Acme Time Travel Incorporated - Volume 1

Gabriel pushed his bicycle up the gravel drive leading to the front reception of the Sunny Vale Care Home. He could have done without being pulled over by the police, but once he’d given them Barney’s number, it hadn’t taken long to get sorted out. He’d had longer and more difficult run-ins when he was in London.

And from hearing the policeman’s phone call to Barney, he could imagine that Barney had probably enjoyed the chat with the copper. He did feel a bit sorry for the policewoman, though. She had looked a bit embarrassed about the whole affair. He thought it might be worth doing a bit of a write-up about it. There might be a bit of mileage in it.

He wondered if he was starting to think more like a reporter.

He had already taken a photograph of the care home from the main road, to be used as an establishing shot for any possible publication. Barney had stressed that it always helped to get revenue from potential clients if any articles about them showed a favourable picture of their premises. He had been lucky. Barney had loaned him a digital camera with quite good resolution. And the day was sunny. Nobody wanted their premises photographed during a downpour.

Parking his bicycle next to a tree, Gabriel walked over to the front door. He had been thinking about how to introduce himself most of the bike ride here. He knew that Barney had arranged with the manageress, so she was expecting him, but he was still wondering what to say. He rang the door-bell and waited, somewhat pensively.

The front door opened, and a young girl of about Gabriel’s own age opened the door. She wore a light grey smock on which was a badge saying

Ginny Peters

Trainee Carer

She was small and very cute looking, with blonde hair tied back into a ponytail. Her eyes seemed very blue against her pale skin ... and then Gabriel became aware that he was staring at her, and she had seen him doing it.

Gabriel felt his cheeks burning. He knew that his dark skin would make his blush less obvious, but that didn’t make him feel any the more comfortable. He stared down at his boots ... like he had never seen a pair of boots before.

“Are you from the Gazette?” the girl asked.

Gabriel forced his eyes up to hers. She was smiling at him.

“erm, well ...,” mumbled Gabriel, wishing the ground would open up underneath him.

“Are you new at your job as well?” she asked. “I guess we will both get better after we have been doing it a bit.”

Gabriel liked her smile. He thought that maybe if he could see her again ... maybe if he could make her smile again ...

“My name’s Ginny,” the girl said, “though you probably know that already.”

She was pointing with one long graceful finger at the badge on her smock.

“Yes, I do work for the Gazette, and yes, I haven’t been doing this job long.”

Gabriel felt strangely pleased to have managed to get a coherent sentence out in one piece.

Ginny reached out and lightly touched Gabriel’s arm, as if to usher him through the front door. She was smiling still. “Come on then. I’m supposed to take you to see the Manageress, Denise, before you see our Birthday Boy.”

Gabriel nodded, and she ushered him in, leading him to a door marked ‘Manager’. Before they reached it, a middle-aged lady came out, who nodded to the young girl and gestured that she could leave. Ginny turned to walk away, but as she did so, she threw a last glance towards Gabriel. He caught her glance and returned her smile.

Gabriel turned back to the middle-aged woman.

“I’m Denise,” she said. “I had thought Barney would be doing this interview himself.”

“Barney said he wanted me to get the experience,” Gabriel replied.

“Oh well ... down this way,” she said, turning and walking along the corridor to the residents’ rooms. Gabriel detected a touch of disappointment in her voice and wondered if Barney and she had something going on. Barney might be a bit of a grumpy old bugger, but Gabriel reckoned that he still had a bit of a spark, which could quite feasibly attract the ladies.

As she walked, she cast a glance at him, maybe to check that he was following her.

“Anyway, here he is,” Denise said, pointing to a room with a number 3 on it.

She knocked gently on the door, saying, “Hello John, your visitor is here.”

“Please come in,” replied a voice from inside the room.

Denise pushed open the door, but then ushered Gabriel inside. She remained outside, closing the door after he had entered.

Gabriel looked quickly around the room. He could see the man he had come to interview standing by the window. He was obviously very old, but his face did not exhibit the slack expression often found in people who no longer had their faculties.

“Hello, I am Gabriel Jones, and I work for the Frinton and Dovercourt Gazette.”

John looked over to Gabriel, presumably expecting a bit more of an explanation.

“I believe that you are expecting me ... er ... to do an interview about your experiences ... things that you have seen in your very long life.”

“Please come in and sit down,” John said. “Would you like a cup of tea or coffee? I am just about to make some.”

Gabriel breathed an inward sigh of relief. He had been very much expecting to find a very old person but who had lost their capacity to remember or to communicate. “Just a glass of water would be nice, thank you,” he said.

John took down a glass from a shelf and poured Gabriel a glass of water. Gabriel stepped over to get the glass, rather than having the old man carry it over to him.

John filled his kettle with water, then switched it on.

Gabriel looked across the room. On a shelf on the wall were several old photographs. They were mostly black and white. Old photographs in simple dark wood frames.

“Please feel free to look at the photographs,” John said, seeing Gabriel looking at them from across the room.

Gabriel walked over to the shelf on which the photographs were standing. One showed a couple, probably in their late twenties or early thirties. They had bathing costumes on, and they were laying alongside each other in a grassy meadow. They were smiling at each other.

“Is this you?” Gabriel asked, pointing to the photograph of the couple in the meadow.

“With Mary, my future wife to be,” John replied. “We were both in our early thirties then. It would have been June 1951. We married in the September.”

Gabriel picked up the adjacent photograph, showing the same couple, maybe now a little older. They were walking down a main street, dressed very smartly. They were walking arm in arm.

“That would be 1957,” said John, looking over. “We had gone up to London. I forget why. We were pretty dapper, don’t you think?”

“You certainly were,” replied Gabriel.

He picked up the third photograph. This one was in colour, but the colours were very saturated, glowing reds and oranges. It showed a couple walking along a beach. They appeared to be in their sixties. They looked fit and healthy, and they were holding hands. The man was smiling and so was the woman. Written on the bottom right of the photograph was the note ‘on the beach 1970’.

“Mary was just starting to show signs of dementia,” John said. “If you look closely, you can see it in her eyes.”

Gabriel peered more closely at the photograph. Maybe he was just empathising with John’s comment, but he thought that there was a maybe a slight vacancy in her face.

Gabriel put the photo back, easing out the little cardboard flap at the back to allow the photo frame to stand up. As he did so, he dislodged something which fluttered to the floor. He bent to pick it up. He saw John looking over at him.

“It’s alright, Gabriel. I had forgotten that was there. Please be kind enough to pick it up and put it back behind the photo frame.”

Gabriel picked up the piece of paper from the floor. It was a small photograph showing a couple sitting on a bench in a park. The woman had her hand on the handle of a pram. They were both looking lovingly at what was presumably their baby in the pram. Gabriel guessed that the photo had been taken some time in the 1950s.

He carefully tucked the small photo into the back of the photo frame, then sat back down, feeling uncomfortable.

John was watching him.

“She was called Isobel,” said John.

“Sorry?” Gabriel said.

“She died at four months old.”

Gabriel turned to look out of the window, unable to look John in the face.

“They said it was probably because Mary was thirty-four years old when she had her.”

“They said that having a first child at that age could cause complications.”

“They said that if we had had her earlier, she would have grown up to be a bonny young thing.”

Gabriel shuffled uncomfortably in his chair.

“The doctors told me that it would be for the best if we didn’t try for any more ... but ... well, I didn’t tell Mary that.”

Gabriel looked awkwardly towards John.

“Well, she never asked me, you know, but ... well ... it was very difficult for her.”

Gabriel levered himself up from his chair and walked over to the window.

John’s window looked out onto a small lawn. Two small apple trees stood together in the middle of the lawn. Gabriel didn’t know what sort of apples they were, but he could see that there was going to be a good crop this year.

The kettle started to make a low hissing noise, and Gabriel turned to see John walking towards it. The kettle clicked itself off, and John picked it up and poured the hot water into a small teapot.

“I’m sorry, John,” Gabriel said. “You don’t need to tell me this stuff, you know. I know that I’m here for your story, but this is too ...”

“So, what is it that you want to know then, Gabriel?” asked John.

Gabriel sat back down. He felt shaken by John’s reminiscences over the photos. He reverted to the little speech he had planned to say before he got here.

“Well, we, I mean ‘The Gazette’, wondered what interesting things you may have seen over the years ... what changes you have noticed ... what were the major things you have seen in your long life. After all, you were born in 1917, just near the end of the First World War. You must have seen a great deal that our readers would be interested to read about.”

John pondered the question.

“Do you like music, Gabriel? Would you mind if I put on a little music? I find that it soothes me.”

Gabriel mumbled “yes, of course,” wondering if perhaps his first assessment of John had been incorrect.

“Vicky, could we please have a little music, perhaps Bach’s Air on a G string. I would like the version with Anastasiya Petryshak on violin if you don’t mind. And Vicky, can you please play it so that we can all hear it.”

“Are you sure about this, John?” Vicky asked in a whisper.

“Yes please, Vicky.”

“Alright. Of course, then, John, as you wish,” Vicky said.

Gabriel looked around the room to see who or what John was talking to. He had been loaned a Smartphone by Barney, and that device had voice-operated commands, but he didn’t know that they could be given such detailed requests.

Nor was he aware that they questioned the wisdom of given requests.

The haunting sounds of Bach’s music filled the room, not loud yet very clear. Gabriel was amazed at the quality of the sound. John’s hi-fi made it sound as though they were standing in a cathedral listening to the live performance.

“Lovely, isn’t it?” said John. “There are many good versions of this piece of music, but I think that this one is my favourite.”

“Are you using blue-tooth, with concealed speakers?” Gabriel asked. He himself didn’t have any sort of sound system in his mum’s flat, and he couldn’t imagine how expensive the gear would be to provide a sound like this.

“No, not quite,” replied John. “I can see that I need to give some sort of evidence, a demonstration of sorts. Something that will enable you to understand what I am about to tell you. Something to give you a context.”

Gabriel took a sip from his glass of water. He didn’t understand where this conversation was going.

“Vicky, would you please display, for the both of us to see, what the Earth looks like from space. Could you please do it as if we were floating in space, with nothing around us but the Earth and the stars.”

“John,” Vicky said, “do you know what this could mean. Do you realise the possible consequences of showing these things to this young man? We don’t know him. We don’t know what he might do ... or whom he might tell. Please John. Are you quite sure about this?”

Gabriel looked about him. From somewhere, a young woman was offering John advice, and she sounded very worried.

“Please Vicky. I don’t know why, but I think young Gabriel is the person to tell about these things. Please do as I say.”

Instantly Gabriel felt as though he was an astronaut floating in space. His fingers clutched the arms of the chair that he was sitting in. He could see the Earth floating below him. He could feel the tug of the Earth’s gravitational pull. He felt as though, if he got out of the chair, that he would tumble out and down towards the Earth. In his hand, he was still holding the glass of water. He thought to focus on the level of the water in the glass. It would show him if he started to tumble forwards. Maybe he would be alright if he just concentrated on keeping the water level.

The young woman’s voice said to him, “Don’t worry Gabriel. You are still sitting in your chair. You are perfectly safe. Just stay seated. Just relax. You will be fine.”

“Thank ... thank you,” Gabriel replied, though he still did not know to whom he was speaking.

Bach’s Air on a G-string continued to play, sounding as though the Heavens themselves were the auditoriums in which it was being played.

As the piece of music died away, it was replaced by a vast silence. Then from out of the silence, Gabriel could hear John speaking to him.

John’s voice seemed to be nowhere and everywhere.

“Gabriel,” said John quietly, “I am sorry if I have alarmed you, but I wanted to try to illustrate that I am more than just a very old man living in a rest home.”

“Are we really in ...?” Gabriel asked. “I mean ... I guess not, and I feel stupid having asked the question, but it seems so real ... and you had no gear around ... you know ... you know, 3D goggles and stuff.”

“I think that I should offer some sort of explanation,” said John.