Dallas, Texas
It was early afternoon when Paulette and Oliver began walking the two blocks north to Elm Street. They turned left toward the Texas Depository Building a half-mile away. Oliver’s head was moving back and forth trying to take in everything he saw on the street. They passed several shops, including a barber shop, a few hotels, and parking garages. Paulette whistled aloud, which caused Oliver to spin his head around.
“What are you whistling about?”
Paulette pointed at a large sign at the entrance of a parking garage. “I was whistling at the price for parking. It’s amazing to see that it only costs seventy-five cents to park all day. Where I came from, it could cost twenty dollars or more to park all day.”
Oliver glanced at the sign and the large opening of the parking garage, shrugged, and snapped back at Paulette. “Who cares what it costs to park. We’re here for one thing and one thing only. Focus on what needs to be done.”
Paulette’s forehead wrinkled in a scowl, and she took a halting step toward Oliver before thinking better of it. “Well if we need to focus, then let’s pick up the pace and stop looking at all the old buildings.”
“Are you saying I’m slowing us down?”
“Yes. You keep slowing your pace, gawking, with your mouth hanging open, at all the buildings and the people.”
Oliver, in a huff, walked away from Paulette, making her jog to catch up.
They continued in silence. Paulette was relieved to not have any further confrontations with the arrogant man.
She considered their plan once they arrived at the depository. They were going to scout out the sixth-floor room that Lee Harvey Oswald used to assassinate the president. Their aim was to find a way to hide and then subdue Oswald prior to his firing the weapon. A grumbling noise emanating from her stomach interrupted her thoughts.
“Hey, Oliver, don’t you think we should get a bite to eat before we get there?”
Oliver walked back to Paulette. “Oh, now you’re not in a hurry anymore, are you? Why should we stop to get something to eat?”
“So we have the energy to climb six flights of stairs when we get there. We don’t know if there’s an elevator in the building. Besides, you said we need to stay focused on the mission. How can we do that if we don’t eat?”
Oliver glared at her for a moment, then sighed. “Fine, I guess it’s a good idea to get something to eat, considering we haven’t eaten since yesterday.”
“That’s the spirit,” Paulette replied, hoping that if he got something to eat, he wouldn’t be so irritable. “I saw this pleasant restaurant nearby. We could head over there to grab some lunch.”
“Fine.”
They headed back the way they had come. After several blocks, they entered a restaurant called Piccadilly's. At the front door, a young, red-haired woman wearing an apron greeted them.
“Howdy, folks. Just two of ya?”
“Yes, thanks.”
The woman led them to a small booth and set menus on the table for them. Paulette kept a wary eye on Oliver. She wasn’t sure how much she could trust him. The man was a pain in her side, and she needed to keep a vigilant watch.
Not long after placing their orders, the waitress came out and placed their steaming hot meals in front of them. They both dug into their food and ate without talking much. Just before they finished eating, Oliver mumbled something with his mouth full.
Paulette determined he was asking what they would do once they observed the room at the depository. “Once we see the room, we can determine our course of action. There’s no sense speculating right now.”
Oliver’s head bobbed up and down in acknowledgment, while he stuffed the last of his pancakes into his mouth.
Finishing their lunch, they paid and headed out. They headed west toward their destination. Picking up their pace, they walked the final few blocks and stood at the entrance to the Texas School Book Depository Building.
The birds were chirping, and fluffy clouds were skittering across the sky on a beautiful, sunny November day in Dallas. A young family took advantage of the beautiful day and was sitting on a blanket having a picnic on the grass at Dealey Plaza. Their son picked up a ball and said, “Daddy, can ya play catch with me?”
“Sure, son.” The dad stood and walked with his son, and then the son took off running a ways before turning around. “Catch.” The boy threw the ball into the air, and it sailed toward his dad. The dad caught the ball and threw it back. The boy missed and ran after the rolling and bouncing ball. He caught up with the ball, snatched it off the ground, and as he came back up, he noticed two strange-looking people by the entrance to the Texas School Book Depository Building. His dad wasn’t paying attention, so the boy pretended that he was still chasing the ball. He looked both ways before running across Elm Street.
The boy came to a screeching halt in front of the two strangers and tugged on the bottom of the man’s jacket. The boy jumped back when the man twirled around with an angry scowl on his face.
“Sorry, mister. I was just wonderin’ who y’all are?”
The boy watched as the gentleman turned back around and said something to the lady who glanced down at the boy. “What’s your name? Where are your parents?”
The boy smiled and pointed toward Dealey Plaza. “My mother and daddy are over there. We’re havin’ a picnic today.” Then he remembered she had asked for his name too, so he blurted out, “My name is Billy.”
“It’s nice to meet you, Billy. Shouldn’t you be with your parents?”
“Oh, yeah, but…” Billy paused, and produced the ball, showing it to Paulette and Oliver, “this got away, and I ran after it. Then I saw y’all and decided to come over and say howdy.”
“Well, howdy back to you. So why are you curious about us?” Paulette asked Billy.
“Well, I could tell y’all aren’t from around these parts, and I was wantin’ to know if ya came from that thing that fell from the sky the other night.”
Oliver, not amused said, “Beat it kid. We have important things to do.”
“Oliver, be nice to the kid. He’s simply curious.” Paulette knelt to talk to Billy closer to his eye level. “So you saw something fall from the sky?”
Billy jumped, clapping his hands. “Yes, I did. Did you come from the sky? What’s it like? Are you aliens?”
Paulette held up a hand to stop the boy’s insistent questioning. “Billy, that’s a lot of questions. Let me see if I can answer some.” Paulette glanced at Oliver and mouthed, “No one will believe him, so leave it be.” Then she glanced back to Billy. “So, Billy, what if I told you we dropped from the sky?”
“Oh, boy, I knew it!” Billy said as he jumped up and down again. “Are y’all aliens?”
Paulette shook her head as she assured Billy. “No, we’re not aliens. We come from the future.”
Billy stopped bouncing around and stared at Paulette like she had two heads. “The future?”
“Yes, and we came here to do something very important.”
“W’at did y’all come here for?”
“Shhh, it’s a secret. I can’t tell you what we’re here for. It’s too dangerous for you to know.”
Billy’s eyebrows shot up and he whispered back, “Y’all are secret agents from the future. That’s so cool. Can I go back with y’all?”
“No, Billy, you need to go back to your parents”
“Ah, but I don’t wanna. I wanna go with y’all.”
Just then a shadow fell across Billy and Paulette. Billy looked up and stuttered, “D-d-daddy!”
The gentleman looked at Paulette and Oliver, then down to his son Billy. “Son, w’at ya doin’ over here talkin’ to these strangers?”
“Daddy, they aren’t from around these parts, and I was curious.”
“Ya know w’at we said about talkin’ to strangers.”
“Yes, Daddy, but…”
“No buts, we’re headed back to the plaza. Then we’re goin’ home.”
“But we didn’t eat yet.”
“Too bad. You shouldn’t have run off.”
Billy looked up with pleading eyes. “But, Daddy, these here folks come from the future. They’re on a secret mission.”
“That’s enough, Billy.”
Billy’s bottom lip stuck so far out a bird could have perched on it. He turned and began stomping back toward the plaza.
“I’m sorry my son bothered y’all.”
“No problem, really. He was curious,” Paulette replied.
“Well, curious or not, he shouldn’t have come over. Also, please don’t go fillin’ little kids’ minds with that nonsense ya told my son.”
“Yes, sir, sorry. Just fueling his curiosity.”
“Well, don’t.”
The man turned and marched after his son, leaving Paulette and Oliver standing there.
“Well, that was interesting,” Paulette said as she and Oliver walked up the steps to the front entrance of the building.
“A waste of time, if you ask me.”
“You would say that. You know, you’re such a…” Paulette stopped herself before finishing the sentence, remembering the electrocution she got before leaving Washington, D.C.
“I’m a what?” Oliver asked as he stopped and looked at her, his face redder than it had been when the boy tugged on his jacket.
“Oh, nothing. It’s just that you can be so mean sometimes.” She didn’t want to anger him any more than she already had.
“So what? In my world, you must fend for yourself or you die. If being mean helps me stay alive, so be it.”
“That’s really no way to live. Besides, here in Texas, being mean will get you shot.”
“Whatever. We need to get inside and figure this thing out before the twenty-second.”
They entered the building and walked down a hallway, looking back and forth for any signs of an elevator. Paulette noticed an office to the left and an open space to the right as they walked along the hallway.
“Do we have to walk up all these stairs?” Oliver complained while holding his hand on his lower back. “My back is killing me.”
“I don’t know. Let’s keep walking down this hallway and look around.”
They continued walking down the hallway when Paulette spotted an elevator at the end of the hall. “Bingo.”
“Bingo? What the heck is that?”
“It’s a saying. It means I found the elevator.” She pointed it out to him.
Oliver smiled, and after stretching his back, he moved toward the elevator. Paulette followed. She pushed the up arrow. The door slid back and she stepped in. Oliver stepped in next to her. The door slid shut. Paulette noticed there were only four floors available.
“Looks like we’ll have to climb stairs for the last two floors.”
“I’m not happy, but at least it’s only two floors and not all six.”
Paulette pushed the button, and the elevator lurched upward. The door slid open, revealing the fourth-floor hallway. They stepped out and headed toward the stairwell door. She glanced back and saw Oliver trying to keep up with her long strides.
They entered the stairwell and climbed the last two floors, exiting onto the sixth floor.
Paulette worked her way to the corner room that she assumed was the one Oswald would use in a few days. She tested the door knob and found it to be unlocked. She opened the door and entered a large room.
There were stacks of boxes of books in several rows and a few scattered about the room. Paulette headed to the window where Oswald would position himself the day of the shooting. She scanned the room for a possible hiding spot and noticed Oliver staring at all the boxes and the large room. “Figures. I knew he wouldn’t be much use,” she mumbled. She moved to a row of boxes and inspected them. She didn’t want to disturb things too much. Oswald worked at the Texas School Book Depository Building, and if they moved too many boxes around, he might notice the change. But since they would be making the changes before Oswald came in, maybe, just maybe he would think someone working there had done it during the night. It was worth a try.
“Oliver, can you come over here? I have an idea.”
Oliver looked up from the boxes he was investigating and nodded. He walked to her. “What are you thinking?”
“I was thinking we could rearrange some of these boxes. We can set up one spot for you to hide behind Oswald and a small hideout for me by the far window. I can let you know when the motorcade is at the right spot. When I yell out, it’ll distract Oswald, you come out and overpower him, then fire the rifle twice in the air. After the secret servicemen hear the shots, they’ll immediately begin moving the president out of danger.
“I guess it’s worth a try. You know this era better than I do. Just remember, no funny business.”
“Got it. Let’s get to moving these if you don’t mind.”
Oliver gave her a glare and then began moving boxes and repositioning them so that there was a small, square cubby hole between the rows, allowing him to hide nearby. Then they moved boxes around to obscure his view of where Paulette would be hiding.
Finished with their setup, they left the building and headed back to the hotel.