It was a day like any other. She had come down the stairs,
her phone was ringing, and she stopped to answer it, realizing her pump had
slipped halfway off. She put her hand against the building, and leaned in,
pulling the pump over her heel. She
caught herself looking at a bearded man, sitting in the park, reading a
newspaper. Her eyes looked him up and down.
On a hunch, she crossed the road to the park, not even
looking for taxi cabs, even though she knew they wouldn’t stop. She’d read just
the other day about a kid who had been hit, holding hands with his father. She didn’t know why she was headed to the
park. She should have turned right and walked the length of the street, on the
way to Barnes Butler to drop off the package. But there was something vaguely
familiar she saw in the man.
When she had crossed, she stopped and she stared at the back
of his head, silently daring him to turn around. He was engrossed in the
newspaper, and she thought maybe she should just turn and leave. Instead, she
barreled forward as if driven by a motor and stood in front of him, like a tree,
blocking his reading light. He shook the paper and tilted his eyes up towards
her. His face twitched in instant recognition, but it was too late for him to
go anywhere.
“I thought that was you,” she said.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“I work across the street.”
She sat down next to him, and he folded up the paper and sat
it on his knee. He gave her a sidelong look as she stared at the print on the
paper and gingerly picked it up with her thumb and index finger.
“You know if you’re going to sit here on a bench in Central
Park in the middle of New York City, the least you could do is buy a newspaper
dated for today. March 4, 1972, really Henry?”
“I take it there’s nothing in that manila envelope I need to
be worried about. It doesn’t look thick enough to carry a gun.”
“What do they say these days?” she asked, raising her
eyebrows at him. “Take a chill pill?”
“Yes, I think that’s correct. I’ll tell you the English language
is not what it used to be.”
“You’re not my target this time.”
“Who is?”
“That’s privileged information, and you know it.”
“So how come you can’t kill me now, but in 2150 I’m your
mortal enemy?”
She shrugged, clutching the package in her hand, and looking
from side to side to make sure no one had followed her. He put his hand down on
the bench, and he moved it over towards her skirt, but her reflexes were quick
and she slapped it away. It pained her
too, because she’d always found him attractive, even with a target on his
head. But this wasn’t one of those spy
movies where the two people fell in love and forgot all about the price on
their head. She knew she’d have to target Henry next time they warped, and she
didn’t want to risk unnecessary emotions becoming involved. She had never been here, to this time, and it
was a surprise to see him. He looked innocent and younger than the last time
she’d seen him. Of course then, his
hands had been gripping the side of the building and she had been just about to
peel them off one by one. She had imagined the scene as he dropped the fifty
stories to the ground. She could even hear the splat his body would have made
against the pavement, but in that exact moment in time she had warped.
The next assignment had not been a good one either, because
it had occurred during the war, and it had taken much longer than she expected.
Blue versus Gray, and she had been a housewife. She thought to herself that she
should have never taken this job. She had no roots. Babies born and abandoned.
But here she was, still at the hands of the powers to be.
“I could help you,” he said.
“And why would you do that?”
“Because you didn’t kill me last time.”
Ha, she thought to herself. Only because there was a glitch
in the machine. “I tried to.”
“Have you thought that maybe the orders have changed?”
She looked him in the eyes. She felt like she could trust
him, but she didn’t know why. Her mind jumped to the moment in time where he
was about to fall to his death. His eyes had looked sincere and warm, and in
that moment she had felt a twinge of guilt. She never felt that way. It was
always just business to her, never guilt.
“And why would they have changed?”
“Ophelia, we’re working for different people who have the
same objective, aren’t we?”
She nodded, because she knew he was right. She looked down
at her watch, the second hand spinning fast, and she felt the familiar wave
come over her. No, not now, she thought. She couldn’t warp now. She grabbed the
park bench, her grip tightened against the wood, as if she could save herself
from traveling through space and time.
“What is it?” he asked.
“I think it’s coming. The warp.”
He shook his head. “That’s impossible. You haven’t done your
job yet.”
“And how do you know what my job is?” she asked.
“That’s simple,” he said. “Our groups, they’ve—“
But the words were gone, in a swirling whirlwind, because in
that moment her body was disassembling into millions of tiny particles, atoms,
quarks, and it was traveling through a funnel towards another time period.
When she opened her eyes…(To Be Continued by someone else!)
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