Sean Robin Hughes

“Take a number,” the wrinkled crone grunted from behind the patina counter. “Be with you in a moment.”

Charlie shrugged, pulling his shielding hood down to cut the yellow glare from the overhead lights, and req’d a number from the kiosk panel near the door. The panel was cracked, barely registering his finger press, and his wrist chimed with the assignment.

He flicked his wrist to silence the notification, and took a seat near the window. It had a virtua-panel over the glass, and like the kiosk, it was cracked in places, flickering the image of a idyllic city scape in the rain. Virtual water dripped down over the blurred lights in a city that did not exist, and Charlie imagined what it be like to live in a world with rain.

There was a single other occupant in the lobby, an old man with optical implants, snoring against the wall like he was a human shaped white noise machine. Charlie shook his head, and tilted his head to turn on his newsfeed.

As usual, the future was all bullshit. Just like taking a number in a lobby with no one in it, except the snoring dude who was more like a water feature than living being waiting for the old crone at the desk. Election time was the worst time of year, and the newsfeeds were so heavily saturated with crafted messaging, it felt sticky. If you read it, it would embed itself like a virus, going full on mal-code, and subsuming neurons like Alzheimer’s. Charlie turned it off like he was scratching an errant itch, and focused on his breathing. The new implants were nagging his management subsystem, adopted kids letting the adoptive parent know they were terrible investments.

But he had to have them for his job. Natural lung tissue was far too sensitive to pressure changes, and utilizing a buffering system allowed the substandard gear the company dropped on the market to actually function. He didn’t need it to survive in the mines, but having the implants opened options. But it cost, man. Implants were never cheap, even though they were the standard for most folks. Kids got their network uplinks the first year of school these days, and the recent legislation pushing towards mandatory implants at birth had some real support behind it.

The Earthers did not appreciate it, but the were nothing but tourists really, thinking the edge of the human frontier was an exciting opportunity. A way to start over! Be like our ancestors exploring the wilderness!

Charlie scoffed inwardly. Fucking idiots, each and every one, and he knew, because he used to be one himself, a lifetime ago. Mankind couldn’t afford to be ‘au natural’ here on the edge, it only would lead to an inevitable death. And Charlie felt that humanity should collectively just let them die. Because afterwards, people like him, born survivors, would be sitting at the top of the pile, fully aug’d and ready for whatever the in-system worlds thought they could toss the colonies beyond the belt. His optical interface popped from the edge of his vision, and he noticed the crone behind the desk was staring him down, as if he was a shit stain on the chair.

“Sorry, off in LaLaLand over here,” Charlie apologized as he hustled over.

“When your number is called, you are supposed to come to the window, hun,” the Crone grimaced in some semblance of a pitying smile.

“I know, I know. It’s the election, its in my head,” Charlie groused.

“Join the club,” the Crone commiserated. “I don’t even turn on the feeds any more.”

“Did you vote?”

“No. Never have.”

“Huh.”

“I don’t complain about who is ruining our lives,” the Crone explained further. “The damn politicians all screw it up, just in different ways. So my vote doesn’t matter, Election Day is only good for the food.”

“Fair enough,” Charlie shrugged, dropping his hood down over his shoulders. “You know back on Earth, it used to be called Thanksgiving. Not Election Day.”

“Weird. Who would be thankful for a politician fucking them over? Anyway, what can I help you with, hun?”

“I need a imprint restore.”

“Customer ID?”

Charlie handed over the card that had been haunting him since he arrived back to the realm of the living.

“Wow. This one is old.”

“It’s my mom’s account. She passed a long ways back. My name is on the beneficiary field.”

“How long!? This card number is at least… what? A century old? The imprint date here, it says 2044. Wait, you can’t be over thirty?”

“I was in a coffin for a long haul, when I came out, the jump was wrong. It took a while to get back to the belt,” Charlie said offhand, avoiding the pain of the experience in telling the real story of first contact with a long dead species. She would have died in place hearing a story that long.

“I would say so,” the Crone sniffed. Her bouffant shifted on her head, and Charlie realized it was an artificial hair piece.

“Cancer?”

“Excuse me?” The Crone sniffed, typing furiously into her console.

“Your hair. I am assuming cancer?”

“Just my genes, hun. Mother was a spliced Ionian, her genes were designed for zero hair growth. My dad thought she was beautiful anyway. My brother got the hair, I got the skin,” the Crone paused. “Ah here it is. Look at that. That is impressive.”

“How long will it take?”

“A couple mins to spool up. The age on it means it is the crystal storage, so it will need to be lased back to the nearline matrix. But it’s here. The entire stack.”

“Wait, her entire stack?” Charlie wondered aloud. He was expecting a goodbye letter or a tearful farewell from his mom. Not her entire consciousness imprint.

“Looks like it, hun. You know what, since it is the holidays, I will spin up the entire thing for you. Looks like you need a little good in your life,” the Crone crooned. “It won’t cost you extra.”

“Th-Thanks,” Charlie stammered.

“What do you do now, Mr. Rembrandt?”

“Detective now,” Charlie admitted openly. “I found long haul mining a bit too stressful.”

“I can imagine. You went in, came up for air, and found the universe shoved you into the future. Why are you grabbing this imprint now?”

“Call it being homesick,” Charlie was still asking himself why. He didn’t know the real reason. The card had been sitting on his shelf, the only thing left of his old life, staring at him every day since he had landed his job on Europa. Five years of waking up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes, and seeing his mother’s name on his shelf. Beckoning him, calling him to remember a family that had passed a hundred years before he had even woken up. The entire contact event had wrought him into something new, something he had never imagined. Touching his old life felt like reaching across an unfathomable distance to something that should not be there to touch.

“You definitely need your memories, hun. It is what makes us who we are,” the Crone said. She handed him a small block, within contained the graphene and crystal memory core that contained all of what he had left behind. “Happy Election Day.”

“Happy Thanksgiving, you mean,” Charlie winked.

“Happy… Thanksgiving.” It sounded foreign on her tongue.

Charlie tapped his fingers against the core, and wandered back to his quarters, wondering if he would grow the balls in the intervening distance to see his mom again.

He didn’t know yet. But remembering Thanksgiving was better than any Election Day. Charlie smiled at the thought. Holidays are not what they used to be, but then again, maybe not all that much has changed after all.

I built a time machine.

Don’t ask about the technical specificities, or the fact that the science I am using is not factual or able to be validated. Please don’t whine about the betterment of mankind, or the fact that I am not trying to save us all from ourselves.

We are already lost. That is the point to our species’ existence. It is the great punchline that no one is willing to accept. I accepted it, and so… I built a time machine.

Hypothesis: I am entangled upon myself. My past self, my future self, my current self are all three states of the same set of functions. I am more than just an observation machine built to suffer through the horrors of being. I am a fully realized uniqueness, imprinted upon the skein of reality, a frayed edge of a thread, which in turn is a part of a frayed cord, in turn, a part of a frayed coil of a universe that struggles to exist onwards towards the death of everything.

That is the science of it, the principle of how it works. I inject a massive amount of energy into my fingerprint of existence, and connect back to myself at every moment of when I am me. The furthest back I have traveled is about nine years old. Prior to that, it seems I was someone else. Kind of like me, but not. My grip on my nine year old self is barely attainable, and the amount of effort it takes me to stay in control is ludicrous. Around fourteen, I have far more control, nearly perfect, and by my mid twenties, it is no different than it is today in my sixty-four year old shell that sits before you.

Conclusion: My time machine is perfect. It works every time and I am able to change my own past however I wished. When I first started, it was small things, like how I treated someone that one time that left me with tortured late night remembrances for years afterwards. Then after that, it was my first kiss, it was a mistake, so I avoided it by politely excusing myself before it happened. I went on and on like that, reliving small parts of my life, looking at the results, and then backing up to the next moment, making small improvements, over and over, iterating through the decades of my life.

Correction: I built a time machine, and I thought it was perfect. I thought I could go back and change whatever I wanted, however I wanted. But I am human, so even now I make mistakes. I could fix those mistakes, but that leads to other mistakes. Instead of having sex for the first time with one girl, I saved it for another. But then that lead to other girls and other problems that I didn’t want to have in the first place. Entire lives popping into and out of existence, like my life is nothing more than a magic trick that no one is watching.

So I went back, and fixed it again, and again, and again. And I eventually put it right back to how it was before I started. Because I realized that I had already lost. I lost the chance when I had it, when I made the choice, the chance was discarded again and again, thrown to the wind like an errant leaf no longer caught by a wet windshield. The energy that poured into my time machine was poured into my own life, and every moment that I cherished was just as affected as every moment I loathed.

And the secret is that the vast majority of moments were not worth changing. Living is life, and life is living. Eating, drinking, sleeping, taking a shit, a shower, a walk… all those things are just moments that make up any version of myself. It is still me, it is still what I am inside. Those small moments, the critical pivot points that define who I am, those are only an abstracted insignificant fraction of the total sum of me.

Funny that so much that I thought was important, turned out not to be. The things that I held immutable and full of truth in my youth, don’t seem to matter now, as I sit here with the owl of wisdom on my shoulder. It turns out my time machine was not a machine to travel through time, it was a machine to travel through self.

Outcome: I learned a few simple things that I need you to remember forever.

1. Tell your loved ones that you love them
2. Don’t waste time on people that don’t value you as a person
3. Make time for what matters, and what matters is family and experience
4. Be a friend to all, those that return the favor, are friends worth having

Being alive is not the same thing as living. And now that I am here, on this side of the equation, I realize that it is too late for me.

But, for you, at fourteen, it isn’t. Make your own mistakes, find our own path. This is my last use of the time machine, and I am leaving the results to you, my young friend. You can be anything, go anywhere, and find happiness along the way. Because the end… it comes no matter what kind of life you live.

“One.”

“Excuse me?”

“Two.”

“If you think you can just-“

“Three. When I get to five, love, your time is up.” Her eyes widened as he said, “four,” and she ran.

“Five,” he whispered, grinning. He watched her run into the trees, her multiphasic wings touching the branches, their dark bark flashing to green blooms of summers long forgotten, only to fade in moments to their stark white of winter.

He pounded his fists into the ground in anticipation, raising his face to the glowing moon in the night sky and howled like one of his own hell hounds. He pushed his legs backwards, powerfully rocking the earth, shifting the dirt, and sending a small wave of cold earth into the air, as he roared forward as if propelled by the energy of the sun itself.

He caught her scent, the glow of her passing, like the soft touch of a lover long remembered, and he howled again, caught in the moment. A faint giggle floated back over the air in response, and he realized he had already passed her by. She had spun in place somewhere along the way, hiding amongst her kindred spirits so he would not notice.

He stopped running, feeling the night air pull his sweat from his naked back, steaming in the winter air. “The Dryads. Clever, my love. Clever.”

Another giggle floated from the other direction in response, and just the hint of her voice teasing him from afar. “If ever I wasn’t clever, silly boy.”

He stretched his arms over his head, wiggling his fingers among the bare branches, as if tickling the tree’s skin. “It is not time for spring-“

“It is always time for spring,” her voice floated from his right, and then to the left, “if I am allowed to dance among the trees.”

Hades smiled widely at his wife’s teasing. “Instead come and dance with me, love.”

“Time enough to dance with my husband in winter’s embrace, dearest, now my sister’s yearn for us to frolic a while longer so they may dream of spring.”

A flash of green in front, and a tree blossomed in moments, the pink flowers of an apple tree burst into being, as if lit by a sun from another world. In the gloom of the winter’s hold dreaming in between the spaces of the wood, it was a strange, even to his ancient eyes.

He had personally witnessed the birth of stars, the demise of entire populations, and the shift of a thousand light years as the Titans had assailed Olympus with their fury. But here, under the canopy of bare trees, under the terrestrial sky of Terra Mater, his heart was filled with joy at seeing his wife’s power manifest. Everyone knew that Persephone could bring life to anything, but only Hades realized her brilliant touch included his own heart.

“You love me,” she called.

“And you love me?” He replied.

“More than all the springs that shall ever be, and the summers that shall follow,” Persephone’s voice narrowed to a faint whisper again. “What do you wish of me, my Lord?”

Her voice was like a soft tickle across his neck, and absentmindedly, he ran a hand across his scalp to push the black hair from his eyes. “I wish to see that which makes me whole.”

“Your wish is granted,” she coalesced nearly in front of him, framed by a circle of trees, and they burst to greenwood and leaves in ethereal song. “I am here to tell my husband, I am his and he is mine.”

Hades strode powerfully forward, his fingers vibrating the shadows as he passed. “And what do you wish of me, my wife?”

“A dance.”

Hades stopped in his tracks, watching his wife smirk as she floated softly to the ground, her bare toes causing green grass to leap from the sleeping earth. Her Aspect was as brilliant as the sun, as if Helios had dropped a tear of his golden light within the folds of the forest.

“A…a dance?” He stammered incredulously.

“Now,” she smiled seductively, “such a Lord as yourself surely knows how to dance? You do such other things related to dancing so well, I would think the light step of your feet would match the care of your lips and fingertips.”

Hades grumbled lightly, and the shadows near his feet groaned and retreated from the ground, briefly revealing the white glow of the Underlands. They slunk back slowly, uncertain of the place they held before.

“Come now, my love. I promise a kiss.”

“A kiss?” Hades rose an eyebrow and grinned again.

“You know of my kisses, then?”

“I care for them greatly, my Lady,” Hades admitted openly.

“Then you shall remember your dancing feet, and join your wife,” Persephone raised her hand in invitation. “Come.”

Hades laid his hand over her palm, and they entered into a dance only the Dryads would witness among the embrace of the soft winter’s night.

There is a ghost in the house. They do not have a name, they do not have a gender.

Your first response is to call it a him, but then over time it changes to her. You don’t know why. A female presence seems more calming perhaps. A balm to the constant sun burn of the world that exists outside the walls of your home. You call her Friday, after the Robinson Crusoe character. Remember, Friday started out as a him, which makes sense… but now as a her, and Friday still sticks regardless. You tried out other names, but they felt strange in your mouth, like tasting the edge of the house key as you hold your keys in your mouth to shuffle in the door of the house with the groceries. A house is not a home, but a home can be anywhere, and this home has a ghost.

Friday is quiet. Trying to define who she is is like trying to define what a blue sky in ski country is. Well, yes, it’s blue, and yes, it’s pretty, but beyond that, it is just a sky that attempts to defy description without one experiencing it themselves. Likewise, Friday is a ghost, and quiet, but in the end, still just an indescribable ghost. She is not like the Ghostbusters’ version, all glowing and ethereal, but instead, an unseen force, like a stray burst of wind which was caught inside the the walls of the house and hasn’t figured it’s way back out the door yet.

She caught the fly in your house. That is how you met her. The fly was buzzing through the rooms, loud and insistent, screaming for attention like a miniature chainsaw with wings. Three hours of it, and it had invaded your consciousness like Genghis Khan, running roughshod over any scrap of ability to actually work remotely. The fly stopped, in the middle of the room, held in place without the wings buzzing incessantly. As you marveled at the oddness of it, the small voice asked what they should do with it.

{should I hurt it}, it asked.

The sound of the voice, so much like a child, but carrying the deep weight of the bottom of the ocean, the weight of only itself, like Atlas shrugging the earth onto the other shoulder, does not surprise you and only invites response.

“No, it should go outside where it belongs,” you respond quietly, narrowly registering a response to question barely understood.

Without another whisper, the fly meanders towards the door, quite confused as to how it is traveling without meaning to. It tries to buzz it’s wings intermittently, but whatever force is holding the fly, holds them still after a few confused flicks. A few minutes later, after you send a lengthy email that no one is going to read, you hear the voice again.

{why did you choose to let it go?}

Again, the voice should scare you, disembodied and aimless, seemingly arriving from the walls and the carpet simultaneously, but it doesn’t. It is soft and gently caressing your ears, apologizing for the act of being heard as it happens.

“Live and let live,” you reply. “Already too much death in the world, killing a fly wouldn’t make anything better, at least that is what my mom would say.”

{perhaps}

You sit, leaning back in your chair, not looking at the computer screen, starting to suspect that this is what a mental breakdown is like for the person having it. You wonder if working from home for so long is causing damage that you were not aware of. Maybe it was carbon monoxide poisoning or something similar. You should tell your mom about your ghost, but for some reason, you don’t.

“Why won’t you say something?” You ask the air.

{it looked like you were thinking}

As ghosts go, Friday is a good ghost. There when you need to talk, but not always on top of you like a bad roommate or an incessant relative. You pause in the hallway after you mother’s funeral, buckling to your knees in grief. The floor catches you roughly, as the tears stream down your face. You know that Friday is with you. You don’t know how you know, but you can sense it.

{death is not so bad. i think i was alive once, it is hard to tell. but i don’t think the death part was hard}

“Is my mom out there?” I manage between the sobs.

{somewhere. nothing ends}

“Everything ends.”

{you will think differently someday}

“When is that?”

{when you are dead}

The next week, the tears don’t come as often. You still cry whenever you think of your mom, but you are able to keep your mental fingers out of the wound. It is scabbing up in an ugly way, as loss usually does. It will hurt for years to come. Losing your father was different. He had been so ill for so long, and the end was merciful. Not like your mom. She was vibrant, active, and wonderfully alive. Until she wasn’t.

“Friday?” You call out in the night, the dark at the edges of the room stretches out like a cinema shot, a scene lengthening from within a horror movie. The walls are far away, but pressing inwards like a vise. You need someone, even if it is a ghost.

{i am here}

“Why does it hurt so much?”

{you have to feel. it is your purpose}

“Do you feel anything?”

{i feel your presence}

You fall asleep knowing that at least someone is watching, even if you don’t know who it is. It is better than no one at all.

A month later, you are trying to get dressed like a normal human being and clean the disaster of your home. It is less a home and more of a dump at this point. Mess spread like an infection, it’s fungal arms reaching like tree roots incessantly chasing after sprinkler lines, taking over spaces slowly by duplicating detritus and creating extra layers that only an archaeologist would understand. As you are midway through the living room, the gut punch of loss hits again, and you double over in wracking sobs remembering a story you would have laughed about with your mom. The soiled mass of paper plates and to-go containers clutched in your hand floats away, finding its way into the trash can. The dishes find their way to the sink, and the dirty clothes wrangle themselves into the hamper.

Something like a hand brushes your forehead and cradles you gently.

{small steps are still steps}

“I talked to her everyday.”

{you can talk to me everyday}

“Until I can’t.”

{until you can’t}

“How can I get over something like this? How do people carry on after those they love in their lives are taken away?”

{nothing ends}

“You said that already.”

{i am answering your question. it might lessen in strength, but it is a part of you now. forever. you will carry it like a scar on your knee or a memory in your mind}

“How? How do people survive?”

{a choice}

You wipe at your nose with the back of your hand, and suddenly tissues appear over your shoulder. You take them gingerly, unsure how it would feel when they brush against Friday, instead your fingers find nothing but kleenex.

“A choice of what?”

{a choice to believe that nothing ends, including the love you carry. a choice that you don’t end because of it}

“People kept telling me at the funeral that she was with me. It is such bullshit.”

Silence, but another gentle caress on my forehead.

“She is not with me. She is not here to tell me everything is going to be ok. She is not here to see anything of me in the future.”

{you are right}

“So how can I do this?”

{make the choice to take another small step}

“On what?”

{anything. but for now, you can lie here, and remember. it’s ok}

So you do. And a few days later, you finally are able to leave the house for the first time. It releases you gently to the evening air, and the dark is comforting in its own way. You manage to go grocery shopping and make it home without shedding a single tear.

{the apples look good}

“They do, don’t they,” you respond. You smile at the Honeycrisps, and set them gently on the table in your mom’s wooden bowl. It’s where they belong, after all.

And for some reason it makes the house a home again.