Rewind: A Time Travel Romance Read online

  "What makes me a troll?" he protested.

  "You're refusing to let me cross the bridge."

  "I'm escorting you over the bridge. That has to make me the most mannerly troll in existence."

  They had arrived at Dr. Slone's office, so Suzannah chose to ignore her kind of cute, but otherwise annoying, escort by knocking. A voice bid her come inside.

  Her eyes nearly popped out of her head when she saw the man in the desk chair. He was so much...younger than she could compute. But he was Phillip alright. Bald as a cue ball though, even decades earlier and with smoother skin, he had that same look in his eyes. That look that belied how much he actually KNEW about you.

  "She's telling the truth, Matthew. There is no need to worry."

  Suzannah shot Matthew a snotty look before handing the box to Phillip. Unbeknownst savior to mankind or not, Matthew was kind of a know-it-all. "Nice to see you again, Doctor..."

  "I must confess, for me, this is the first time we've met, but if my future self trusts you with something like this, then... you must be special indeed." Phillip smiled warmly in her direction.

  "Oh...right..." she snickered and blushed. "Sorry." She glanced around the room. "Also...want to apologize in advance... the first time I met you, I broke (or I break?) that vase. " She pointed towards a red and black vase on an end table beside his sofa. "Apparently, it's a keepsake or something? So, yeah...sorry about that, Doctor."

  "I'm sure it's quite alright, my dear. " He turned his attention briefly to the package she'd handed him, opening the envelope first, and scanning its contents quickly. "Ah. Have a seat, Ms. Jack, is it? Do you like tea?"

  "Sorry, I'd love to, but I'm kind of in a hurry..."

  "Future-Phillip has informed me that your scientists' figures are off. You won't be here for only seven minutes, you'll be here for seven days. I must apologize on his - our - behalf, but we couldn't risk telling you lest the timeline be twisted impossibly. Suzannah blanched, sitting down roughly on the sofa. "What?"

  "Seven days. But, I'm sure you'll find some way to pass the time." His eyes glanced over at Matthew, who was still loitering awkwardly in the doorway. "Matthew. Join us."

  Suzannah swallowed as he sat down beside her on the couch. "I'm kind of...not prepared to stay here for a week. I didn't bring anything." Not to mention that she wasn't prepared to actually be here...now. She'd thought she'd be plopping down in December 1987, do a trial run and go back to her time. Where they'd send her back further, to September of 1987 so she could secure a sizable blood donation from Matthew. Or Matthew. But that was really wishful thinking now that she only had a week, wasn't it?

  She was going to be stuck here a week. Seven days, including the day where Matthew goes missing...

  Could she panic now? Could she?

  "You're welcome to stay in one of the spare rooms available here. I have plenty in my personal wing of the building. And I'm sure we'll be able to procure some clothing and basic necessities for you. It might not be 2017, but we're not completely in the dark in the 80s."

  "2017? That's where you're from?" Matthew nodded thoughtfully. "I must look different then, if you didn't recognize me...do I not age well? Big face scar or something? Or do Phillip and I have a falling out?" His tone was teasing, but his face fell the longer she was silent.

  Suzannah pressed her lips together, glancing over at the professor who waved his hand vaguely. "No information that could impact the flow of time, please, Ms. Jack."

  "Oh right. Sorry..." Matthew wiped his hands on his pants. "Also, sorry I was a being a 'troll' earlier... and sorry you're stuck here for a week."

  "Sorry I tased you," she added, unsure of what else she could even say at this point.

  "Still...it was kinda bad-ass. Walking out of a time portal and tasing me. "

  "Thanks. I think?"

  ----------

  ~ June 26, 2017 ~

  ----------

  Henry

  "Dr. Laster?" Barry's voice sounded worried as he looked at the laptop screen "How many times did we check your work on these figures?"

  "You triple-checked, remember?" Henry replied. "You were being really obnoxious about it."

  Henry really just wanted this time travel test drive to be over and done with. She hoped at least that Suzannah was alright. That was her number-one concern right then.

  "Well, you've both got this equation incorrectly copied. " Barry began to rewrite the equation up onto the dry erase board. "You've got this backwards here..." He circled a portion. So, an hour in our time doesn't equal seven minutes in 1987... seven minutes in 2017 equals an hour there." The math was right, but we had the wrong equation... I..." Barry bit down hard on his fist. "I can't believe this happened."

  Henry's stomach dropped. Where, she didn't know. She was pretty sure they could maybe find it in the basement level if they ran really fast. Panic burned in her veins as she scrambled to come up with a solution. "Oh my god...so we have seven minutes to set up the portal or..."

  "Or you miss your chance for this time and location."

  "I couldn't set up the coordinates in seven minutes even if I had the right equation," she lamented. "I'd need... at least a day and a half. Maybe I could do it in twenty-four hours with competent help. Barry. Do you mind staying?"

  "Not at all, that's what I'm here for anyway." He reached for the button on his blazer, slipping it off and over his shoulders as he draped it over Henry's desk.

  She took a deep breath and exhaled, trying to calm herself. She was no help to Suzannah if she wasn't calm and collected. "So. Our new goal is twenty-four hours. Twenty-four hours to a new portal. Which means she'll be there for a week. Oh geez. Barry, this isn't good. This isn't good at all. "

  "No kidding. I ... also have reason to think we might have sent her back to the wrong day."

  "One ridiculous problem at a time," Henry requested, taking a deep breath and clearing her mind. "Let me talk to Phillip. Maybe he knows something."

  "Also..." Barry interjected. "Stay with me here, but if each person's timeline is fixed, as we've come to believe through our hypothesizing... Dr. Slone probably remembers Suzannah visiting him in 1987. Maybe he already told her? He did send a letter along with her."

  Henry frowned. "So what are you saying? Suzannah already knew we were going to mess this up?"

  "No. I can't imagine she'd have kept that to herself. But... Phillip did. And remember, he gave her a note for his past self? And a package?" Barry tapped his pen against his bottom lip. "I'd say she probably already knows, but still... call Dr. Slone and make sure."

  Henry frowned. "Why on earth would Dr. Slone withhold this information from us? He could have let us know that the formula was wrong!"

  "Fixed timelines, Henry," Barry reminded her. "If he had done that, Suzannah would have been back much sooner. There's something she needs to do there, where she is. When she is. Something important, I'll bet. Phillip always has his reasons. And I'm sure Suzannah is in good hands."

  Henry wasn't sure she agreed.

  ~Chapter Two~

  ---------

  ~ September 27, 1987 ~

  ----------

  Matthew

  The purple portal had opened directly onto the lawn. He must have been the only one who saw it. Totally didn't stop him from heading out there to check it out, though.

  Of all the things to walk out of that portal, Matthew hadn't really expected to see a woman. Alone. By herself. All smoking hot with her hand on what looked like a gun.

  It wasn't a gun, as he discovered fairly quickly.

  It had thrown him off. That's why it caught him square in the chest. Because he wasn't sure what the hell it was.

  It definitely wasn't because he was looking at her face and wasn't really paying attention to what was happening.

  It was probably a good thing it wasn't a gun, if he was being completely honest. He'd be dead if it had been. Instead, he just suffered a minor burn to his ego. And a minor one to his chest. Thos
e contacts were no joke.

  Suzannah Jack. The smoking hot babe who walked out of a time portal and shot him with a stun gun.

  Which, would have been enough to turn most sane people off, but he wasn't most sane people. And this wasn't exactly a sane situation, being sent by his boss to meet someone who was supposedly going to step out of the future.

  Plus, there was just something about her. Something that felt ... right. Even when she so clearly didn't belong in this time. She had a purse full of gadgets and a wide-eyed look that screamed innocence and integrity. And then she opened her mouth and pure, uncut cynicism spewed out.

  If she wasn't perfect, he didn't want to know what was.

  He was clearly infatuated. And that was most definitely a problem.

  Nope. He couldn't be sprung on her, not this soon. It was the fact that she could tell him things. Future things. He was pretty sure of it. That was really all it was. His attraction was based purely on his desire for knowledge. Not on his desire for what she was packing under that blouse of hers.

  Matthew was curious by nature, and she could tell him how Dallas ended. If Dallas ended. And the Cold War. And who was gonna win the next presidential election.

  Yeah. That was all he wanted to know. Red or blue.

  Nothing else going on at all.

  He couldn't even form a decent argument in his head. It was a good thing literally no one else knew about this. He couldn't stop himself from thinking about her, either.

  She was different. If she had a theme song, it'd be "Killer Queen". She was kick ass.

  She certainly kicked his ass.

  He had to face it, he'd spent most of the last couple of years face deep in medical studies and being bored out of his mind. That made for a fairly boring existence. It was all set to stay boring, too. Then enter Suzannah Jack and her taser/stun gun thing, straight from the future, where his answers might just lie.

  He didn't have a flipping clue what his place was here. Everyone had a thing they did, except him. He hadn't ever really picked a niche. Instead, he collected degrees like some people did stamps and ran this research center with Phillip, for lack of drive to do anything else. He didn't even go home most nights, usually just crashed in one of Phillip's guest rooms. Who wanted to go home to a big empty house? Even the house wasn't really his. It was his parents', left to him in the will. He had nothing else to show for his time. No one and nothing.

  Matthew supposed,more than anything else, he wanted to know how he turned out. If that ever changed for him.

  But when he asked before, she made a face. One he couldn't read, but he was pretty sure wasn't a good thing. She'd seemed so surprised to see him. If she was from the future and connected to Phillip, she'd have met him, right? Future-him?

  He was so deep in thought that he very nearly missed the turn into the hall to go down to the research facility. He skidded to a halt and took a few steps back, nearly running into Phillip in the process.

  "Ah yes, Matthew..." Dr. Slone's hand reached out to touch his arm, likely to steady himself. "I was wondering if you'd do me a favor this week?"

  "Sure thing, Phil. What do you need?" Hopefully it was a favor that would get him out of the research facility.

  "Can you spend some time with our guest? Keep her company? I have a feeling she's used to a... faster pace. That's certainly something you can provide, isn't it?"

  "I guess?" Matthew chuckled dryly. "I don't know what I could do that would interest a chick from the future, but I'll give it a shot."

  "My future-self has told me that Suzannah's a fine young woman. Smart as a whip and completely under-utilized by her peers. So... even if you were to get into a little bit of trouble? It might do you both some good. Just...nothing to upset the time-space continuum, eh?"

  "You're giving me permission to get into trouble?" Matthew had to laugh at that. They were both adults. Supposedly. "How could someone upset the time-space continuum? Just...asking for like...no reason at all."

  "Don't take her near her birthplace. Richmond, Virginia. She'd be just an infant now and meeting a past version of herself might..." Phillip mimed a shaking box. "Mess things up a bit."

  "Got it. No taking her to visit the baby version of her."

  "That should cover it," Phillip reiterated.

  Matthew nodded."Gotcha. Where abouts is Suzannah--?"

  "She'll meet you in the front atrium in ten minutes."

  "Awesome."

  He had ten minutes to kill, so he took the opportunity to run down to the kitchen for a soda. He never claimed to be a connoisseur of health food. And since there wasn't enough time to brew a pot of coffee, soda seemed to be just about the next best thing.

  He ran his tongue over his teeth, the slick feel of just having brushed them was quickly wearing off, but the taste of his toothpaste wasn't. Maybe soda wasn't the best thing to drink first thing in the morning.

  Matthew hoped he wasn't gonna have funky breath walking around all day with Suzannah. It had been a while since he'd wanted to impress a woman.

  She probably thought he was gross. Outdated. Old.

  He certainly felt that way lately. Old, even though he was only thirty. By all rights, he had more than half his life to live. Of course, all of his college friends were settling down. Buying houses and doing the white picket fence thing. Starting families. And he was sticking needles in his arms, trying to see what happened if he injected himself with this or that.

  Human guinea pig for himself. It wasn't really much to brag about at the reunions.

  He cleared his throat, took another swig from the can.

  His stomach growled, and he was another two chugs into the soda when he decided to grab a Twinkie on his way out to the front atrium to meet Suzannah.

  He was stuffing the rest of it in his mouth when she locked eyes with him on her descent down the stairs. He chewed it and swallowed it as quickly as he could without choking. Not exactly getting a good start on impressing her.

  "Sorry to catch you in the middle of breakfast," she quipped.

  "Nah, don't worry about it ... unless..." He jutted his thumb over his shoulder, arching his eyebrows quizzically."You hungry?"

  "I wouldn't say no to a Twinkie, if you've got another one."

  "Hold on a sec." He jogged out of the room and back into the kitchen, grabbing a second Twinkie from the box.

  "Whoa. You really meant a second." She laughed nervously and unwrapped the pastry. She took a small bite. "Oh my gods, this is so much better than the ones we have..."

  "They change Twinkies?" Matthew groaned. "I don't know if I want to live in a future where they changed Twinkies." He glanced back over at her, her mouth now stuffed full of the entire snack. "You okay over there?"

  She laughed and covered her mouth, chewing it slowly and swallowing it in pieces. "Sorry..." she mumbled. "It's good."

  "Glad to hear it." He snickered and looked down at his shoes, unwilling or unable to address the warmth that flowed from his chest to his extremities when he looked at her. It was more than just attraction. He pushed it down with the rest of his thoughts. Being attracted to a woman who wouldn't be here in a week wasn't the best idea.

  "So what do you have planned? What do all the hip young scientist-types do to pass the time around these parts?" she asked, taking a few steps towards the door.

  "Well, pretty much whatever you want. There's a mall. There's a movie theater in the town proper. They're showing Dirty Dancing and The Princess Bride, I think."

  "Classics," she said with a nod.

  He laughed. "I guess you'd know. You've seen 'em, then?"

  She pursed her lips in thought. " But, well, they're definite repeat-view-types of films. I think I've seen Dirty Dancing hundreds of times. At least."

  "No way, for real? I guess it's okay. I dunno if it's a 'hundreds of times' kind of flick."

  "What do you MEAN, you 'guess' it's okay? This is a classic of romantic cinema, Matthew."

  He snort-laughed when she sa
id 'romantic', feeling a warm blush rise in his cheeks. "If you say so."

  "I do."

  "Huh. Well, I haven't actually gotten to go see 'The Princess Bride' yet. Haven't had a chance."

  "If you don't mind, I'd love to go see it with a virgin." Suzannah winked.

  His eyebrows shot up. "I'm not... I mean... I don't know what you've heard but..."

  "Princess Bride virgin. Calm down, bruh."

  "Oh I totally knew that..." he lied. Because he totally should have known that. But the dumbass he was got caught up in the fear that she thought he was an actual virgin.

  She reached into her pocket. "So, I have car keys. But I'm under strict instructions not to let you drive Phillip's car..."

  He exhaled slowly, folding his arms. "Lame."

  "Sorry if being destroyed in a car accident in 1987 doesn't appeal to me."

  "I'm hella careful, gorgeous. I'd never let anything happen to you."

  "Hella careful, huh? Not just careful, but hella. Hella careful."

  "Do they not say 'hella' anymore in 2017?"

  "Naw, they say it." She smiled and twirled the keys around her finger. "So, you want shotgun, I'm assuming?"

  He made a face and reached out to grab the keys. "I can drive. Just tell me where we're going."

  "Okay. Richmond, Virginia. I'd like to go visit my mom and rip a hole in the space/time continuum. You up for it, Sparky?"

  He frowned slightly. "Sorry, don't know how to get there. What's your second choice?" Nervously, he glanced around. "I can take you literally anywhere else. We can go to New York City, if you want?"

  "Dude, chill. I'm kidding. Henry's already told me that's a no-no. I was just checking to see if you're doing this out of the goodness of your heart, or if you're my babysitter."

  "Who's Henry?" he asked, sensing a change of subject from the one place Suzannah couldn't go might be a good thing. Also, Henry sounded like a dude's name. Her dude's name. Did she have a dude?

  "Oh right. Dr. Henry Laster. She's one of the scientist people behind this whole time travel thing. Also, a totally awesome lady who cannot hold her tequila to save her life. "