fiction

I've decided this is as good a place as any to serve as a central location for some not-so-great-yet-still-interesting short works. For every time I've started a story and left it undone, every fiction contest I've not quite entered, every ill-conceived notion that almost saw a reader's eye, there must be an answer. It shall be here.

To begin: last summer before I left for that trip to Europe, I heard about a writing contest on NPR. I had a couple days at most before the deadline. I began a story; I lost interest, presumably, or simply failed to get it done in time. In any case I wrote what is now a lost chunk of micro-fiction and haven't done anything with it since. If memory serves, there was a 500 word limit and the following prompt: the first sentence must be, "The nurse left at five o'clock." The title below is the best I can come up with at the moment.


Memory (working title)

The nurse left at five o'clock. She entered the subway station at Charles Street nineteen minutes later and waited another ten minutes for an inbound train. She boarded it, sat by herself and began to murmur quietly, not rocking back and forth, not sitting bolt upright, not staring or sweating or showing any other immediately visible sign of distress. At 6:03 a.m. her train crashed into another Red Line train waiting to enter the track at Park Street and at 6:04 a.m. she emerged from the wreckage clutching her left arm to her side, pushed her way through the crowd and walked up the stairs without a word. This much we know. What we do not know - what I cannot stop dreaming of her until I know - is why. My name is Marcus Andrews and I am from the future.

Five people were killed instantly by the initial impact; another seventeen were wounded. Witnesses called the EMS immediately and the first medical personnel arrived on the scene in under four minutes. During that time, three injured passengers succumbed to their wounds and died. Above them, a fully qualified RN named Annie Gilbrading held her left arm against her side and walked away.

I would like to tell you that this event is of crucial significance - that I traveled back in time to save the life of a man who would have cured a disease, or to save a nurse's soul - but I am shirking my responsibilities by being here, studying these events. They matter solely to me and I do not know why they compel me. I have a husband, a daughter. My career is meaningful. Still I dream of her soft, blank face and find her beautiful. Still, she lets them die.

Strict rules govern time travel: a cap on number of years from the point of projection, a limit on the duration of each trip. No physical manifestation is allowed. If you discover certain facts pertaining to your own life or origin, they may be confiscated on your return. The authorities may enter and search your mind without a warrant if your trip is deemed a threat to national security, and you can be called to account for actions taken outside your native timestream.

I push them. Settle myself on her like a cloak, mimic her experience of the cold, the drip from the wound. and as glances or stares or earnest inquiries come in I press my lips tight and breathe. She says nothing. Walks toward something on a horizon no one else could see and I am behind her, beside her. If they discover these thoughts I will be punished, no doubt, but I have no answer for them.