Chapter Fifteen

An Impossible Choice

Elias had been more than a bit baffled when Tyler showed up, dropped a book in his lap, and requested he read it right away. But then he read the first line of the first chapter:

Elias Caldwell was a seventeen-year-old of aristocratic birth who had just been accepted to the University of Cambridge. When he mysteriously vanished during the summer of 1886, the lives of those closest to him were forever shattered.

Shattered? He thought they would be relieved, overjoyed, even.

Somehow, this book contained all the answers to the happenings after his disappearance from London. His mother and father were apparently sick with worry and had spent almost every dollar they had in order to try to locate him. His father stopped working entirely, and they lost the estate and almost every piece of property they owned. It did not make any sense—he could never see his parents making such a sacrifice and halting their lives because his whereabouts were unknown. But then he thought of the inscription in the museum detailing Peter’s painting. It now made sense why Peter would be raising and donating money to help his family.

But what of his grandfather? If things had really become so dire, wouldn’t his grandfather have told the others the truth of what had happened to him? Then again, if he had tried, it was all too likely that no one had believed him. Hot tears stung Elias’s eyes as he read further and discovered that Walter Caldwell had passed not long after Elias had left.

The tears were loosed down his cheeks as he continued and learned what fate had befallen his dear sister. Because the family was all but penniless, Samantha was left without any suitors. She died alone, at age forty-one, from typhoid fever. Poor, sweet Samantha. She was not supposed to be alone. She was supposed to have someone, someone who would love her and take care of her. She was supposed to have moved on after he left.

They all were supposed to.

Instead their hearts were broken and their worlds collapsed.

None of it made any sense. All he had wanted was to find a place for himself, a home. He had never intended to destroy theirs. He was so desperate to find his own happiness, he had not considered what impact it would have on the rest of his family. A family he had been so sure loathed him—his parents, at least.

But the words on this page were proof that it wasn’t true. They did care about him; they loved him more than he could have guessed.

Selfish bastard, Elias thought, wiping the tears from his cheeks.

He looked pitifully around the four walls of the dorm room. When he had first laid eyes on it he thought it was the measliest excuse for living quarters he had ever seen. But now it really was starting to feel like a home, his home.

Elias exhaled a heavy breath. He had no idea what he was going to do—what he was supposed to do. He had simply gone on to find a better, happier life for himself. Was that so wrong? He had never intended to harm anyone.

The only thing he was certain of was that, no matter what he ended up doing, he was not ready to go home…not yet. He also wasn’t ready to speak with Tyler about his plans, or rather, his lack of them. He expected Tyler to press him for answers or ask him a million questions, but he didn’t. Elias was grateful for this, but it also caused a great many awkward silences while they were in the dormitory together. Usually, they just ended up huddled over Tyler’s laptop watching something on Netflix. Every now and again, Tyler would eye the book on his desk then look to Elias. No doubt he was wordlessly trying to suggest that they should talk about it, but Elias simply pretended like he didn’t notice.

If he didn’t talk about it, then he could cling to this life for just a little while longer. Each new morning he told himself just one more day.

One day, while Tyler was off at Algebra, there was a knock at the dormitory door. It was odd; he never received visitors when Tyler wasn’t there. His assumption was that it was either Zoe or Oscar.

“Hello?” Elias asked, hesitantly.

“It’s just me,” Oscar said from the other side.

“Oh good, come on in.”

Oscar stepped into the room, looking around like he was inspecting the place for something. He then flashed a smile at Elias. “How’s it going, man?”

Horrible. But Oscar didn’t really need to hear the sordid details, so Elias just shrugged.

“Cool…cool. Tyler around?”

The question almost caused Elias to snort with laughter. The tiny dormitory room had few places where Tyler could have been hiding at that moment. “No, he’s in class right now.” As soon as he replied he also found Oscar’s inquiry rather odd for a different reason. Being one of Tyler’s best friends, wouldn’t he already be familiar with Tyler’s class schedule by now?

“Ahh, I figured.” Oscar seemed…fidgety. Rocking back and forth on his heels as he looked about the room. The only way he would be less inconspicuous was if he had started to whistle. Finally, his eyes landed on the laptop on Tyler’s desk.

“That’s Tyler’s, right?”

Another odd question. Elias nodded. “He leaves it here for me while he’s in class so I don’t get bored to tears.”

Oscar laughed in response, but it sounded a sliver forced and a sliver nervous. He then said, “I’m actually working on something for Tyler’s birthday next month and would love to get some footage off his hard drive to use. But it’s supposed to be a surprise for him. If I bring this with me to the computer lab for just a couple hours to get some files, do you think you could stall him for me?”

The proposition, though a seemingly reasonable one, also managed to give Elias an inexplicably uneasy feeling that tied his stomach into knots. It’s not like he couldn’t keep a secret—his entry into the future and into the school was a big secret, after all—and besides, Oscar was one of Tyler’s closest friends. Whatever he was working on, it was to make Tyler happy, so it stood to reason that he couldn’t get that angry if he were to find out about Oscar borrowing the laptop for a bit.

“I suppose I could stall for a little while, but promise you’ll have it back as soon as you can.”

“Scout’s honor!” Oscar replied.

Elias wasn’t sure what that meant and he also wasn’t sure why Oscar was holding up three fingers, but it didn’t really matter. Oscar grabbed the laptop and made his exit. This left Elias alone in the room with no Netflix to amuse him.

As soon as Tyler got back, Elias knew he had to think quickly to ensure that Tyler would not notice the empty space on his desk. He didn’t want to be that person who ruined a birthday surprise. As soon as he was opening the door to walk in, Elias looped his arm through Tyler’s, guiding him right back out into the hallway.

“Whoa, what…”

“I’ve been thinking and I really want to try that treat you keep talking about. What was it again? Frozen yogurt. That’s it. Let’s go get some frozen yogurt.”

“Umm…okay.”

During the car ride, Elias had the volume turned up as far as he could manage without it hurting their ears. He quickly realized his error in that by picking an activity where they would sit down to eat, they would eventually have to talk about something or other. Elias truly was fascinated by how many different flavors there were: pistachio, raspberry, almond hazelnut, salted caramel, even chocolate-covered pretzel. But he stalled even further by playing up that fascination and sampling each and every flavor, earning him more than a few glares from the employee in the paper hat.

Elias made sure that he was the one guiding the conversation, whether it was giving Tyler a detailed review of each flavor he had tried, asking him about a sitcom or a horror film he had watched on Netflix, or pestering him about why he had not mentioned that his birthday was coming up.

“Wait, how do you know when my birthday is?” Tyler asked.

Whoops.

“I’m pretty sure Zoe mentioned it in passing recently.”

The answer seemed to satisfy him, for he gave a shrug and said, “I dunno, I’ve just never been a big birthday guy. If you couldn’t tell when we went to the Gathering, parties aren’t exactly my thing.”

“Fair enough,” Elias responded, going back to his yogurt that had been covered with almost every variety of topping the place had to offer. He hoped he was eating slowly enough to give Oscar enough time to finish doing whatever he was doing but fast enough that it wasn’t noticeable.

By the time they got back to the dormitory, Elias’s heart was rattling around in his chest and his fingers were shaking. He followed Tyler into the room and almost squealed with delight when he saw the thin silver laptop lying on Tyler’s desk, positioned almost exactly as it had been before Oscar had taken it. He bit his lip to mask his relief.

Tyler wouldn’t know a thing. At least, not until Oscar revealed whatever surprise he had planned for his friend.

…

The following night, they were sitting in the room, Tyler working on an essay for one of his classes and Elias was reading a book while trying to wipe his memory of another book he had read not long before.

“Are we ever going to talk about it?” Tyler asked.

Apparently, Tyler was not about to let him forget.

Elias did not respond, pretending to be engrossed in the particular chapter he was reading.

Tyler continued, “You can’t just avoid it forever. Only so much time can pass before you have to actually address what happened back then and how it affects you now.”

“Or do I?”

“Huh?”

Elias reached into his pocket and pulled out his grandfather’s pocket watch. “Timelines don’t mean anything to a time traveler like myself.”

He had meant it in jest, but the frown on Tyler’s face let Elias know that he was not amused.

Elias leaned forward, this time speaking earnestly. “Think about it. I could spend as much time as I want—a whole lifetime even—in the future, living out the life I want, the life that makes me happy. And then, once I am good and ready, I will go back to around the time when I first left to make things right and let them know that I am okay. It’s genius!”

Tyler raised an eyebrow. “Mmhm, foolproof. Just one question, though: how exactly are your parents going to react to a withered old man coming up to them saying ‘It’s me, your son…Elias’.”

He hadn’t thought through that part of the plan. Mainly due to the fact that he hadn’t thought any part of it through, because it had just come to him.

“Look, I’m not necessarily saying that you should go back,” Tyler said. “I want you to stay. But that doesn’t mean that you should pretend like we don’t know what we know. If you do stay, then it’ll always be in the back of your mind. You’ll always be thinking of what happened to them. We should really talk about it.”

He was right. Elias knew he was right. He looked about the room, suddenly feeling constrained by the four walls and like he was not getting enough air. Finally Elias said, “You’re right, but can we do it somewhere else?”

Tyler nodded. “Let’s take a walk.”

Tyler pulled on a sweater and handed one to Elias before leading him outside. They didn’t get very far, though. Once they were outside and on the main stone path that connected each of the school’s major buildings, a large group of people swarmed them.

People who were not in BGA uniforms and who were clearly too old to be students. People Elias did not recognize.

The first thing Elias heard was someone shouting, “That’s him! That’s the boy from the video!”

Instantly the small crowd erupted in equal parts action and noise. Some were taking photographs, others quickly jotting notes, and a few were holding out phones like Tyler’s, as well as devices that looked similar in size and shape but with no screen. They were all speaking over one another in an attempt to be heard. The effect caused all the voices to blend together in a frenzied din. However, every once and again a single question could be heard above the cacophony:

“Are you Tyler Forrester?”

“Was it staged?”

“How did you do it?

“Is that boy really from the 1800s?”

Elias’s eyes grew wide and his heart was vibrating so rapidly that it nearly felt motionless. The sounds of the strangers speaking started to blur together, and the individual questions were no longer discernible. Elias couldn’t process anything in that moment he heard someone asking about the 1800s.

They knew.

They were all here because they knew about Elias and his secret. He was “that boy” they were asking about. But who were they? And how? How could anyone possibly know or even believe the truth?

Elias looked to Tyler and attempted to swallow the lump that had formed in his throat. The video that Tyler had was the only proof of how Elias had arrived here. Logically, the only way that others would know about Elias’s secret was if Tyler had shown someone else the video. He promised he wouldn’t. He had promised Elias that his secret was safe. But he had also confided in Elias about his dreams of becoming a filmmaker—of attending an esteemed university and making a name for himself creating films and telling stories that would have the world talking. It appeared that Elias’s story already had people talking.

Were his promises of secrecy all a lie? Was getting close to the time traveler part of some grand plan to win fame and get a head start into the life he so desperately wanted before Elias had ever shown up?

Tyler’s eyes were wide, and he looked just as stunned as Elias. But Elias had believed him up until this moment. If this was simply another act… Elias brought his hands up to his temples and began to rub at his throbbing head. He no longer knew what to believe or whom to trust.