6. (skins) i am living underwater - 3/3.
i am living underwater | part three
the end
In the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years.
- Abraham Lincoln
*
(2013) chris is 25, jal is 23
He ends up at the park. There are clothes hidden behind a bush, just where she said she had left them. He remembers Jal talking about this meeting two years ago. He had no clue what she was on about at the time.
“Hi,” she says. She sits next to him on the park bench. She looks younger, more vibrant. “You look sad, Mopey-Boots.”
Chris shrugs, “Seems to be the habit these days.”
“What’s going on?”
Chris waves his hand. “Nothin’.”
“C’mon, Chris. You can’t just toss in the bait and not reel the fish in.”
Chris grins. “So, you’re a fish, ‘ey?”
Jal rolls her eyes. “You know what I mean.”
Chris hums. “We’re fighting,” he says. “Sort of. It’s silent ragey ... stuff.”
“What about?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he says, too quickly. “The matter is is that we’re not talking,” he says. He looks down. “It’s bugging the fuck out of me.”
Jal smiles. “Well,” she says, slapping his leg. “Do somethin’ about it.”
“It’s not that easy, Jal,” he says, looking at her. “It’s not like I can write ‘Yes’ on a post-it note and stick it to your fivehead.”
“Hey!”
“Sorry,” he says. “It’s rather beautiful, your fivehead, that is. I can see my rather handsome reflection in it.” He flicks her forehead.
She rolls her eyes. “I’m not a fucking child, Chris.”
“Yes, I know.” He wiggles his eyebrows.
“Sometimes I wonder why I like you.”
“I am rather good-looking.”
“Completely subjective.”
“You’re not very nice.”
-
(2015) jal is 25, maxxie is 25
Jal counts the silence between the strikes of thunder. She gets to six before it hits the earth again. Chris disappeared four hours ago, for the seventh time that month. The clothes he involuntarily left strewn on the floor are now folded, sitting on the edge of their bed. Jal sits on the lounge, the television flickering soft light around the room, with the thunder drowning out the volume and her thoughts.
She hears, between the thunder’s breaths, a knock at the door.
“Max?” she frowns, her mouth tilting into a questioning smile. Maxxie is soaked to the bone, with a big bag sitting by his feet. “What are you doing here?”
“Was jus’ in the neighbourhood,” he says, distracted with wringing out the water from his jacket. He creates a small pond on the welcome mat Ace and Lynton bought for her leaving-home party.
“Max,” Jal says, eyes narrowing as he squirms. Instantly, she thinks he must feel uncomfortable. The air is crisp and the nights have become cooler as the seasons shift. “You were nowhere near the neighbourhood,” she says, reaching for his bag and placing it off to the side of the entrance. Maxxie stays where he is, wringing out his clothes.
He shakes his head, little bits of water splattering everywhere. She feels some tickle her cheeks. “Nah. But I thought you may like some company.”
Immediately, she frowns. “Did Chris ask -”
“No. Sometimes i want to spend some time with my friend Jal.” He leans in, wriggling his nose as a drop of water slides along his skin, escaping from his hairline. “Don’t tell anyone,” he says, whispering, “but she’s pretty rad.”
“I don’t think people say that anymore,” she says, smiling. The thunder hits the earth once again.
Maxxie shrugs, taking a few steps forward. He tries to wring out more water from his jacket sleeves. “Well,” he runs his hand through his hair. “You gonna invite me in?”
Jal moves to the side, punching him in the shoulder when he passes.
“I’m wet and now I’m hurt,” Maxxie smiles, leaning down for his bag and picking it up.
Jal walks to the kitchen. She calls out, “Don’t drip on my carpet!”
Maxxie’s laugh follows her.
After warming up, and having a few rounds of hot chocolates and cups of tea, Maxxie breaks in the guest bedroom.
“No one’s ever slept in here before,” Jal says from the doorway. She leans against it with her arms crossed over her chest.
“Well,” Maxxie fluffs a pillow. “I promise to be gentle.”
She smiles. Looking at the bed spread, she sees Maxxie’s things laid out neatly before him. A few shirts, some shorts, and some pants. She sees a book or two sitting near the head of the bed, almost tucked away under the bedspread. “How much shit did you bring?”
Maxxie counts in his head. He hums as he makes a show of calculating. “Just a bag,” he grins, kicking his bag back behind him. It doesn’t move a significant amount, but seems to keel on its side. “I didn’t want to impose.”
“You’re never imposing,” Jal says, immediately.
Maxxie cocks his eyebrow. “That’s what you’re supposed to say.”
“Thank god I got that right,” she says, smiling. “If you need anything -”
“I know where everything is,” he says, picking up a shirt and throwing it to the other side of the bed. He looks down at his shorts, searching through the four pairs. “I helped you move in, remember?”
“I still cannot find my lucky watch,” she says, smiling.
“Finders keepers,” he sings. Maxxie sits down on the bed. “Do you know where he is?”
Jal turns slightly against the door. She looks at the pillows sitting nice and straight against the headboard. “Faintly. I think he’s with me when I was 23.”
“Do you get ... feelings?”
She shakes her head. “No. I just ... suddenly remember something. It might be a word or a smell or something I saw. I just know he’s with me.” What lingers in the air is what she doesn’t say. ‘He’s with me, but he’s not here with me.’
*
chris is 25, jal is 25
Chris falls down onto the bed, pushing himself up on his stomach until his lower legs are hanging off of the bed. “Jal,” he says, playing with her toes.
“Chris,” she laughs when he finds a spot she’s ticklish. She puts her book down on her lap. “What is it?”
“Can Jal come out and play?”
She shakes her head. “I’m busy.”
“Reading isn’t as fun as what I have planned,” he says, brushing his fingers along the arch of her foot. She pulls it away, laughing.
“Tickling me isn’t fun.”
“That wasn’t what I had in mind,” he grins.
Jal’s face stiffens. “Chris,” she says, finality in her tone. It makes him look up, the smile falling off his face and his hands stilling on her foot.
He looks down onto the bedspread. He picks at it. “I think we should talk about it.”
“There’s nothing to talk about.”
“Jal,” he says, looking up at her. “When I went to the future, I saw us with a kid.”
Her jaw tightens. “When I think about our future, I see you in it. With me.”
“That’s not fair.”
“I’m sorry,” she says, shuffling on the bed until she’s kneeling in front of him. “But I don’t want kids, Chris.”
“Why not?” He places his hand on her knee. “You’d be a great mother.”
She scoffs. “I don’t ... want kids.”
“Does this have something to do with your mother?” he says. She cocks her eyebrow. “‘Chelle was tellin’ me -”
Jal pulls away. “Jesus Christ -”
Chris sits up. “Why don’t you talk to me?”
“Because you are never here!”
“I’m here now,” he says, trying to straighten himself on his knees. “So, talk to me.”
Jal’s body seems to sag. Her straight posture disappears. She picks at the duvet. With her eyes downcast, she murmurs slowly, “I do not want to be my mother.”
Chris tilts his head so he’s looking up at her. He tries to catch her eyes. “You’re not your mother.”
She looks at him. Her hands settle on her bent knees. “How do you know? How do we know this kid won’t travel? How do we know we can rewrite this kid’s genes, Chris?”
Chris bites the inside of his mouth. “We don’t,” he says. He places his hands over hers. “But I may know someone who might.”
-
Chris finds the card on the fridge. It’s hidden behind a piece of paper he wrote on, something about tin cans and string. He’s not sure what he was thinking when he wrote that.
He finds the phone in its cradle by the sink. Moving to the kitchen table, he sits on a chair and presses his fingers against the buttons. “Hello? Is this Dr SomethingWhat’s office?”
-
He waits until the dust has settled before he corners her in the kitchen. He makes her sit at the kitchen table. She crosses and uncrosses her legs as he tries to explain what he’s done.
“Chris, I’m not getting my hopes up -”
“I don’t want you to,” he says, standing. He paces, trying to gather his words. She watches him move back and forth, wearing out the wooden floorboards. “I just want us to give it a chance. You should have met her.”
“I don’t understand -”
“When I travelled to the future, I met our kid.”
“I know this -”
“If you let me finish,” he says, smiling. Jal bites her bottom lip to keep herself from interrupting. “When I travel, I’m quite fond of reading newspapers. I found this article on this doctor I remember hearing about when I was younger and travelled.”
Her brows crinkle. “You travelled to the future before?” When they were younger, he used to tell her about all the things he’d seen. About all the people he’d met. About all the feelings he’d felt. He’d opened up about Peter, albeit reluctantly, and she only got a few details from those trips, but he still spoke about them. She doesn’t remember any stories about him going to the future. Their future.
He shrugs. “I don’t remember it. But the name gave me funny ... feelings.” His brows furrow.
“Deja vu.”
He nods. “So when I travelled to the past, I found him. I pleaded my case and he thought I was crazy.”
She grins, surmising, “Too soon.”
Chris nods. “Yep. So I called his future office, which is his present office, and I hit the jackpot.”
“Again,” she says, grinning.
“Yes, m’dear,” Chris says, grabbing her hand. His grip is so tight and warm. “It does appear that lightning can, indeed, strike the same spot twice.”
*
eleven: 2014
jal is 26
Jal thinks it’s stupid to be jealous of herself.
She remembers being twenty-two when Chris visited her. She was upset about her clarinet. Sitting at their usual bus stop, she hadn’t expected him to walk up in odd clothes and sit down next to her. He had pushed the side of his body up against hers; giving her none of the breathing space she wanted. She remembers him telling her to stop being such a ‘Mopey-Boots’ and that in the future, she’s something great. He guarantees it.
She remembers the hope he elicited after that visit. She also remembers him running off to hide behind a thick tree to disappear.
Later, she remembers being twenty-five. Chris, a younger one, had visited her. It was a short visit. She doesn’t think he saw her. It had only lasted two minutes. She’d spotted him hanging around the backyard of their house. He was disoriented, butt-naked, and picking at her dead flowers.
She remembers being twenty-one, twenty-two and twenty-three, having him return after six hours of being gone.
At twenty-six, he’s been gone for fourteen days, six hours, thirty-six minutes and twenty-seven seconds.
*
chris is 26, jal is 26, michelle is 26, tony is 26
“Just because I cannot cook to save my life doesn’t mean I cannot host a good lunch!” Michelle laughs, moving from the island in the kitchen to the sink. Jal stays at the stove, mixing the spaghetti sauce around. “C’mon, Jal,” Michelle laughs, turning to her, “back a sister up!”
Jal looks over her shoulder, smiling, “I won’t deny it.”
“Thank you!” Michelle exclaims loudly, laughing. She holds her hands out in a wild gesture, as if asking for a hug. “Even while I’m heavily pregnant,” she looks pointedly at Tony, “I still make the greatest hostess.”
“Still,” says Chris, grabbing knives and forks from the drawers. “A good hostess does not a lunch make.”
Jal frowns. “What the fuck, Chris? You hold dinner parties and let me tell you, babe, it’s not you standing in the kitchen!”
He shrugs, holding his arms up in a wild gesture. The knives and forks look like finger extensions. “Fuck it. I’m inadequate. What are you gonna do?” He goes to the kitchen and sets the table for four. He returns with the extra two forks and one knife he had accidentally picked up. Chris moves to Jal, wrapping his arms around her waist. “That smells good.”
Jal rolls her eyes. She grits out, “Thanks.” She places the spoon on a plate sitting by the stove and covers the pan with its lid. She turns, manoeuvring herself out of Chris’ arms. She grabs the bread from the island and starts cutting into it.
Michelle stops washing up, leaving the tap running hard. “Oh!” She leaves her arms floating on either side of her, waiting for something. Jal watches her from the corner of her eye. “Oh! Jal, c’mere,” she mutters, her hands pressing to her abdomen.
Jal moves over to Michelle, who takes her hands and places it underneath her hands. Jal feels the warmth of her body heat through her maternity top. She waits. Michelle looks at her expectantly as they stand in the kitchen, silent. Then she feels a little bump against her hand. “Oh my,” she mumbles.
“It’s amazing, isn’t it?” Michelle grins.
Jal bites her bottom lip, nodding.
*
(2016) chris is 26, jal is 26
It happens in threes:
-
one late March - late April
Jal sits by him on the steps outside the house. “Baking?” she laughs.
Chris nods, watching what he can see of the empty street. “Always, babe.” He looks at her from the corner of his eye. “What’s wrong?”
Jal bites the bottom of her lip. “Nothing has to be wrong if I want to sit here with you.”
“But your show is on. Y’know, the one with all the sex.”
She rolls her eyes. “I’m pregnant,” she says to the yard and street before them. She turns to look at Chris.
His face doesn’t move for what she counts as five Mississippi’s. Then, she heats up, he smiles. “Really?” he whispers. He doesn’t wait for her response when he envelopes her in a hug.
-
Chris buys a calendar. At the end of each day, he writes one word. Three Wednesdays ago it was ‘Orange juice’. Last Thursday, it was ‘Sick’. Yesterday it was ‘Girl’. (She doesn’t really understand how Chris came to the conclusion that they were having a girl, but she doesn’t dare ask. Sometimes it is better to not understand Chris’ logic.)
When they lose it , it takes Jal three days to notice the calendar has disappeared. The pages he wrote on are scrunched up in the bin.
-
two: early July - early September
Tonight is Italian night mixed with a Bruce Willis movie. Chris bans her from cooking in the kitchen. She can smell the spaghetti sauce from in the lounge room.
When he hears her footsteps, he angles his body so he can point at her. “No,” he says, tasting his sauce. “No Jalander’s allowed.”
She rolls her eyes. She holds her hands up in mock surrender. “I promise to not cook.” Chris cocks his eyebrow. “Promise,” she says, sidling up to him. “That smells good.”
He continues to stir. “Thank you,” he says quietly, a little embarrassed.
Jal stares at the side of his face. He continues to stir his sauce, putting in more herbs from the little bottles she bought at the store a week ago. “Chris,” she says, and he hums. “I’m pregnant.”
He turns to look at her, a small smile on his face. “Really?”
She nods.
“Well,” he says, placing the spoon on the side. The sauce drips onto the counter. He envelopes her in a hug, though he doesn’t wrap his arms around her as tightly as before. “This calls for a celebration.”
He lets her choose the movie for the night.
-
The calendar reappears on the kitchen counter by the sink, missing two months. Chris makes sure not to wet it when he washes up dishes. He continues to write words on it, such as ‘Autumn’, ‘Winter’, ‘Pickles’ and ‘No gender - alien :)’.
When they lose it , Jal finds the calendar in the bin. Chris had tipped leftover sauce on top of it.
-
three: late October - mid December
Chris is in the shower. Jal sits on the lid of the toilet as she listens to him sing a Britney Spears song. She is going to make Anwar regret ever purchasing her finest collections CD.
“Hey, babe,” Chris says when he sees her. He’s soaping under his arms. She hopes he’s not using her loofah and body wash. He opens the sliding door, peeking his head out. There is soap all over him. He grins, “Wanna join me?”
She rolls her eyes. “I’d never make it out alive,” she says. Chris disappears to wash the soap off of him, leaving the door ajar. “Your singing is horrific.”
“Oi!” he calls from under the spray. When he appears again, there is less soap clinging to his skin. “That was hurtful.”
“I’m sorry,” she smiles. Chris ducks back in to wash the remnants of soap off. Jal taps her feet against the tiles. “I’m pregnant,” she says, quickly.
Chris peeks his head out. “Come again?”
“I’m pregnant,” she says a little softer.
Chris grins, “Sorry, didn’t hear you. I think you need to come a lil’ closer.”
Jal rolls her eyes. She gets up from the toilet lid and walks over to him. “I’m pregnant,” she says slower.
Chris rolls his eyes. “I know, I heard you. Just ‘cause I’m old - and fantastically good-looking - doesn’t mean I’m deaf,” he says, grinning. She narrows her eyes. Before she can say anything, he pulls her into the shower.
-
Chris doesn’t buy a calendar. He finds post-it notes and sticks them all around the bedroom. Jal reads them when she brushes her teeth. They range from ‘Hi Jal’ to ‘Puppy’ to ‘Exclamation Point’ to ‘Buy more shorts’. Even when she looks, she can never find the post-it notes relating specifically to the baby.
When they lose it , the post-its remain around the bedroom. The ones with reminders, such as ‘Pasta’ and ‘Tomato sauce’, disappear eventually. They don’t make a big deal about Christmas.
-
chris is 26, jal is 26, michelle is 26
Michelle has her baby mid September, early in the morning when the sky is a nice, lovely pink. She has tiny curls sprinkled atop her head and her mother’s oddly pointed nose.
Jal finds Chris outside the hospital, leaning against a wall and smoking a spliff. She feels the wind wrap its arms around her, tugging at the stray strands of her hair. “I thought you quit,” she says, stuffing her hands into her cardigan pockets.
Chris shrugs, exhaling. “Pills,” he says, taking another puff. “I quit pills.”
Jal nods, coming to stand next to him. She leans against the wall, mimicking his stance. “You should quit,” she says.
“I know,” he finishes it, dropping it onto the pavement and stamping his foot on it. “You keep telling me that.”
“Then why don’t you?”
“Quit?” Chris looks at her, his eyes a bit droopy. His hair is a mess. The silence stretches upon them. Eventually, he says, “I have nerves Jal. It’s the only way to calm them.”
Jal narrows her eyes, shaking her head. “Yeah, nerves,” she says, spitting the words at him. “I’m going back inside. It’s cold out here.”
-
Chris lies to her. “Let’s go book shopping,” he had said. He pulled her out of the bed and promised her a list of books she had been writing down on a couple of post-it notes. Out by the car, he had said, “I’ll even pay,” and he opened the passenger side door for her.
Where they went first wasn’t the bookshop or even on the itinerary. Outside a long rectangular building, made mostly of glass windows, Chris drags Jal across the street and inside.
“I am tired, Chris,” Jal says, dragging her feet a little as he pulls her along. Her small heels tap against the tiled floor. Her voice echoes. For a minute, she feels Chris’ hand tighten around hers.
They approach the elevator. He presses the up arrow and takes a few steps back, watching the little box above the doors. He waits outside the left elevator. “C’mon, Jal,” he pulls her into it and presses a button hard. “We owe it to that little girl.”
Jal narrows her eyes. She pulls her hand out from his and crosses her arms tightly over her chest. “Don’t you dare -”
He holds his hands up in surrender. “Please,” he says quietly. Jal inhales through her nose.
She watches the floor numbers appear. “This is the last time,” she says through clenched teeth. “I’ve had enough.”
*
twelve: 2017
(2017) chris is 27, jal is 27
-
Jal slides back under the covers.
Chris turns to face her. “You’re up early.”
“It’s only nine, Chris.”
He makes an attempt at a shrug. “Day doesn’t start ‘til eleven.”
She raises her eyebrow. Jal lies down, moving closer to him. “I’m pregnant, Chris.”
Chris gives her a sleepy smile. “More reason to sleep in,” he says, pulling the duvet up around her shoulders.
-
When they make it to four months, Chris litters the house with post-it notes. She finds them on the doorframes of the kitchen, the guest bedroom and her bedroom. She finds them all over the study. They range from ‘diapers’ to ‘crib’ to ‘Hi Jal go sit down’ and, in the study, ‘Jal’s room: where music superstars are born’.
It becomes worse when they hit six.
-
“Chris,” she waddles into the kitchen.
He looks up. When he sees her, he jumps out of his chair at the kitchen table. “Are you crazy?”
“No,” she crosses her arms over her chest. “Not as crazy as you,” she looks at him pointedly. He stops in his tracks. She holds up a post-it note. “Seriously, Chris. I love the post-it notes, but writing dirty lyrics on them -”
He approaches her and takes it off of her. He reads it, “If you seek Amy.” He looks at her. “How is that dirty? It’s just a song I need to download, to add to my collection -”
She narrows her eyes, snatching it off of him. “You are unbelievable,” she says before turning around, walking back into the lounge room.
“What?” he shouts after her. He raises his arms in a shrug. “Seriously. I think you’re readin’ one too many gossip magazines and it’s like sucking away your intelligence.”
“Fuck off!” she yells.
Chris smiles and snaps his fingers. He nods to himself, muttering, “That’s more like it.”
-
Chris disappears less and less during the months. It feels weird to Jal, having someone with her when he does disappear.
-
Chris keeps yelling “It’s time!” into the phone. When he finishes calling everyone, he makes sure she’s safely in the car and drives off at a speed that is reminiscent of all the Bruce Willis movies they have watched over the past months.
When they’re at the hospital, it’s all a blur. Everyone comes in at rapid speed, one after the other. “Where’s Olivia?” Jal looks at Michelle and Tony, minus a person.
Michelle stands by her, taking her hand. “With my mother.”
Tony mumbles, “God have mercy.”
When she’s only “five centimetres”, as the doctor had said, Jal made sure Chris got some air. “You’re looking pale,” she says, running her fingers along his cheek. “Go outside.”
“I’m fine.”
“For me,” she says, holding his hand. “I can’t move, let alone stand up in an elevator. Go outside for me.”
Maxxie goes with Chris outside. They stay out there for twenty minutes.
When “it’s time”, as the doctor had said, Jal makes sure she’s squeezing the life out of Chris’ hand. She ensures Michelle comes. “I don’t want him to faint and leave me all alone,” she says through gritted teeth.
Chris immediately protests. “I have muscles of steel.”
Jal squeezes his hand tighter.
When she comes, the world seems to stop spinning. Jal holds her, feeling the weight settle nicely along her arms.
Chris tentatively touches the little girl’s hand. She wraps her small hand around his finger lightly. Jal smiles, “She’s beautiful.”
“She gets her good looks from her father,” Chris says, laughing softly.
-
(2008) chris is 27, tony is 18
Tony leads them outside the pool area. There are a few tables lined up along the sides. Chris has never seen them before.
When they sit, Tony pulls out two sandwich cases. Both are tuna. “Why do you keep travelling?” Tony asks, for once his sandwich is untouched.
Chris looks down, drawing patterns on the table. “Can’t tell you, mate.”
“Why not? Wouldn’t it help you?”
Chris shakes his head. He looks up at Tony. “Nah, mate. I’ve tried changing the past. It never works. It just happens anyway.” He doesn’t make eye contact with Tony.
“I’m sorry,” Tony says.
“Don’t be,” he mumbles. Chris shrugs, trying to shake off the tension that has settled between them. “I just left the best day of my life,” he smiles. “I’m sort of glad that I travelled to this moment.”
“What happened?”
Chris puts a finger to his lips. “Shh,” he laughs. “If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”
They sit in silence. Chris takes the other sandwich and has a bite.
*
(2017) jal is 27
“I didn’t want to tell you this,” Maxxie says, sitting on the lounge next to her.
Quickly, Jal says, “What is it, Max?” She angles her body to face him.
Maxxie doesn’t make eye contact with her. He looks down at the lounge. “I saw Chris with some spliff, before Anna was born. Outside the hospital.” Then, quickly, he says, “Maybe he was just blowing off some steam?”
Jal nods, “Maybe.”
-
Jal catches Chris with spliff twice. She doesn’t tell him. She figures that, maybe, he needs to blow off some steam. That, maybe, Chris doesn’t find walking around the neighbourhood to be nerve-calming.
She catches him a month after Anna was born. He’s outside, around the back of the garage, smoking it. She doesn’t say anything. She returns back inside and watches Anna sleep in her cot. He disappears later that night.
The second time is five weeks after that disappearance. He’s smoking spliff early in the morning, after picking up the morning paper. He disappears in the late afternoon.
-
Chris is sitting on the lounge, watching a television program with the volume on mute. She stands behind him, leaning against the lounge. She wraps her arms around his neck. “I think you should go see Dr Tatum.”
-
Dr Tatum asks a number of different questions:
1. “How is Anna?”
Chris smiles. “She’s fine. Looks more like her mother every day. Thank god.”
2. “Have you been travelling?”
“On and off,” he says. He fidgets in his chair. “It’s like before Jal’s pregnancy. I just - go. Sometimes.”
Dr Tatum writes something down. “I see.”
3. “Do you do anything to trigger it?”
Chris pauses. “No.”
4. “How do you feel when you travel? Anything ... distinctive?”
Chris shakes his head. “Nothin’. Just feel disoriented when I get there.”
5. “Do you ever try to stop it?”
“All the time.”
“Has it ever worked?”
“No.”
6. “Does she travel?”
Chris blinks. He shakes his head and shrugs his shoulders. His mouth feels dry.
-
After he sees Dr Tatum, Jal has her own questions:
1. “Anything conclusive?”
2. “Have you found a way to stop it?”
3. “Will she have it?”
Chris never gives her any answers.
*
While Jal is busy trying to prevent Michelle from maxing out all of her cards, Chris takes Anna to the cemetery.
He walks with her in his arms, leaving the pram in Tony’s car. When he reaches Peter, he lifts up her small arm and waves to the headstone. “That’s Uncle Peter,” he says to her, bobbing her up and down slightly. “I’ve got many stories to tell you about him.”
And so, he begins with the one where little Chris was being picked on by a taller boy and Peter gave his little brother his clothes.
*
chris is 27, tony is 27
Tony finds him outside.
“You know, mate,” Tony says, snatching Chris’ spliff from his fingers. “You’re a good friend.” He puts the spliff in his back pocket. Chris looks a little lost without it. “You helped me when I was down, y’know? I figure it’s time I do that for you.”
Chris frowns. “What are you on about, Tone?”
Tony looks at him. “The spliff. It’s so 2005.”
Chris slides his hands into his pockets. “Tony -”
“I know,” he says. “It doesn’t take a genius, but I figured it out.”
“What out?”
“The travelling. It is like vertigo. You see spliff, you take spliff, you smoke spliff, you travel because of spliff.”
“I don’t know -”
“Chris,” Tony says, voice lower. “Shut up for a sec, yeah? I’m breakin’ in my doctor shoes.” Chris looks away from Tony, hearing the voices from inside filter out through the open kitchen window. “You smoke spliff, you travel. Pretty damn simple, I think. But why you smoke spliff,” he turns to face Chris, “is what we need to figure out.”
“We?”
Tony nods. He places his hands into his pockets and walks behind Chris. He pats Chris on the back. “Friends don’t let friends drive drunk, y’know.”
-
After some consideration that lasts only five minutes after they get home, Chris finds his spliff stash and puts it in the outside bin. Early, the next morning, he mows the grass and puts the cuttings in the garbage bin, on top of the spliff - just as a safety precaution.
-
He keeps only one spliff. Five days after mowing the grass, he smokes it.
(20..) chris is 27, peter is, chris is
Chris spots Peter and little Chris instantly. They’re walking home along the path from school. Peter’s taller than him, walking by his side. Chris remembers he never felt so safe before that moment.
Little Chris’ bag slides off his shoulders. His shoelace has untied itself over the course of the walk. Peter stops them, kneeling down and tying up Chris’ shoelace. He does it slowly. The memory comes back to Chris in tiny pieces, like a puzzle. He slowly puts the pieces together; he remembers Peter showing him the steps to tying his shoelace, telling him he’ll show him again later and later, until he knows how to do it in his sleep. Peter takes Chris’ bag and swings it over his shoulder.
The two start walking again. Little Chris keeps glancing down at his tied shoe.
When they round the corner, Chris disappears.
*
(2017) chris is 27, jal is 27
It has been four months, two days, five hours, thirty-seven minutes and twenty seconds since Chris broke up with spliff.
He sits on the front steps, watching Jal walk around with Anna in her arms. She’s telling her a story about the flowers, he supposes, as he catches tiny snippets of their one-way conversation. Jal bobs up and down slightly as she walks slowly around the front garden.
He thinks that if he was still with spliff, still in that rather abusive relationship, as he has come to see it, he would miss moments like these.
-
zero:
He does travel one last time.
(2025) chris is 27, jal is 35
He ends up at the graveyard.
Jal is by a headstone. With her is a small girl with thick dark hair. She holds onto Jal’s arm with one hand, in the other she holds onto a small bouquet of flowers. Anna places the flowers down in front of the headstone. She touches it, feeling the roughness of the cement. Jal is talking to her, telling her a story. Anna watches the way Jal’s mouth moves, and looks at the headstone again.
They stay for a few minutes. Chris doesn’t move from his place near a large monument. He can’t hear what Jal’s saying, but he figures he knows.
When they leave, walking at a slow pace, hand-in-hand, Chris approaches the headstone. The freshly picked flowers are from their garden. He planted the seeds just yesterday, listening to Jal’s instructions to water them every day. He bought a torch earlier that day to speed up the photosynthesis process he’s Wikipedia’d due to Anwar’s advice.
He touches Peter’s headstone and says, “You watch out for her, mate.”
When he disappears, the lead that sits in his stomach dissipates.
-
(2017) chris is 27, jal is 27
When he appears in the backyard, he grabs a pair of three-quarter pants from the clothes line. Running inside, he finds Jal lying on the lounge, watching her usual garbage program.
He drops onto the lounge at her feet, crawling up her body. He kisses her neck.
Jal laughs, fidgeting under him. “What are you doing?”
“Kissing you,” he says against her skin. “Isn’t it obvious?”
Jal finds her hands, placing her palms against his warm cheeks. “Chris,” she says, laughing.
He grins, slipping out of her palms and back to her neck. “Let’s make a boy baby,” he murmurs.
She laughs. “As opposed to a normal baby?”
Chris moves from her neck to look at her, frowning. “No,” he says, rolling his eyes. “We need a boy baby. To balance out the ying and the yang.”
Jal only frowns. “Will you be having this baby?”
Chris cocks his eyebrow. “Have I come back to the right century?”
Jal laughs, pulling him into an awkward hug. His face ends up back at her neck.
“We’ll name him Peter,” he says, giving her neck a kiss. “And we’ll get a golden retriever, too.”
“You’re so bossy,” she says. Chris hops up off the lounge. He runs his hands over his pants, trying to flatten them. Jal stares at his askew hair. “Where are you going?”
“We are going to bed,” he says, before bending down and slipping one arm under her knees and one around her back. He lifts her up and kisses the other side of her neck. He carries her off to their room, her laughter echoing throughout the house.
-
It’s dark now and I am very tired. I love you, always. Time is nothing.
- Audrey Niffenegger (The Time Traveler's Wife)
fin.
author's notes:
This fic was hard to write. I had no idea how I wanted to format it. Did I want to copy Niffenegger's The Time Traveller's Wife and have the timeline jump all over the place? How would I not confuse anyone who read this? How would I not confuse myself? The one thing I knew from the beginning is that Chris, if I could help it, would not die.
I wanted to deal with a lot of things. I wanted to deal with the hit and miss nature of the original relationship in the book and movie adaption. I also wanted to deal with Chris and his mother, Chris and Peter, Jal and her mother, and Tony's accident. I didn't get to deal with Chris and his mother, and Jal and hers, as much as I had wanted to. Instead, I think I left Chris and his mother's relationship more up to interpretation. I was going to have her appear in "the end" section, but it didn't fit right. The one thing I didn't want to do, as I was figuring out what I wanted to deal with in "the end", was to tie up all the bows nicely. I wanted to leave some of them untied. I also didn't want to show everything, like Chris meeting Dr Tatum for the first time, or even giving Dr Tatum much ~screentime~. I wanted this fic to be more of a representation of the major points in Chris and Jal's lives, and leave the rest of it to interpretation. I didn't want to show everything. Simply because it was too hard at times for me to develop.
Cassie didn't really play a big part in this. I couldn't really find a place for her in the story, as well as my own personal feelings for her caused me to not find her a role to play in Chris and Jal's story. Although, I caved, and gave Chris that phone call. So I guess you can say that Cassie's storyline in this fic follows that of the season two finale where she flies off to New York on a whim. With that, I really did want to focus on the gang, but I felt that if I did so, it may detract from Chris and Jal's story. And, besides, it was long enough as it is. :p
This was a lot of fun to write, and a really big challenge. And I hope that you enjoyed the story. I wanted to leave some things open-ended for Chris and Jal as I hate it when things are neatly tied up, and I personally felt that their story couldn't be tied up in a neat little bow.
Anyway, thank you so much for reading. :) ♥
Please check out jeauexe's lovely mix.
masterpost | i | ii | iii
the end
In the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years.
- Abraham Lincoln
*
(2013) chris is 25, jal is 23
He ends up at the park. There are clothes hidden behind a bush, just where she said she had left them. He remembers Jal talking about this meeting two years ago. He had no clue what she was on about at the time.
“Hi,” she says. She sits next to him on the park bench. She looks younger, more vibrant. “You look sad, Mopey-Boots.”
Chris shrugs, “Seems to be the habit these days.”
“What’s going on?”
Chris waves his hand. “Nothin’.”
“C’mon, Chris. You can’t just toss in the bait and not reel the fish in.”
Chris grins. “So, you’re a fish, ‘ey?”
Jal rolls her eyes. “You know what I mean.”
Chris hums. “We’re fighting,” he says. “Sort of. It’s silent ragey ... stuff.”
“What about?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he says, too quickly. “The matter is is that we’re not talking,” he says. He looks down. “It’s bugging the fuck out of me.”
Jal smiles. “Well,” she says, slapping his leg. “Do somethin’ about it.”
“It’s not that easy, Jal,” he says, looking at her. “It’s not like I can write ‘Yes’ on a post-it note and stick it to your fivehead.”
“Hey!”
“Sorry,” he says. “It’s rather beautiful, your fivehead, that is. I can see my rather handsome reflection in it.” He flicks her forehead.
She rolls her eyes. “I’m not a fucking child, Chris.”
“Yes, I know.” He wiggles his eyebrows.
“Sometimes I wonder why I like you.”
“I am rather good-looking.”
“Completely subjective.”
“You’re not very nice.”
-
(2015) jal is 25, maxxie is 25
Jal counts the silence between the strikes of thunder. She gets to six before it hits the earth again. Chris disappeared four hours ago, for the seventh time that month. The clothes he involuntarily left strewn on the floor are now folded, sitting on the edge of their bed. Jal sits on the lounge, the television flickering soft light around the room, with the thunder drowning out the volume and her thoughts.
She hears, between the thunder’s breaths, a knock at the door.
“Max?” she frowns, her mouth tilting into a questioning smile. Maxxie is soaked to the bone, with a big bag sitting by his feet. “What are you doing here?”
“Was jus’ in the neighbourhood,” he says, distracted with wringing out the water from his jacket. He creates a small pond on the welcome mat Ace and Lynton bought for her leaving-home party.
“Max,” Jal says, eyes narrowing as he squirms. Instantly, she thinks he must feel uncomfortable. The air is crisp and the nights have become cooler as the seasons shift. “You were nowhere near the neighbourhood,” she says, reaching for his bag and placing it off to the side of the entrance. Maxxie stays where he is, wringing out his clothes.
He shakes his head, little bits of water splattering everywhere. She feels some tickle her cheeks. “Nah. But I thought you may like some company.”
Immediately, she frowns. “Did Chris ask -”
“No. Sometimes i want to spend some time with my friend Jal.” He leans in, wriggling his nose as a drop of water slides along his skin, escaping from his hairline. “Don’t tell anyone,” he says, whispering, “but she’s pretty rad.”
“I don’t think people say that anymore,” she says, smiling. The thunder hits the earth once again.
Maxxie shrugs, taking a few steps forward. He tries to wring out more water from his jacket sleeves. “Well,” he runs his hand through his hair. “You gonna invite me in?”
Jal moves to the side, punching him in the shoulder when he passes.
“I’m wet and now I’m hurt,” Maxxie smiles, leaning down for his bag and picking it up.
Jal walks to the kitchen. She calls out, “Don’t drip on my carpet!”
Maxxie’s laugh follows her.
After warming up, and having a few rounds of hot chocolates and cups of tea, Maxxie breaks in the guest bedroom.
“No one’s ever slept in here before,” Jal says from the doorway. She leans against it with her arms crossed over her chest.
“Well,” Maxxie fluffs a pillow. “I promise to be gentle.”
She smiles. Looking at the bed spread, she sees Maxxie’s things laid out neatly before him. A few shirts, some shorts, and some pants. She sees a book or two sitting near the head of the bed, almost tucked away under the bedspread. “How much shit did you bring?”
Maxxie counts in his head. He hums as he makes a show of calculating. “Just a bag,” he grins, kicking his bag back behind him. It doesn’t move a significant amount, but seems to keel on its side. “I didn’t want to impose.”
“You’re never imposing,” Jal says, immediately.
Maxxie cocks his eyebrow. “That’s what you’re supposed to say.”
“Thank god I got that right,” she says, smiling. “If you need anything -”
“I know where everything is,” he says, picking up a shirt and throwing it to the other side of the bed. He looks down at his shorts, searching through the four pairs. “I helped you move in, remember?”
“I still cannot find my lucky watch,” she says, smiling.
“Finders keepers,” he sings. Maxxie sits down on the bed. “Do you know where he is?”
Jal turns slightly against the door. She looks at the pillows sitting nice and straight against the headboard. “Faintly. I think he’s with me when I was 23.”
“Do you get ... feelings?”
She shakes her head. “No. I just ... suddenly remember something. It might be a word or a smell or something I saw. I just know he’s with me.” What lingers in the air is what she doesn’t say. ‘He’s with me, but he’s not here with me.’
*
chris is 25, jal is 25
Chris falls down onto the bed, pushing himself up on his stomach until his lower legs are hanging off of the bed. “Jal,” he says, playing with her toes.
“Chris,” she laughs when he finds a spot she’s ticklish. She puts her book down on her lap. “What is it?”
“Can Jal come out and play?”
She shakes her head. “I’m busy.”
“Reading isn’t as fun as what I have planned,” he says, brushing his fingers along the arch of her foot. She pulls it away, laughing.
“Tickling me isn’t fun.”
“That wasn’t what I had in mind,” he grins.
Jal’s face stiffens. “Chris,” she says, finality in her tone. It makes him look up, the smile falling off his face and his hands stilling on her foot.
He looks down onto the bedspread. He picks at it. “I think we should talk about it.”
“There’s nothing to talk about.”
“Jal,” he says, looking up at her. “When I went to the future, I saw us with a kid.”
Her jaw tightens. “When I think about our future, I see you in it. With me.”
“That’s not fair.”
“I’m sorry,” she says, shuffling on the bed until she’s kneeling in front of him. “But I don’t want kids, Chris.”
“Why not?” He places his hand on her knee. “You’d be a great mother.”
She scoffs. “I don’t ... want kids.”
“Does this have something to do with your mother?” he says. She cocks her eyebrow. “‘Chelle was tellin’ me -”
Jal pulls away. “Jesus Christ -”
Chris sits up. “Why don’t you talk to me?”
“Because you are never here!”
“I’m here now,” he says, trying to straighten himself on his knees. “So, talk to me.”
Jal’s body seems to sag. Her straight posture disappears. She picks at the duvet. With her eyes downcast, she murmurs slowly, “I do not want to be my mother.”
Chris tilts his head so he’s looking up at her. He tries to catch her eyes. “You’re not your mother.”
She looks at him. Her hands settle on her bent knees. “How do you know? How do we know this kid won’t travel? How do we know we can rewrite this kid’s genes, Chris?”
Chris bites the inside of his mouth. “We don’t,” he says. He places his hands over hers. “But I may know someone who might.”
-
Chris finds the card on the fridge. It’s hidden behind a piece of paper he wrote on, something about tin cans and string. He’s not sure what he was thinking when he wrote that.
He finds the phone in its cradle by the sink. Moving to the kitchen table, he sits on a chair and presses his fingers against the buttons. “Hello? Is this Dr SomethingWhat’s office?”
-
He waits until the dust has settled before he corners her in the kitchen. He makes her sit at the kitchen table. She crosses and uncrosses her legs as he tries to explain what he’s done.
“Chris, I’m not getting my hopes up -”
“I don’t want you to,” he says, standing. He paces, trying to gather his words. She watches him move back and forth, wearing out the wooden floorboards. “I just want us to give it a chance. You should have met her.”
“I don’t understand -”
“When I travelled to the future, I met our kid.”
“I know this -”
“If you let me finish,” he says, smiling. Jal bites her bottom lip to keep herself from interrupting. “When I travel, I’m quite fond of reading newspapers. I found this article on this doctor I remember hearing about when I was younger and travelled.”
Her brows crinkle. “You travelled to the future before?” When they were younger, he used to tell her about all the things he’d seen. About all the people he’d met. About all the feelings he’d felt. He’d opened up about Peter, albeit reluctantly, and she only got a few details from those trips, but he still spoke about them. She doesn’t remember any stories about him going to the future. Their future.
He shrugs. “I don’t remember it. But the name gave me funny ... feelings.” His brows furrow.
“Deja vu.”
He nods. “So when I travelled to the past, I found him. I pleaded my case and he thought I was crazy.”
She grins, surmising, “Too soon.”
Chris nods. “Yep. So I called his future office, which is his present office, and I hit the jackpot.”
“Again,” she says, grinning.
“Yes, m’dear,” Chris says, grabbing her hand. His grip is so tight and warm. “It does appear that lightning can, indeed, strike the same spot twice.”
*
eleven: 2014
jal is 26
Jal thinks it’s stupid to be jealous of herself.
She remembers being twenty-two when Chris visited her. She was upset about her clarinet. Sitting at their usual bus stop, she hadn’t expected him to walk up in odd clothes and sit down next to her. He had pushed the side of his body up against hers; giving her none of the breathing space she wanted. She remembers him telling her to stop being such a ‘Mopey-Boots’ and that in the future, she’s something great. He guarantees it.
She remembers the hope he elicited after that visit. She also remembers him running off to hide behind a thick tree to disappear.
Later, she remembers being twenty-five. Chris, a younger one, had visited her. It was a short visit. She doesn’t think he saw her. It had only lasted two minutes. She’d spotted him hanging around the backyard of their house. He was disoriented, butt-naked, and picking at her dead flowers.
She remembers being twenty-one, twenty-two and twenty-three, having him return after six hours of being gone.
At twenty-six, he’s been gone for fourteen days, six hours, thirty-six minutes and twenty-seven seconds.
*
chris is 26, jal is 26, michelle is 26, tony is 26
“Just because I cannot cook to save my life doesn’t mean I cannot host a good lunch!” Michelle laughs, moving from the island in the kitchen to the sink. Jal stays at the stove, mixing the spaghetti sauce around. “C’mon, Jal,” Michelle laughs, turning to her, “back a sister up!”
Jal looks over her shoulder, smiling, “I won’t deny it.”
“Thank you!” Michelle exclaims loudly, laughing. She holds her hands out in a wild gesture, as if asking for a hug. “Even while I’m heavily pregnant,” she looks pointedly at Tony, “I still make the greatest hostess.”
“Still,” says Chris, grabbing knives and forks from the drawers. “A good hostess does not a lunch make.”
Jal frowns. “What the fuck, Chris? You hold dinner parties and let me tell you, babe, it’s not you standing in the kitchen!”
He shrugs, holding his arms up in a wild gesture. The knives and forks look like finger extensions. “Fuck it. I’m inadequate. What are you gonna do?” He goes to the kitchen and sets the table for four. He returns with the extra two forks and one knife he had accidentally picked up. Chris moves to Jal, wrapping his arms around her waist. “That smells good.”
Jal rolls her eyes. She grits out, “Thanks.” She places the spoon on a plate sitting by the stove and covers the pan with its lid. She turns, manoeuvring herself out of Chris’ arms. She grabs the bread from the island and starts cutting into it.
Michelle stops washing up, leaving the tap running hard. “Oh!” She leaves her arms floating on either side of her, waiting for something. Jal watches her from the corner of her eye. “Oh! Jal, c’mere,” she mutters, her hands pressing to her abdomen.
Jal moves over to Michelle, who takes her hands and places it underneath her hands. Jal feels the warmth of her body heat through her maternity top. She waits. Michelle looks at her expectantly as they stand in the kitchen, silent. Then she feels a little bump against her hand. “Oh my,” she mumbles.
“It’s amazing, isn’t it?” Michelle grins.
Jal bites her bottom lip, nodding.
*
(2016) chris is 26, jal is 26
It happens in threes:
-
one late March - late April
Jal sits by him on the steps outside the house. “Baking?” she laughs.
Chris nods, watching what he can see of the empty street. “Always, babe.” He looks at her from the corner of his eye. “What’s wrong?”
Jal bites the bottom of her lip. “Nothing has to be wrong if I want to sit here with you.”
“But your show is on. Y’know, the one with all the sex.”
She rolls her eyes. “I’m pregnant,” she says to the yard and street before them. She turns to look at Chris.
His face doesn’t move for what she counts as five Mississippi’s. Then, she heats up, he smiles. “Really?” he whispers. He doesn’t wait for her response when he envelopes her in a hug.
-
Chris buys a calendar. At the end of each day, he writes one word. Three Wednesdays ago it was ‘Orange juice’. Last Thursday, it was ‘Sick’. Yesterday it was ‘Girl’. (She doesn’t really understand how Chris came to the conclusion that they were having a girl, but she doesn’t dare ask. Sometimes it is better to not understand Chris’ logic.)
When they lose it , it takes Jal three days to notice the calendar has disappeared. The pages he wrote on are scrunched up in the bin.
-
two: early July - early September
Tonight is Italian night mixed with a Bruce Willis movie. Chris bans her from cooking in the kitchen. She can smell the spaghetti sauce from in the lounge room.
When he hears her footsteps, he angles his body so he can point at her. “No,” he says, tasting his sauce. “No Jalander’s allowed.”
She rolls her eyes. She holds her hands up in mock surrender. “I promise to not cook.” Chris cocks his eyebrow. “Promise,” she says, sidling up to him. “That smells good.”
He continues to stir. “Thank you,” he says quietly, a little embarrassed.
Jal stares at the side of his face. He continues to stir his sauce, putting in more herbs from the little bottles she bought at the store a week ago. “Chris,” she says, and he hums. “I’m pregnant.”
He turns to look at her, a small smile on his face. “Really?”
She nods.
“Well,” he says, placing the spoon on the side. The sauce drips onto the counter. He envelopes her in a hug, though he doesn’t wrap his arms around her as tightly as before. “This calls for a celebration.”
He lets her choose the movie for the night.
-
The calendar reappears on the kitchen counter by the sink, missing two months. Chris makes sure not to wet it when he washes up dishes. He continues to write words on it, such as ‘Autumn’, ‘Winter’, ‘Pickles’ and ‘No gender - alien :)’.
When they lose it , Jal finds the calendar in the bin. Chris had tipped leftover sauce on top of it.
-
three: late October - mid December
Chris is in the shower. Jal sits on the lid of the toilet as she listens to him sing a Britney Spears song. She is going to make Anwar regret ever purchasing her finest collections CD.
“Hey, babe,” Chris says when he sees her. He’s soaping under his arms. She hopes he’s not using her loofah and body wash. He opens the sliding door, peeking his head out. There is soap all over him. He grins, “Wanna join me?”
She rolls her eyes. “I’d never make it out alive,” she says. Chris disappears to wash the soap off of him, leaving the door ajar. “Your singing is horrific.”
“Oi!” he calls from under the spray. When he appears again, there is less soap clinging to his skin. “That was hurtful.”
“I’m sorry,” she smiles. Chris ducks back in to wash the remnants of soap off. Jal taps her feet against the tiles. “I’m pregnant,” she says, quickly.
Chris peeks his head out. “Come again?”
“I’m pregnant,” she says a little softer.
Chris grins, “Sorry, didn’t hear you. I think you need to come a lil’ closer.”
Jal rolls her eyes. She gets up from the toilet lid and walks over to him. “I’m pregnant,” she says slower.
Chris rolls his eyes. “I know, I heard you. Just ‘cause I’m old - and fantastically good-looking - doesn’t mean I’m deaf,” he says, grinning. She narrows her eyes. Before she can say anything, he pulls her into the shower.
-
Chris doesn’t buy a calendar. He finds post-it notes and sticks them all around the bedroom. Jal reads them when she brushes her teeth. They range from ‘Hi Jal’ to ‘Puppy’ to ‘Exclamation Point’ to ‘Buy more shorts’. Even when she looks, she can never find the post-it notes relating specifically to the baby.
When they lose it , the post-its remain around the bedroom. The ones with reminders, such as ‘Pasta’ and ‘Tomato sauce’, disappear eventually. They don’t make a big deal about Christmas.
-
chris is 26, jal is 26, michelle is 26
Michelle has her baby mid September, early in the morning when the sky is a nice, lovely pink. She has tiny curls sprinkled atop her head and her mother’s oddly pointed nose.
Jal finds Chris outside the hospital, leaning against a wall and smoking a spliff. She feels the wind wrap its arms around her, tugging at the stray strands of her hair. “I thought you quit,” she says, stuffing her hands into her cardigan pockets.
Chris shrugs, exhaling. “Pills,” he says, taking another puff. “I quit pills.”
Jal nods, coming to stand next to him. She leans against the wall, mimicking his stance. “You should quit,” she says.
“I know,” he finishes it, dropping it onto the pavement and stamping his foot on it. “You keep telling me that.”
“Then why don’t you?”
“Quit?” Chris looks at her, his eyes a bit droopy. His hair is a mess. The silence stretches upon them. Eventually, he says, “I have nerves Jal. It’s the only way to calm them.”
Jal narrows her eyes, shaking her head. “Yeah, nerves,” she says, spitting the words at him. “I’m going back inside. It’s cold out here.”
-
Chris lies to her. “Let’s go book shopping,” he had said. He pulled her out of the bed and promised her a list of books she had been writing down on a couple of post-it notes. Out by the car, he had said, “I’ll even pay,” and he opened the passenger side door for her.
Where they went first wasn’t the bookshop or even on the itinerary. Outside a long rectangular building, made mostly of glass windows, Chris drags Jal across the street and inside.
“I am tired, Chris,” Jal says, dragging her feet a little as he pulls her along. Her small heels tap against the tiled floor. Her voice echoes. For a minute, she feels Chris’ hand tighten around hers.
They approach the elevator. He presses the up arrow and takes a few steps back, watching the little box above the doors. He waits outside the left elevator. “C’mon, Jal,” he pulls her into it and presses a button hard. “We owe it to that little girl.”
Jal narrows her eyes. She pulls her hand out from his and crosses her arms tightly over her chest. “Don’t you dare -”
He holds his hands up in surrender. “Please,” he says quietly. Jal inhales through her nose.
She watches the floor numbers appear. “This is the last time,” she says through clenched teeth. “I’ve had enough.”
*
twelve: 2017
(2017) chris is 27, jal is 27
-
Jal slides back under the covers.
Chris turns to face her. “You’re up early.”
“It’s only nine, Chris.”
He makes an attempt at a shrug. “Day doesn’t start ‘til eleven.”
She raises her eyebrow. Jal lies down, moving closer to him. “I’m pregnant, Chris.”
Chris gives her a sleepy smile. “More reason to sleep in,” he says, pulling the duvet up around her shoulders.
-
When they make it to four months, Chris litters the house with post-it notes. She finds them on the doorframes of the kitchen, the guest bedroom and her bedroom. She finds them all over the study. They range from ‘diapers’ to ‘crib’ to ‘Hi Jal go sit down’ and, in the study, ‘Jal’s room: where music superstars are born’.
It becomes worse when they hit six.
-
“Chris,” she waddles into the kitchen.
He looks up. When he sees her, he jumps out of his chair at the kitchen table. “Are you crazy?”
“No,” she crosses her arms over her chest. “Not as crazy as you,” she looks at him pointedly. He stops in his tracks. She holds up a post-it note. “Seriously, Chris. I love the post-it notes, but writing dirty lyrics on them -”
He approaches her and takes it off of her. He reads it, “If you seek Amy.” He looks at her. “How is that dirty? It’s just a song I need to download, to add to my collection -”
She narrows her eyes, snatching it off of him. “You are unbelievable,” she says before turning around, walking back into the lounge room.
“What?” he shouts after her. He raises his arms in a shrug. “Seriously. I think you’re readin’ one too many gossip magazines and it’s like sucking away your intelligence.”
“Fuck off!” she yells.
Chris smiles and snaps his fingers. He nods to himself, muttering, “That’s more like it.”
-
Chris disappears less and less during the months. It feels weird to Jal, having someone with her when he does disappear.
-
Chris keeps yelling “It’s time!” into the phone. When he finishes calling everyone, he makes sure she’s safely in the car and drives off at a speed that is reminiscent of all the Bruce Willis movies they have watched over the past months.
When they’re at the hospital, it’s all a blur. Everyone comes in at rapid speed, one after the other. “Where’s Olivia?” Jal looks at Michelle and Tony, minus a person.
Michelle stands by her, taking her hand. “With my mother.”
Tony mumbles, “God have mercy.”
When she’s only “five centimetres”, as the doctor had said, Jal made sure Chris got some air. “You’re looking pale,” she says, running her fingers along his cheek. “Go outside.”
“I’m fine.”
“For me,” she says, holding his hand. “I can’t move, let alone stand up in an elevator. Go outside for me.”
Maxxie goes with Chris outside. They stay out there for twenty minutes.
When “it’s time”, as the doctor had said, Jal makes sure she’s squeezing the life out of Chris’ hand. She ensures Michelle comes. “I don’t want him to faint and leave me all alone,” she says through gritted teeth.
Chris immediately protests. “I have muscles of steel.”
Jal squeezes his hand tighter.
When she comes, the world seems to stop spinning. Jal holds her, feeling the weight settle nicely along her arms.
Chris tentatively touches the little girl’s hand. She wraps her small hand around his finger lightly. Jal smiles, “She’s beautiful.”
“She gets her good looks from her father,” Chris says, laughing softly.
-
(2008) chris is 27, tony is 18
Tony leads them outside the pool area. There are a few tables lined up along the sides. Chris has never seen them before.
When they sit, Tony pulls out two sandwich cases. Both are tuna. “Why do you keep travelling?” Tony asks, for once his sandwich is untouched.
Chris looks down, drawing patterns on the table. “Can’t tell you, mate.”
“Why not? Wouldn’t it help you?”
Chris shakes his head. He looks up at Tony. “Nah, mate. I’ve tried changing the past. It never works. It just happens anyway.” He doesn’t make eye contact with Tony.
“I’m sorry,” Tony says.
“Don’t be,” he mumbles. Chris shrugs, trying to shake off the tension that has settled between them. “I just left the best day of my life,” he smiles. “I’m sort of glad that I travelled to this moment.”
“What happened?”
Chris puts a finger to his lips. “Shh,” he laughs. “If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”
They sit in silence. Chris takes the other sandwich and has a bite.
*
(2017) jal is 27
“I didn’t want to tell you this,” Maxxie says, sitting on the lounge next to her.
Quickly, Jal says, “What is it, Max?” She angles her body to face him.
Maxxie doesn’t make eye contact with her. He looks down at the lounge. “I saw Chris with some spliff, before Anna was born. Outside the hospital.” Then, quickly, he says, “Maybe he was just blowing off some steam?”
Jal nods, “Maybe.”
-
Jal catches Chris with spliff twice. She doesn’t tell him. She figures that, maybe, he needs to blow off some steam. That, maybe, Chris doesn’t find walking around the neighbourhood to be nerve-calming.
She catches him a month after Anna was born. He’s outside, around the back of the garage, smoking it. She doesn’t say anything. She returns back inside and watches Anna sleep in her cot. He disappears later that night.
The second time is five weeks after that disappearance. He’s smoking spliff early in the morning, after picking up the morning paper. He disappears in the late afternoon.
-
Chris is sitting on the lounge, watching a television program with the volume on mute. She stands behind him, leaning against the lounge. She wraps her arms around his neck. “I think you should go see Dr Tatum.”
-
Dr Tatum asks a number of different questions:
1. “How is Anna?”
Chris smiles. “She’s fine. Looks more like her mother every day. Thank god.”
2. “Have you been travelling?”
“On and off,” he says. He fidgets in his chair. “It’s like before Jal’s pregnancy. I just - go. Sometimes.”
Dr Tatum writes something down. “I see.”
3. “Do you do anything to trigger it?”
Chris pauses. “No.”
4. “How do you feel when you travel? Anything ... distinctive?”
Chris shakes his head. “Nothin’. Just feel disoriented when I get there.”
5. “Do you ever try to stop it?”
“All the time.”
“Has it ever worked?”
“No.”
6. “Does she travel?”
Chris blinks. He shakes his head and shrugs his shoulders. His mouth feels dry.
-
After he sees Dr Tatum, Jal has her own questions:
1. “Anything conclusive?”
2. “Have you found a way to stop it?”
3. “Will she have it?”
Chris never gives her any answers.
*
While Jal is busy trying to prevent Michelle from maxing out all of her cards, Chris takes Anna to the cemetery.
He walks with her in his arms, leaving the pram in Tony’s car. When he reaches Peter, he lifts up her small arm and waves to the headstone. “That’s Uncle Peter,” he says to her, bobbing her up and down slightly. “I’ve got many stories to tell you about him.”
And so, he begins with the one where little Chris was being picked on by a taller boy and Peter gave his little brother his clothes.
*
chris is 27, tony is 27
Tony finds him outside.
“You know, mate,” Tony says, snatching Chris’ spliff from his fingers. “You’re a good friend.” He puts the spliff in his back pocket. Chris looks a little lost without it. “You helped me when I was down, y’know? I figure it’s time I do that for you.”
Chris frowns. “What are you on about, Tone?”
Tony looks at him. “The spliff. It’s so 2005.”
Chris slides his hands into his pockets. “Tony -”
“I know,” he says. “It doesn’t take a genius, but I figured it out.”
“What out?”
“The travelling. It is like vertigo. You see spliff, you take spliff, you smoke spliff, you travel because of spliff.”
“I don’t know -”
“Chris,” Tony says, voice lower. “Shut up for a sec, yeah? I’m breakin’ in my doctor shoes.” Chris looks away from Tony, hearing the voices from inside filter out through the open kitchen window. “You smoke spliff, you travel. Pretty damn simple, I think. But why you smoke spliff,” he turns to face Chris, “is what we need to figure out.”
“We?”
Tony nods. He places his hands into his pockets and walks behind Chris. He pats Chris on the back. “Friends don’t let friends drive drunk, y’know.”
-
After some consideration that lasts only five minutes after they get home, Chris finds his spliff stash and puts it in the outside bin. Early, the next morning, he mows the grass and puts the cuttings in the garbage bin, on top of the spliff - just as a safety precaution.
-
He keeps only one spliff. Five days after mowing the grass, he smokes it.
(20..) chris is 27, peter is, chris is
Chris spots Peter and little Chris instantly. They’re walking home along the path from school. Peter’s taller than him, walking by his side. Chris remembers he never felt so safe before that moment.
Little Chris’ bag slides off his shoulders. His shoelace has untied itself over the course of the walk. Peter stops them, kneeling down and tying up Chris’ shoelace. He does it slowly. The memory comes back to Chris in tiny pieces, like a puzzle. He slowly puts the pieces together; he remembers Peter showing him the steps to tying his shoelace, telling him he’ll show him again later and later, until he knows how to do it in his sleep. Peter takes Chris’ bag and swings it over his shoulder.
The two start walking again. Little Chris keeps glancing down at his tied shoe.
When they round the corner, Chris disappears.
*
(2017) chris is 27, jal is 27
It has been four months, two days, five hours, thirty-seven minutes and twenty seconds since Chris broke up with spliff.
He sits on the front steps, watching Jal walk around with Anna in her arms. She’s telling her a story about the flowers, he supposes, as he catches tiny snippets of their one-way conversation. Jal bobs up and down slightly as she walks slowly around the front garden.
He thinks that if he was still with spliff, still in that rather abusive relationship, as he has come to see it, he would miss moments like these.
-
zero:
He does travel one last time.
(2025) chris is 27, jal is 35
He ends up at the graveyard.
Jal is by a headstone. With her is a small girl with thick dark hair. She holds onto Jal’s arm with one hand, in the other she holds onto a small bouquet of flowers. Anna places the flowers down in front of the headstone. She touches it, feeling the roughness of the cement. Jal is talking to her, telling her a story. Anna watches the way Jal’s mouth moves, and looks at the headstone again.
They stay for a few minutes. Chris doesn’t move from his place near a large monument. He can’t hear what Jal’s saying, but he figures he knows.
When they leave, walking at a slow pace, hand-in-hand, Chris approaches the headstone. The freshly picked flowers are from their garden. He planted the seeds just yesterday, listening to Jal’s instructions to water them every day. He bought a torch earlier that day to speed up the photosynthesis process he’s Wikipedia’d due to Anwar’s advice.
He touches Peter’s headstone and says, “You watch out for her, mate.”
When he disappears, the lead that sits in his stomach dissipates.
-
(2017) chris is 27, jal is 27
When he appears in the backyard, he grabs a pair of three-quarter pants from the clothes line. Running inside, he finds Jal lying on the lounge, watching her usual garbage program.
He drops onto the lounge at her feet, crawling up her body. He kisses her neck.
Jal laughs, fidgeting under him. “What are you doing?”
“Kissing you,” he says against her skin. “Isn’t it obvious?”
Jal finds her hands, placing her palms against his warm cheeks. “Chris,” she says, laughing.
He grins, slipping out of her palms and back to her neck. “Let’s make a boy baby,” he murmurs.
She laughs. “As opposed to a normal baby?”
Chris moves from her neck to look at her, frowning. “No,” he says, rolling his eyes. “We need a boy baby. To balance out the ying and the yang.”
Jal only frowns. “Will you be having this baby?”
Chris cocks his eyebrow. “Have I come back to the right century?”
Jal laughs, pulling him into an awkward hug. His face ends up back at her neck.
“We’ll name him Peter,” he says, giving her neck a kiss. “And we’ll get a golden retriever, too.”
“You’re so bossy,” she says. Chris hops up off the lounge. He runs his hands over his pants, trying to flatten them. Jal stares at his askew hair. “Where are you going?”
“We are going to bed,” he says, before bending down and slipping one arm under her knees and one around her back. He lifts her up and kisses the other side of her neck. He carries her off to their room, her laughter echoing throughout the house.
-
It’s dark now and I am very tired. I love you, always. Time is nothing.
- Audrey Niffenegger (The Time Traveler's Wife)
fin.
author's notes:
This fic was hard to write. I had no idea how I wanted to format it. Did I want to copy Niffenegger's The Time Traveller's Wife and have the timeline jump all over the place? How would I not confuse anyone who read this? How would I not confuse myself? The one thing I knew from the beginning is that Chris, if I could help it, would not die.
I wanted to deal with a lot of things. I wanted to deal with the hit and miss nature of the original relationship in the book and movie adaption. I also wanted to deal with Chris and his mother, Chris and Peter, Jal and her mother, and Tony's accident. I didn't get to deal with Chris and his mother, and Jal and hers, as much as I had wanted to. Instead, I think I left Chris and his mother's relationship more up to interpretation. I was going to have her appear in "the end" section, but it didn't fit right. The one thing I didn't want to do, as I was figuring out what I wanted to deal with in "the end", was to tie up all the bows nicely. I wanted to leave some of them untied. I also didn't want to show everything, like Chris meeting Dr Tatum for the first time, or even giving Dr Tatum much ~screentime~. I wanted this fic to be more of a representation of the major points in Chris and Jal's lives, and leave the rest of it to interpretation. I didn't want to show everything. Simply because it was too hard at times for me to develop.
Cassie didn't really play a big part in this. I couldn't really find a place for her in the story, as well as my own personal feelings for her caused me to not find her a role to play in Chris and Jal's story. Although, I caved, and gave Chris that phone call. So I guess you can say that Cassie's storyline in this fic follows that of the season two finale where she flies off to New York on a whim. With that, I really did want to focus on the gang, but I felt that if I did so, it may detract from Chris and Jal's story. And, besides, it was long enough as it is. :p
This was a lot of fun to write, and a really big challenge. And I hope that you enjoyed the story. I wanted to leave some things open-ended for Chris and Jal as I hate it when things are neatly tied up, and I personally felt that their story couldn't be tied up in a neat little bow.
Anyway, thank you so much for reading. :) ♥
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