The Time Machine

Okay, so this is lgbtq+, but like, that’s just the world. I am not putting it under the category though, because that is not the main focus.

It is finally finished. I look at my masterpiece. Taking up the whole room, my invention hovers about a foot off the ground, hung up from the ceiling by five small ropes. The machine looks like a big square box with multiple wires and circuitboards running through it; this tangle of complicated math and science that makes sense to me only. The only simple thing was a small number pad attached to the front side of it. Many people helped me come this far: teachers in college, friends caring for me, and all of the people who believed in what I was doing. There was one person that helped me the most. My dear friend Louis. He had always been there for me, no matter what. He never got to see what I have now created. I know that he would have been proud of me. I wipe a tear from my and and smile. I had done it. I had created time travel.

Now, it was not true time travel. It was more moving sideways through time. There are infinite universes apart from our own. It would be prideful and simplistic for me to think otherwise. In these realities, every choice that can be made is. For example, if it was in my power to decide whether a man will die or not, there are two different universes. I follow one, but in the other I follow the other. One is not more true than the other. If this theory is true, then that means there are multiple different universes that time moves differently in. This means that time travel is not moving backwards through our universe, but sideways, to another. This kind of thinking earned me a lot of skeptics, but I have proved them all wrong. I have found a way to change what universe I am in. There is a lot of science behind it, that I can not simply write down. It is too difficult to visualize it, but in my mind, it all makes sense. The process of running it is fairly simple. I punch in a number for the time and place into the number pad and then wait ten seconds before pressing 1 or 2. 1 meant that I would be visible to all; 2 meant that you would be a viewer of history. I have a large book that took me the good part of a year to write every significant place in history numbered from 0000001 to 9999999. The future was hard to nail down, so I went up by a hundred years for each number. I stand proudly looking at my creation. I punch in the number 0186352, the day that Julius Caesar was assassinated. I then pressed 2 and waited. And waited. And waited.

Nothing.

I had failed. Everything that I had worked for for the past thirty years has been futile. I had had many different prototypes before this, but this was what I had been working on. All of my math was perfect. All of my work had been checked, rechecked, and re-rechecked. Time travel was impossible. Everything my friends worked on and died for is all for nothing. Blood rushes to my face. In my tears eyes the machine sits defiant to me. I run at it and begin to destroy the machine. I grabbed outer wires and cracked circuitboards until the ropes that had supported it snapped, and it crashed to the floor. My life is over. I am a failure. I sit down next to my broken creation and cry. I lay there for about three hours. I think of all my effort I out into it. The nights that Louis would come over and we would stay up all night and dream about time travel. I knew it was not his passion, but he did it for me. I miss him so much. I think of the life I never got to live. Louis and I were too focused on the machine to get anywhere in our relationship. Whenever he talked about being more than what we were. I wish I had not have been so work-driven. I could have had a family and went out the movies and gone out to eat and led a normal life. I could be a teacher and get to use my knowledge to inspire others, but I was so caught up in my machine. This machine had ruined my life. It overcame me until I became a lifeless zombie focused on nothing but my beautiful creation.

I hear a noise.

There is a small beeping coming from outside my room. I slowly turn around and open the door. The beeping grows. I walk towards the sound, and find myself in my bedroom. There is a phone sitting on the bed. I do not recognize it. The number calling me feels familiar, but I can not remember it specifically. I pick it up.

“Hey Henry, look, I was wondering if you wanted to go to the movies tonight. I know you have been working on your machine for a while now, but I think you deserve a break.”

“Who is this?”

“Who do you think it is? It’s Louis! Duh! Henry, you confuse me sometimes. I just want you to take some time apart from that machine.”

I hang up. I check the date in my phone. It hasn’t changed. Time travel had not worked. The call must have been a prank or some delusion made up by me insane mind. I have no fear left to cry, so I am left with nothing. There is a know on the door. I exit my room and walk to the front of my house, and open the door. There is a face that I have not seen in ages. Henry stands there in all of his glory. His pale face, long curly hair, and pale blue eyes are before me.

“I gave you a chance with the call. I knew you would say no, so I had already come over here to convince you. Before we go, let’s look at the machine.

“Woah. What happened? This is a wreck! Henry, what did you do? Did the machine fail? Are you okay, Henry? Do you feel alright? Wait, no talking hold on.

“There we go. Nice and warm under that blanket. You look as if you have seen a ghost. Looks like no movies, eh? No need to respond, stay quiet. You need to rest. You have obviously been through a lot already. So let’s just rest here.

“Henry, we are going to play a little game here. I will ask you a series of questions, and you will blink once for yes and twice for no. Okay? Good, very good. You always are a quick learner. First question: did you try to power the machine? Henry. You should have waited for me. We could have done it together. Second question: did you destroy it? Yes? Henry, you shouldn’t have done that. We will have to start over now. No? You do not want to start over? Next question, which might seem pretty obvious: did It work? Henry, three blinks is not an answer. Is it a yes? Henry, how could it work and not work at the same time? You need rest. Close your eyes and go to sleep.”

I smile at Louis. His face looks so caring. I have not seen it in a while. The machine worked, but not in the way I expected. It took me into a different universe, and even though it was not the one I chose, it was the one I needed. Time was merciful it gave me a second chance. A chance to move on with my life with the person that loves me, and I will not squander this chance I have been given. Most people do not get this chance. They are stuck in their reality that they trap themselves in and destroy the means of getting back on track. They are left helpless. But not me. I was given a blessing. I look into my beautiful Louis’s eyes and fall asleep.