Throwback, p.15
Throwback, page 15
Corey had a long broom handle. He did manage to push away at least four items. Luckily, none of the bystanders was looking at him.
After it was over, his legs felt wobbly from the riding. The temperature had shot up and the humidity made every inch of fabric stick to him. As he and Quinn dismounted, Jensen’s only comment was, “You’re hired. Report here for the late shift at five o’clock.”
“Both of us?” Quinn said.
Jensen gave him a sour look. “You said that’s the only way you’d do the job, right?”
It wasn’t exactly a compliment, but Corey would take it.
“Thank you, sir!” Quinn said with a deep bow.
As the old guy limped back to the hut, Corey leaped into the air. “Woo-HOO!”
He threw his arms around Quinn. But instead of hugging him back, Quinn pushed himself away. “Woo-hoo?” he said.
“That’s East Coast for yee-hah,” Corey said. “Sorry, dude. I guess hugging isn’t what guys do in Wyoming. In 1917. Whatever. But this is so awesome, Quinn! You taught me how to ride a horse.”
Quinn nodded. His face was red. “Well. You’re . . . awesome, too,” he said. “Dude.”
Corey could hear squeals and splashing from beyond the pilings that lined the river. “Now that we’re free for a while, I have an idea,” he said. “Follow me.”
He ran toward the river and looked over. The group of swimmers had grown. There were maybe twelve of them, half wearing shorts and the other half skinny-dipping. It looked like some of them were brothers. Corey figured their ages were maybe eight to fourteen or so. Everyone looked cool and wet and happy. “Come on down!” a boy called upward.
“No grown-ups here!” another yelled. “So don’t worry about being caught!”
“Twist our arms,” Corey said, turning to climb down.
Quinn stepped to the edge and looked over. Eyes widening, he stepped back. “Nah. I’ll pass.”
“Oh . . . ,” Corey said with sudden understanding. “You can’t swim?”
“I can swim,” Quinn replied. “I just don’t want to.”
The coolness of the river breeze felt great on Corey’s back. He was dying to jump in. “Dude, we were in the Gash, and then that fleabag hotel. We didn’t shower. You didn’t even sleep. Plus, we just spent the morning on horses, I smell like a sewer, and the Hudson’s not polluted like it’s going to be in a few years. So the water will be awesome—”
“I said no,” Quinn snapped. “Do what you want. I’ll do what I want.”
“’Smatter?” one of the kids yelled up. “Ya friend too good for us?”
As Quinn turned to go, one of the boys scrambled up the ladder, darting around Corey. The kid was quick and slippery, and he reached over the piling, pulling Quinn by the ankle.
Quinn was caught off guard. Windmilling his arms, he teetered backward and tumbled over the dock. Corey watched as he arced through the air and splashed into the river.
The boy on the ladder did a backflip after him, and his friends screamed with approval. Corey scrambled down the ladder. By the time he got to the rickety dock, Quinn had emerged, gasping for air and treading water. His hat had come off and gone floating away, but the boy who’d pulled him into the river grabbed it. Smashing it down on his own head, he shouted, “Yippie-ay-oh-ki-yay!”
Lunging through the water, Quinn took his hat back. With his other hand he grabbed the boy by the neck. “Nobody does that to me,” he shouted, jerking his neck forward.
He butted his forehead sharply with the kid’s, who sank back into the water. “Aaaaaay, whadja do that for?” one of the other boys shouted. “It was just a joke!”
With powerful strokes, Quinn swam to the dock. Corey kneeled, extending a hand to help. “Are you okay?” he asked.
Quinn’s face was red. Clasping Corey’s hand, he yanked him off the dock. “Are you?” he shouted, as Corey plunged in.
Now the other boys were hollering again. Corey felt the heaviness of his clothes weighing him down. He swam to the piling and pulled himself up. Quinn had made it to the ladder and was climbing fast, water cascading from his clothes.
“Wait!” Corey said, struggling to his feet.
By the time Corey got to the top of the ladder, Quinn was striding angrily downtown. His wet boots crunched against the rocky soil. Corey ran after him as quickly as he could. “Quinn, sorry!” he shouted.
Quinn spun around. The brim of his waterlogged cowboy hat drooped on both sides like a bonnet, but the expression on his face was no laughing matter. “That’s the thanks I get, huh?” he spat. “Just pull me into the water fully dressed in the only clothes I own, after I said no?”
“That wasn’t me, Quinn,” Corey replied. “It was one of those kids. And what was the big deal, anyway? It’s just water. Your clothes will dry.”
Quinn’s face was red. “You egged them on. Because why? Because my no doesn’t mean anything? Because you know what I want, better than I do?”
“Whoa, I never said that!” Corey protested.
“You know why I left Wyoming? Do you? It’s because everybody knew the best for me. How I should dress, what I should believe, who I should make friends with, what I should be interested in. I thought people were different here. Obviously I was wrong.”
“Dude, look, I know that sucked, okay? Those kids were jerks. But I didn’t mean to diss you. If you’d told me how you felt about stuff like this, I never would have even considered—”
“I don’t have to tell you anything!” Quinn shoved Corey hard. He stumbled backward and fell onto a sharp rock. Pain jolted up his body, taking his breath away. His vision blurred.
Quinn was standing over him now. Corey blinked away the pain. Mustering his strength, he tucked his head down and lurched forward. His shoulders jammed into Quinn’s knees. Crying out in pain, Quinn tumbled on top of him. The two tangled on the ground, rolling in the dirt. Almost instantly Quinn took charge, straddling Corey as if he were a calf in a rodeo. He gripped Corey’s neck, and in an instant Corey was gagging. “Quinn . . . stop. . . .”
“Isn’t there anything you keep to yourself, Corey?” Quinn growled. “Do you understand what private means? Huh?”
“You’re—you’re choking—cchchcghhhh!” Corey said.
With a desperate burst of strength, Corey jammed the heel of his right hand into Quinn’s jaw. He felt the grip loosen. With a cry of pain, Quinn let go, falling to the ground.
Corey slid away. He struggled to his feet, coughing like crazy. Quinn’s hat had fallen off again, and Corey picked it up, flinging it at his attacker. “You think you have it so bad, poor thing,” he snarled. “You want to know my secret? You want to know what I’m keeping private from you? Why I talk funny, and dress funny, and why I want to get back my stuff—and why what you just did was the stupidest thing in the history of the world?”
Quinn turned. His eyes were red, brimming with tears.
“I’m from the future, cowboy!” Corey blurted out. “Happy now? I was born in the twenty-first century, and that’s the truth. Don’t ask me how I got here. But without the artifacts I brought, I am stuck here with you. And it’s the last place in the world I want to be.”
Quinn stared at him, slack-jawed. “But that’s . . .”
“Impossible?” Corey replied. “Yeah, I thought so, too, until it happened. And I don’t care if you believe me or not.”
Quinn shook his head. His eyes were wide and his skin seemed ashy. His mouth opened, but no words came out.
Corey stood, brushing himself off. He was sopping wet from head to foot and he felt miserable. “Must be nice getting away from those mean, naughty people in Wyoming. But at least you have someone to go home to.”
He spun around and began walking back the way he’d come. Anger and sadness and helplessness all collided in his brain. Quinn had been his friend. Having a friend had made all the difference. It had given Corey hope. Taken his mind away from the fact that he was stuck. A prisoner of time.
Now, as far as Corey was concerned, he might as well be dead.
But Quinn was right behind him. Corey felt a hand on his shoulder. “I have a secret, too,” he murmured in a voice so soft Corey almost didn’t hear it.
He turned. “What?”
“I said, I have a secret.”
“I got that,” Corey said. “I meant, ‘What’ as in ‘What is the secret?’”
The cowboy stood, shaking out his hair. He let the rope fall to the ground. Without the ten-gallon hat, his head looked smaller than Corey had expected. “Quinn is a nickname,” he said haltingly, “for Katherine.”
28
Corey knew his reaction was wrong, but he couldn’t help it. Somehow, the first thing that came out of his mouth was a big laugh.
Quinn’s face fell. She was turning bright red. “I knew it. I should have kept my fat mouth shut.”
“No! No!” Corey shouted. “I’m not laughing at you! Not at all. It’s just that—well . . .”
“Well, what?” Quinn snapped.
“Well . . .” Corey shrugged. “So?”
“So?” Quinn looked baffled. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, so? You’re cis female but you gender identify as male,” Corey said. “Or is it not really a gender-fluidity thing, but just a disguise to get a job? Either way, what’s the biggie?”
“Is that English?”
“The point is—why the big secret? What’s wrong with you dressing and identifying as male?”
Quinn stared at him. Corey tried to read her expression but it seemed east of scared, west of baffled, north of furious, and south of relieved. “So . . . you don’t think that’s wrong?”
“Okay, okay, I think I get this—you’re too out-there for 1917 Wyoming, right?” Corey’s mind went through all the events of the last two days. “So, you and me sleeping on that bed . . . changing . . . going into the water with all those boys who had taken off their—”
“It wasn’t proper,” Quinn said.
Corey exhaled. He had to put his hand on his brow to keep his head from flying away. “Wow. That must have felt miserable, Quinn. Keeping that all bottled inside.”
“I had no choice.”
“Why? Why didn’t you just tell me?”
“Because I didn’t want you to think I was . . .” Quinn’s voice trailed off, and she turned away.
“What?”
“Abnormal, okay?” Quinn said. “Perverted. Sinful. Bad.”
“Wanting to be a boy is perverted?”
“Everyone but you thinks it is! I just wanted to get this job. I can do anything with horses a boy can do. The job advertisement was for boys and men only. So I dressed the part. I like boys’ clothes, anyway. And my daddy was going to make me burn them and marry Buzz Hockenmeyer, which would have been a fate worse than death.”
Corey took a deep breath. The sun was high, passing into afternoon, and the temperature was getting hot enough to dry them. Soon they would be just the way they had been. And then again, not.
He looked out toward the leafy, tranquil New Jersey shore across the river and imagined the steel-and-glass skyscrapers that were to come. “You know, a lot of things really suck in the twenty-first century,” he said. “Trust me. But in some ways it’s pretty cool. Well, kids are cool—some grown-ups maybe not so much. Anyway, if I could bring you back, you’d fit right in. You wouldn’t have to hide or pretend.” Corey smiled and put a gentle hand on Quinn’s shoulder. “Don’t think you’re bad. Bad is torturing puppies or copying someone’s homework or bullying or committing crimes. Bad is not what you are. You are normal. And you’re right, you’re better than the guys.”
“Thanks, Corey.” Quinn nodded, but Corey could tell she didn’t quite believe him. “I—I’m sorry I attacked you.”
Corey rubbed his neck. “I’ll survive.”
“Say, if I help you find the thieves who took your stuff, will you take me to the future with you?”
“I can’t, Quinn. I can’t even get back myself. Besides, you’d hate it.”
“You said I’d fit right in.”
“But you’d have so much to adjust to. Nobody in the city rides horses. Cars are all over the place, and they go super fast. The skies are full of vehicles, too. They’re called helicopters and jet planes. You can’t swim in the river without getting diseases. People carry around their own telephones and spend the whole day looking at them.”
“Well, if there are others like me, it would be worth it. There’s nobody like me now.”
“Yeah, there are,” Corey replied. “You’re in New York. You’ll find them.”
“Promise me when you go back, you’ll look me up in your history books! ’Cause I plan to be famous.”
“I’ll google you.”
Quinn glared at him. “I’ve shot at people for less.”
“No! It’s an internet—never mind,” Corey said, feeling his face turn red. “Hey. Let’s go back to the Better Ridgefield. We’ll take turns standing outside the door while the other takes a shower.”
Quinn smiled. She looked quickly to either side. Then, as quick as a flick of her lasso, she leaned in and gave Corey a kiss. “Deal. Last one there is a rotten egg.”
29
Leila didn’t scream, and that was a big achievement.
Auntie Flora, aka Catsquatch, had vanished along with her pile of possessions. Leila’s bed and all her furniture were gone, too. Her bedroom was four blank walls. In the middle of the floor were stacks of cardboard boxes labeled GOTHAM MOVERS. Which meant that it was not yet her bedroom.
Because she had not been born yet.
“Ohhh-kay,” Leila whispered to herself. “Hang on to your head, Leila.”
The nail file, hot as an iron, fell from her hand. It tinkled as it hit the floor. During her whole life, Leila had never seen the wood floor beneath her carpet. The room was spotless, and poster-less, and she could smell the fresh paint. Outside the window, Central Park was a pattern of darkness and streetlamp lights. At least that looked the same.
No, not exactly. A rack of public bicycles, which had been installed on the sidewalk when she was little, was gone.
Leila had to steady herself against the wall. She wasn’t prepared for this. When Auntie Flora told her to hold the nail file and try to mentally transport herself to 2001, she couldn’t stop cracking up. That tiny nail file like some dollhouse Excalibur sword. It seemed ridiculous. She was sure Corey would be the only one who could do the real deed.
“Honey? Did you drop something?”
At the sound of her dad’s voice, Leila choked back a gasp. He was here. Living here. Before Leila had even been born. Way before he had met the account executive with the small eyes and big feet and moved with her to Parsippany, New Jersey. Leila could not remember him ever calling her mom “honey.” It was hard to imagine them ever being in love. It sounded so nice.
“I think something fell in the front room,” came her mom’s voice, sounding sweet and young.
At the thumping of footsteps, Leila scooped up the nail file and darted into the closet. Without all her stuff, it was empty and weirdly large. She shrank to the back wall, where one day there would be shelves.
Now Leila could hear the bedroom door open. She eyed the closet’s doorknob. Beneath it was a keyhole. Carefully she kneeled down and looked through.
Mom was standing in the middle of the mess, gazing down at the floor. But not Mom exactly. It was as if one of Mom’s old photos had come to life. Leila had seen her looking exactly like this, young and girlish, with the same floral shirt and high-waisted jeans. But here she was in three dimensions, breathing and walking and humming a tune Leila had never heard in her life.
She was dying to talk to her. What would happen if she just pushed the door open? Papou had explained that the past could not be changed, even if you tried. And her mom’s past did not include meeting the thirteen-year-old Leila. If it had, Mom would have told her.
But maybe Leila was a Throwback, too. She’d made it this far. Mom might freak out a little, but she’d get it. She was a writer. She had an imagination. She was open-minded.
Leila put her hand on the doorknob and pushed the door open. But Mom was already out in the hallway, scurrying away. “Do you see the time, George? We have a reservation at Ticker’s!”
Ticker’s. Columbus and Seventy-Fifth. Where they had met. When Leila was a little girl, there was a framed photo of them on the wall, standing happily in front of Ticker’s. The place had gone out of business, right around the same time Mom and Dad’s marriage had, too.
They were out of sight now, giggling and making kissy noises in the hallway. It gave Leila a funny, queasy feeling. She hung back in the room, listening as her parents rushed down the hallway and left the apartment.
She looked out her front window and waited a few moments. Her parents walked out the door, arm in arm. Dad had nearly a full head of brown hair, not yet gray and balding. Mom’s was long, straight, and a deep brown that wasn’t yet aided by a colorist.
They seemed so happy.
With a deep sigh, Leila sneaked out of the room. The hallway was bare and carpetless. All the photos that had gathered dust on the walls through her childhood hadn’t yet been put up.
As she tiptoed past the kitchen, she glanced inside. The same old digital clock was on the wall, only without the chip from when Leila had dropped it at age nine.
It said 9:07 p.m., September 10, 2001.
She was here early. Corey had hopped to the morning of the eleventh, so he wouldn’t be here yet. Leila heaved a sigh. She wanted to kick herself. If she’d waited till the morning, she wouldn’t have to find someplace to hang for a whole night. She would have been able to get a full eight hours’ sleep before traveling into the past.
