walk instead of taking the bus on his short walk back to the hotel. He passed the Oval playground where some children were playing and an occasional hysterical scream rang out. He loafed around watching their boundless energy.

            Tam was reluctant to head back toward a possible meeting with Kalarni. Finding out this minute detail about the law banning a company, especially a pharmaceutical one, would be a red flag at the agency, a detail that would’ve been pounded over his head during his training sessions. This is something that would be indicative of what they’d termed, negative subversive behavior, which was always dealt with harshly by the government. But it got dropped. There was the mild possibility that the agency had no idea. His instincts told him it was a surprise that the agency had not intended for Tam to ever know. Of course they knew. The newspaper article was dated many years after Tam was supposed to have landed. He would’ve stayed a short time and never been able to read the article. They, the omnipresent force like an invisible fog, had kept certain things from Tam. This angered and scared him to such high levels that he was in a state of waking shock. He’d been manipulated. After that much training and agony, it could only be that the agency was using him. He was just a pawn. That’s why they’d suddenly dropped the test box on him. They’d never trained him or informed him of anything but a duty to research. Yet they hadn’t even gotten him access to this crucial library and a few others. It didn’t make sense for a research mission. The day before he was to leave they slid in and told him to take the test box.

            He almost wished he’d played along better at the time, so that he could find out more about what it was that the agency was trying to accomplish.

The sun was fully down now and Tam began to walk briskly back to the hotel. Any shred of naivety was gone for him now. He longed to get back home to his sister, but he knew she’d been killed. And that his current employer was somehow the murderer of his last family member. He decided he was going to abort the mission and the agency. He was going to abort the future. Defect from the whole thing. And stay in India.

            He stopped into a shop on the way and bought some sleeping tablets. In order to get out and go North he needed time and assurance that Kalarni would sleep for at least eight hours.

Once he entered his hotel room he saw he had a message from Kalarni to meet for dinner in the hotel’s dining area. Tam began to pack his things, in a wild manner, his mind was in a million places. He went to his clothes, then jumped to his toiletries and on a sudden notion pounced to the telephone to call Nina’s room.

            “Hello?” she answered on the second ring.

            “Nina, it’s Tam.”

            “Hi Tam, I’ve been wo-”

            “Look, I’m sorry to cut you off but, isn’t there a driving service you mentioned, that comes at any hour?” Nina responded with a panic in her voice,

“Tam, what’s going on? Is everything okay? What happened?” He inhaled and exhaled deeply, Of course she has no clue what is going on, he thought.

“Kalarni and I got into a tiff about work and a I’m eager to take off in the night and leave for a few days.” The line was silent for a long moment, before he added,

“I’d like for you to come with me. I’m going to Agra,” he laughed sheepishly, “Lame me, to see the clichéd TajMajal.” Again a moment of silence.

“Well, I can get you that number, for the service,” she said, “I don’t know if I can go. I mean I want to, I’m touched by the invitation, but I’ve got a lot of stuff I’m finishing up right now.

I don’t know.” Tam sighed.

“Alright, well I’ve got dinner with Kalarni, so I’ll give you a call after that and see how you feel, huh?” She smiled, a huge smile,

“Okay,” she said and they hung up.

He smashed up seven of the sleeping pills in order to douse Kalarni enough. He washed his face with some cold water and left to go dine. Tam was just about to set foot on the elevator when Kalarni intercepted him. He looked dejected and worried.

            “What happened?” Tam asked him. He looked around him and said,

            “We should go back to your room.” Tam worried there might be remains of the sleeping pill box and packing around.

            “Isn’t your room, just there?” Tam suggested.

            “Yeah, whatever. Let’s go.”

Once inside, Kalarni went straight to the black label whiskey.

            “You should sit down, man,” he directed Tam. He sat on one of the chairs in the parlor. Kalarni sat facing him. He placed a highball glass in front of Tam. Tam raised his hand waving it side to side, saying no.

            “We’ll see about that,” Kalarni said this with what Tam detected was a bit of sniveling.

            “Come on, out with it, the suspense is killing me,” Tam said this with a sardonic tone but he was very nervous. Kalarni sighed.

            “Look, I know we’re supposed to head back to our capsules in a couple days, and I just wanted to prepare you.”

            “For what??”

            “The possibility that we aren’t going to get back.”           

            “What? Why?”

            “Because the capsules don’t work.”

            “But you’ve returned successfully from these missions.”

            “Exactly. That’s how I know something is awry.” Tam furrowed his brows in skepticism. Kalarni continued,

            “Look, I’m not here to shadow you. I really got sent back to assist you, which is standard. Only to come here and find there’s no need for me, never was, even if you’d gone forward with the test box.

            It’s all bunk. I don’t know what their angle would be with us, why they’d get rid of us this way.”

            “How can that be? We could hypothetically stay and make detrimental changes with our knowledge.”

            “Look man, I’ve been on the special forces for years now. I know how it works. I know how they set people up, because I’m usually the one who finishes things up.

            They’re getting rid of us.” Tam reached out to the whiskey-filled highball glass in front of him and took a swig. His face became contorted with twenty different emotions as he searched the floor with eyes. He was cataloguing his own moves, trying to find any sign of defection.

            “Why? I’ve devoted my whole life to them. I have nothing else. I’ve never betrayed anything,” Tam said like an innocent child.

            “What about your friends? Your family maybe? Anything even mildly subversive?” Tam thought of his sister’s confession before he’d left.

            “No man. Clean as a whistle,” Tam lied, taking another swig of the whiskey, this time finishing it.

            “Yeah,” Kalarni sighed, “I mean honestly, I can think of a few things that would’ve put me on their radar. And, you landing in the wrong year, that doesn't help.”

            “Why would they waste the money?? Why wouldn’t they just kill us in present day and save the trouble?” Kalarni chuckled and grimly asked,

            “Why wouldn’t they get some free research?

            You see, you don’t understand. I think that maybe we were always meant to come back and get them information. And then, we are a liability to them because of what we know.”

            “So just leave of us,” Tam guessed, “But wouldn’t our extended stay here cause a rift in the whole thing?” Kalarni shook his head, with condescension,

            “They’ve done tests.”

            “Yeah but how are they going to get the information we’ve obtained if they leave us here?”

            “They’ll send someone back to get it, and then return him to the future.”

            “So what happens to that guy??” Tam asked angry now, “Isn’t he now a liability?” Kalarni gravely refilled both of their empties. Tam was expecting an answer to his question and when a moment passed with nothing, he said,

            “I mean it. What happens to that guy, Kalarni?”

            “Tam, I was that guy. They get rid of him. This is what I’m trying to tell you. I know how the agency handles things.” Tam took another generous swig.

            “This is treason!” Tam said, “It goes against at least five of the InterIntel rules, and--”

            “There aren’t any rules,” Kalarni said.

Tam suddenly felt exhausted, he wanted to go to his room and sleep. He’d have to cancel dinner. Kalarni, however, was in the bathroom getting ready to dine.

Tam didn’t know what to believe. He sat back in his chair to take a little nap. His mind was racing. He could easily make the best of being trapped back in time. He was pretty sure he could have a life with Nina. But could he reproduce in this time? She’d surely want children. It was so beautiful in the north. He could live the way people were meant to live. Maybe even travel and see the rest of the world. There was plenty of sunlight everywhere.

            But then he thought of his sister Rosemarie. He couldn’t help but wonder at what had happened to her, if she was still alive. Without hesitation he resigned himself over to going to the capsule he’d buried and just checking the equipment out.

Kalarni was in the bath, still, now was the perfect time. Tam reached his arm to add the crushed sleeping pills to Kalarni’s drink, so that he could at least make a short trip out to the capsule that evening unbothered, unwatched. But he could not move his arm. His body was weighed down. His feet felt like cinder blocks, he could not move. What was happening? Was it the single malt?

            His eyelids were heavy but it was even more painful when he closed his eyes. He could hear Kalarni was opening the door and coming back to the parlor, he couldn’t close his eyes.

Kalarni walked with the gait of a cowboy as he entered the parlor again. He had a sinister smile on his face.

            “How’s that scotch?” Tam’s body felt unusually heavy, he concentrated and with all his might tried to lift himself from the chair. Nothing. His heart was racing, yet his body felt like a stone statue connected forever to the ground.

Kalarni stood in front of Tam, facing him. He pulled out a compact communication device. Tam knew it very well, it was a common walkie-talkie like gadget, from the future. Tam had been briefed again and again during his training by the agency that these devices did not work in the past. The familiar Command Central contact beep emanated from it.

            “Agency.” A familiar voice at Command Central responded.

            “Yeah, Kalarni, here,” he held Tam’s frozen gaze, “Reporting mission completion.” The now horrifying, customary HSA sign-off bleeped through the device. A series of bleep and beeps in a specific rhythm. Kalarni had beat him at his game, and played it much nastier. Tam’s plan was only to put Kalarni to sleep for a bit, not  kill him.

Even as his eyelids fluttered to close for the last time, Tam had hope that he could come out of the heavy feeling that came over him. He continued plotting his escape.