A few years ago, I made up a game to play with the packing boxes. It was called Find the Treasure. The twins and I would pick something familiar—like the eggbeater, say, or the candlesticks—and that would be the treasure. Then while Mom and Dad were unpacking things and putting them away, we would start madly opening boxes, trying to find it. Whoever found the treasure first got to pick the coolest bedroom in the new house. Of course, since Mom and Dad were under the impression that we were actually helping them unpack, they expected us to do things like take the dishes into the kitchen—not just pile them on the floor and move on to the next box. This provided an added challenge.
The last time we moved, the idea just popped into my head that it would be a lot more exciting if, instead of a treasure, it was a bomb—and if we didn’t find it in time, the whole house would blow up! We got so frenzied trying to save the family from annihilation that we broke a couple of things and our parents got really annoyed.
After that, we quit playing the game and just helped unpack like normal kids (normal kids, that is, who move a lot).
Still, the idea of a time bomb hidden among the packing boxes, with their innocent labels (KITCHEN, BED LINENS, TOYS), haunted me.
Later, after everything that happened, I remembered the game and wondered what had put the idea into my head, and why it had stayed with me so stubbornly. It was almost as if I somehow knew, way back then, what was going to happen.
Now, I know this sounds really mystical and off-the-wall, and I apologize about that. And, of course, if you want to be absolutely literal about it, the whole I. M. Fine thing wasn’t about bombs at all. But once you’ve read this story, I think you’ll understand. It was just a different kind of time bomb in a different kind of package. But it was every bit as dangerous as the real thing. And just like in the game, time was running out.
Well, you’ll see.