Cafe At The End Of Time (14.0)

Thornvold Arnquist was a character in a science fiction

novel I had red maybe forty years ago.

“He wants what’s in that bag.”

“And he’d kill for it….”

“Yes.”

“ He was going to use Natricia for that?”

“No!  I was trying to talk her into it, but she cares about

you too much.”

“She didn’t warn me.”

“You found me, didn’t you?”

“Do you know what’s in the bag?”

“No….do you?”

“No….I was told not to look,”

“Well, you’ve been betrayed by someone….don’t you want to

find out what it’s all about?”

“I’m not sure that’s possible. Look, you tell Arnie to stay away,

because I’m on to him. And you stay away from Natricia…and

me. …understand?”

I picked up the bag with the bricks in it and started out. When

I turned back, Tsnelda was taking out her cell phone. I walked

back to the table,  grabbed it out of her hand, and smashed it

under my shoe. Then I left.

I made no attempt not to be followed. I was hoping someone would.  

I walked to my bank and put the bag into a new safety deposit box.  

I took a cab to my apartment,  put the contents of

leather bag that I had hidden into a small insulated cooler.

Then, I hailed another cab and went to my safe house.  When

the drama gets too heavy at my apartment,  I have a tiny hole-in-

the-wall place under the El….like the place Akroyd has in

“Blues Brothers”.  I went in,  put the cooler in a corner. Checked

the fridge…it was empty.

I knew they hadn’t searched my apartment yet…I was sure

they would be going there soon. Then, I felt a shock of realization. 

If I had seen myself leave Tsnelda,  that means that

that me was going to  the train station.  I didn’t cross paths with him 

at my apartment, which meant his apartment was in the

other universe. It also meant that the Tsnelda I saw was in both

at the same time….and so was I…what I saw in the bar had

taken place in the other dimension in the past. 

I went back to my apartment, had the cab stop three blocks

away.  I walked down the alley in back and stopped short

of my place, trying not to be visible. My place was on the

second floor…you could see the kitchen door and window

from down below.  The lights were on …I hadn’t left them on.

I decided that, whatever I did, the place was trashed. Better

I stay out of view for a while.  I’ll show myself when and

where I want to be seen.

I was lying in bed.  The El was passing over….bum bum

bum…tacketa tacketa tacketa…bum bum bum.  This was

crazy.  I was just trying to do a little writing, and here I was

involved in what-all with guns and parallel universes…it was

all getting a little too complex and serious. And it didn’t seem

like it would just go away and be the way it was before. I still

hadn’t contacted the party I was supposed to deliver the leather

bag to…I  would have to do that from an internet café, in case

there was some collusion there.  Someone had actually shot me

in a parallel universe, so, this was beyond serious.  My creative

writing class in college had not prepared me for this.

                                              ****