Wednesday, November 23, 2016

It was eerie how quiet the house was without the dogs. Without barking or toenails clicking on the wood floors, or dangling tags clanging against metal food bowls, and not even any heavy sleep breathing. Dad and Jackie were spending Thanksgiving at Jackie's sister's house in Kentucky, and they'd dropped Kermit and Gonzo off at her friend's farm on their way out of town.

I was still deemed not trustworthy enough to stay there for the long weekend and watch the dogs myself.

There was no school on the day before Thanksgiving, and the plan was in place. I was going to see an early afternoon movie with Kaitlin to distract myself for a while, afterward she'd drop me off at Eric's house, and then I'd travel back to 1993 and follow Liz's instructions. I'd told my mom I was spending the night at Dad's house and that they were leaving for Kentucky on Thanksgiving morning. My car would be parked at Dad's house overnight and hopefully that would give me enough time to take care of what I had to do.

But first, it was time to pack. I dug Liz's suitcase out of my closet and stuffed it into a backpack to look less suspicious. My travel belt was reloaded with snacks and caffeine pills. Pete's belt went in the trash can. I packed away the curtains I'd made and all of the patterns and notions from the drawers of the sewing table into a big plastic storage bin. My collection of vintage dresses was laid out on my bed, except for the red one I'd worn on the beach the day Pete and I first kissed.

I decided to try that one on again, just for a few minutes.

It was too quiet in the empty house, so I played some fifties music as I folded up and said goodbye to my vintage wardrobe. Though I'd daydreamed about it, I couldn't actually bring myself to burn it all, or to put everything in a garbage bag for the trash or a donation bin. Once it was all packed, I'd drag the bin into the attic over the garage, a mysterious black hole of a space that my dad claimed he'd never seen the far reaching corners of.

It would be fine as long as I didn't see the contents until after I'd gone away to college and was safely on track toward a career in something reasonable.

At some point over the previous week, it occurred to me that if I'd never had a need for vintage clothes, maybe I wouldn't have gone down the path of digging through closets at estate sales or thrifting items other than easily castaway one-time use t-shirts.

I also wondered if Pete's dream of a simple life had wormed its way into my brain and made me less concerned with choosing a profession where I'd be more financially secure.

Anyway, time traveling, my history with Pete, and my recently concocted dream of a career in sustainable fashion seemed intertwined, and I thought it couldn't hurt to try to wipe them all out at once. I wanted to stop the constant ache that plagued me, the lack of focus, and the feeling that there was something else, something better, out there that was out of my reach. Or that I was afraid to reach for. I wanted to be content with who I was. Or rather, who I used to be.

A loud knocking startled me and the dress I was folding slipped through my fingers and onto the floor. Through the window, I could see Kaitlin's red car parked in the driveway.

"Kait! You're early!" I exclaimed uneasily as I swung open the door.

"I am? Sorry." She eyed my outfit. "Oh! You look nice. I didn't think to dress in period-appropriate clothes for the movie."

"I'm not wearing this, I was just trying it on. It's a summer dress, anyway."

"We can fix that."

Kaitlin pushed past me, kicked her shoes off, and walked straight to the stairs. By the time I caught up to her, she was digging through my dresser. She tossed a cardigan sweater and tights on the bed, and grabbed a pair of ankle boots from the closet.

"And now it's a fall dress. Wear it." She planted her hands on her hips and looked around the messy room. "What's going on in here?"

"Just re-organizing some things."

"Re-organizing or getting rid of?" She peered into the plastic bin and then into the empty open drawers of the sewing table. "Are you giving up on sewing?"

"It got to be too distracting."

Kaitlin inspected the dresses on the bed, then picked up the plaid blanket coat I'd made and swung it onto her shoulders. "Are you also giving up on wearing clothes?" she teased.

"Only those ones."

"Don't sequester this version of yourself, Vanessa," she said sadly. "The world needs you to fly your freak flag." Then her eyes lit up with excitement. "You know what you should do? You should be the costume coordinator for the winter play. We're doing Little Shop of Horrors and it's all, like, pretty simple sixties-style clothes you could probably find easily. Then you can put it on your resume, or application for design school or whatever."

She was so earnest and encouraging, that I couldn't outright reject her idea. So I left it at a "Yeah, maybe." I finished packing and then Kaitlin reluctantly helped me maneuver the storage bin into the attic.

~~~~~~

The movie theater in Newport was a converted department store, and like at every other business in the area, there were black and white photos on the walls of what the building had once been. The pictures of the store and other scenes of downtown Newport in the first half of the twentieth century were hard to get out of my mind while we sat through the trailers for upcoming films. I tried to come to terms with never seeing any of it in real life again.

The World War II movie was romantic and suspenseful and full of gorgeous costumes, and probably wasn't the right choice that day. Marion Cotillard reminded me of Sylvia, Pete's mom, with her dark, softly waved hair and gray-green eyes, but with a French accent instead of a familiar, nasally Midwestern one. Both were stunningly beautiful and a little scary.

When the comically huge movie theater Diet Coke hit me, I left to use the restroom. The theater had really embraced mid-century style decor. The walls were painted jade green with butter yellow accents and the black wallpaper in the bathroom had a dizzying arrangement of atomic diamonds and starbursts in silver and gold. The wallpaper was so disorienting to look at that I had to close my eyes for a moment while I dried my hands.

Then I started to feel lightheaded. I was so nervous that I hadn't eaten that day and ingesting nearly a half-gallon of Diet Coke with artificial sweetener instead of the real thing hadn't helped. I pressed my back against the wall and slid down to the floor. I'd had low blood sugar episodes before, and I grappled around in my purse for the tiny tube of cake icing I kept for moments like this.

The atomic stars imprinted on the inside of my eyelids turned into actual sparkling stars that glowed brightly and grew and burst and my head grew heavy.

I was lulled back into consciousness by the floral and musky scents of high end perfume. When I opened my eyes, the gasped at the sight of the mirror image of myself, pale and sweaty and slumped on the floor. I was in a changing room, where luckily nobody was changing at that moment.

I could try to go right back or I could explore for just a minute. This might have been one of my last chances to get a glimpse of the past, and what better place to escape for a few minutes than a department store? And I was dressed appropriately for the time period, so why not?

I emerged from the fitting rooms into a section of fur coats that I passed by quickly to get to the tables with neatly folded scarves and mannequin heads displaying structured wool and fuzzy felt hats. The middle of the store was open, and I crossed the center aisle to peer down at the other floors. There was a Christmas tree on the bottom floor draped in thin silver tinsel and surrounded by perfume and makeup counters.

I didn't want to worry Kaitlin, so after taking in the view for a minute I decided to head back to the fitting room. The pricking feeling of being watched came over me and I scanned the winter accessories section. There was a woman at a sales counter clutching the handles of a paper bag and openly staring. It was Sylvia freaking Harrison herself, and she was walking in my direction with her eyes fixed on me.

I panicked. I ran to the elevator and breaking elevator etiquette, I pushed past the woman stepping out and reached for a button to take me away. But there was a smiling elevator operator in a burgundy jacket blocking the panel.

"Ground floor, please," I said urgently.

The bronze cage door unfolded into a pattern of repeating X's and as the elevator slowly descended I heard Sylvia plead, "Wait!"

Without even caring what the elevator operator might think, I willed myself to disappear. I couldn't face Pete's mom, not after he'd left town after the summer he'd spent with me, never to return. Not after hearing from Jimmy that people thought he'd left with the girl he was seeing at the time. And not when I had no idea where Pete had gone.

The elevator approached the ground floor and stopped with a jerk. As the door slowly slid open, I squeezed through the gap and then followed a woman in a red coat outside through the nearest door.

The cold air took my breath away. I quickly walked down the sidewalk against the wind while scattered snowflakes swirled around me.

"Stop!" a voice called out.

Sylvia was running after me, the hem of her long emerald coat flapping behind her. I froze in place and my teeth chattered as she approached carefully and hesitantly, as if she was afraid of scaring me off again.

"It is you," she said in between heavy breaths. "Where is Pete?" Her green eyes were wild and desperate. She took another step toward me and I backed away. "Do you know where my son is?"

"I'm sorry," I said as I shook my head. "I don't know."

And then my knees buckled and she was gone.

~~~~~~

Eric's bedroom was colorless and uncomplicated. Three months before I would've thought, Like his personality, but by then I knew better. He was sitting in the middle of the charcoal quilted bedspread watching me as I paced the floor.

"What was this place in the early nineties, again?" I asked.

"Assisted living."

"Oh boy." I took a giant breath and exhaled. "Okay. Should I go to the bathroom, then? I don't want to land in someone's bedroom."

He shrugged. "You're the expert. Do you want to surprise an unsuspecting person while they're doing bathroom things or bedroom things?"

I groaned. "I guess it's less likely that someone will be in a bathroom? Yeah, bathroom," I said with a definitive nod. "Or should I totally avoid people and go outside? But what if someone sees me?"

Overthinking hadn't helped when I tried to get to Liz the first time and I knew I had to relax and let the Rockmore House take over. I was still shaken from my run in with Sylvia, which ended when I vanished right in front of her on the sidewalk.

I'd changed into flared jeans and a short-sleeved polo sweater that could probably pass in the late-sixties and early-nineties. I hoped the rusty orange granny coat would also work for both decades. I asked Eric to throw away the red dress once I was gone, because I couldn't bring myself to do it. I reviewed the checklist in my head: suitcase, travel belt, phone, charger, and written instructions for how Thanksgiving Eve 1993 had to play out, even though I'd memorized them.

Then I remembered that I still needed to write down my instructions for Liz. Eric retrieved a piece of paper and an envelope and I leaned over his desk to write down what I hoped she'd do for me.

"Can I come with you?" Eric asked. "You said you brought Madison with you that one time, so can you bring me?"

"I can't do that. We have a whole plan."

He looked equal parts crushed and terrified, possibly even more terrified than I felt. Staying behind feeling helpless and worried was probably no fun at all. He caught me by surprise when he drew me into a tight hug.

"Hey!" I said into his shoulder. "Are you trying to catch a lift to 1993? I said you can't come with me."

"No, Ness," he sighed. "I'm just saying goodbye."

I shivered. A sensation of dread settled in my gut, like a sinking stone landing in the sand. I knew that feeling wasn't going anywhere for a while.

"Yikes." I reached up to ease Eric's arms from my shoulders. "Don't say it like that. I'm coming back."

"I know, but it might be different."

"Or it might not. Or if it is, maybe it'll be different in a good way."