The home at 666 North St. Vrain Drive was found burned down today. The blaze was reported by neighbors, who noticed the burning home earlier this evening. The resident’s remains were also found buried in the wreckage. Anyone with information about the cause of the fire are encouraged to contact the Lyons police department. Our thoughts go out to the family and friends of the victims. – From the Lyons Recorder website. December 23rd, 2022.
Jordan was fifteen but understood things about the world most adults could not. He was raised in a time when children learned the greatest secrets of the universe ever uncovered, by scientists who were long past childhood when they uncovered them. These thinkers always said that their discoveries would never be understood intuitively by humans, and mostly, they were right. But this was not true for Jordan. To him, the math of quantum mechanics was as easy to learn as the rules of checkers.
Most people daydream about being the first, the best, the genius, the star. Most people also forget that being that person is the reason many people end up sticking a gun in their mouth or needle in their arm. Being exceptional can come with intense loneliness and even persecution. Jordan experienced both: isolation from his singular ability to understand complex topics without trying, and constant bullying from his peers for being the weirdo. He knew he was different but felt that given a few hundred more years, people like him would be the norm. Not being able to share even his most mundane thoughts with people around him was like a knife in his heart that he couldn’t pull loose. More than anything, Jordan longed to live in a future where a kid that understood special relativity was not so relatively special.
He heard many times about the theoretical possibility of time travel. He also listened to scientists’ lousy explanations for why current technology could not be used to make a time traveling machine. Excuses, he thought, lazy excuses. Jordan was pretty sure that, with a little creativity, it could be done. He decided that if he wanted a time machine, he would just have to build one himself.
“Where are you off to?” Jordan’s mom asked as he put on his coat and shoes.
“Clark’s Hardware. I gotta get some stuff to build a time machine.”
Jordan’s mom would have been skeptical; but after the laser gun, rocket shoes and miniature black hole, she stopped doubting him. She never ceased worrying about his safety, though.
“Ok, but I want you to wear gloves and goggles while you are working on it. Do you want me to drive you to the store?”
“Sure thing. That would be awesome, thanks mom.”
Later that day, Jordan and his mom arrived back home. They were laughing as they pulled into their driveway, drinking Cokes and eating Doritos. After unloading all the switches, wires, plywood, screws and other miscellaneous time machine ingredients, Jordan put on his safety gear and got ready to work. His mom, as usual, looked worried.
“Let me know before you fire that thing up. I want to give you a big hug and kiss in case it… malfunctions.”
“It will be fine, mom. I’ve got it all worked out. It’s pretty simple stuff.”
“You always say that, but I don’t think your definition of simple is the same for a normal human like me.”
Time machine inventors of today will be tomorrow’s janitors, he thought. Somewhere else, I AM normal.
His mom continued:
“You’re sure that thing will work both ways? You can come back to me after visiting the future?”
Jordan replied, “of course, mom.”
Either he was a good liar, or his mom didn’t want to call him out on his bullshit. Afterall, an argument would be a horrible way to spend her last few moments with her only son. Jordan was well aware that it was entirely possible that the arrow of time was barbed and sunken irretrievably deep into the flesh of history, hammered in deeper every day as events in the universe unfurled. There might not be a way to come back to the present if this journey was a success. They both knew the other knew all the things that neither wanted to say out loud. Both chose to stay silent.
Jordan’s mom said:
“Well, let me know if you need anything.”
With that, the boy was off.
For twenty-four hours straight, Jordon’s bedroom was a blur of wires, sawdust, screw guns and smoking solder. When he was done, he wiped his brow and looked at his new machine: a six-foot-tall plexiglass box with two milk crate chairs inside. There was a knee-high wooden control panel in front of the crates with a single dial built from an upturned coffee mug. The large clay coffee mug read “I SEE DUMB PEOPLE” on its side. One side of the plexiglass box had a door just large enough for an adult to crawl through, which locked from the inside with a flimsy, crookedly installed barrel bolt. A pair of jumper cables connected to four car batteries wired in series laid on the floor. This time machine looked as if it were constructed by and for standard trailer trash, but Jordan thought it was beautiful.
All that was left to do was to get in and try it out. Jordan promised his mother he would tell her when it was finished, so he headed out to find her. There was also something else more important on his mind he wanted to ask her.
He found her reading silently in the living room. He peeked around the corner, and when he spoke, it came out much louder than he had planned.
“Mom? I think it’s ready.”
His mother, startled, closed her book and turned in her chair to find her boy — her young man, her little genius — standing in the hallway. His work gloves, apron, and safety goggles were comically oversized. The goggles were pulled up onto his forehead, and his wild red hair shot off in every direction. She took in the sight of her silly-looking son for a long time before responding.
“I suppose you are set to embark on an adventure,” she said, removing her glasses.
“Yea. I just… will you come with me? There’s room for two.”
Jordan’s mom was flattered and relieved upon hearing this.
“Come with you to the future? I thought you would never ask.”
The boy beamed at his mother, elated at her response. His mood then turned serious.
“There is a chance we might not be able to come back. Entropy and all…,” Jordan said.
“I know.” She replied.
They walked back to his room and crawled into the machine. Like two teenagers playing with a Ouija board, they both placed their hands on the bottom of the coffee mug: first Jordan’s and then his mother’s hand softly on top of his. They looked at one another, then turned their gaze to the control board. Someone cranked the dial to the right — neither was sure who — and pointed the handle of the mug to a marker that read 500.
“Here’s to the future and finding people there who can understand a strange, wonderful kid like you.” Jordan’s mom said.
“Well, now I know there will be at least one, so at least it can’t be worse than 2022.”
Jordan then grabbed the thick jumper cables, the red lead in his right hand and the black in his left. He squeezed the handles of the alligator clips, and just as he was about to connect them, he felt the electric shock of sudden recollection surge through his body.
“I almost forgot to take notes in my journal!” He said, dropping the cables.
Jordan reached under the crate he was sitting on and pulled out a beat up 8.5x11 spiral notebook. On the front cover, in fat permanent marker, he had written:
JORDAN’S EXPERIMENTS
!!!TOP SECRET!!!
He turned to a blank page near the back and began to write.
December 23rd, 2022. Lab on 666 St. Vrain Drive. 4:31 PM.
I have successfully built the world’s very first time machine. My mom and I are prepared to take it for its maiden voyage. We are hoping to jump 500 years into the future. It is highly likely we will never return to this time period. Will write more once we arrive at our destination.
After he was satisfied, Jordan put his notebook back under the crate. He picked up the red and black cables and connected the two terminals. There was a huge shower of sparks and the lab at 666 St Vrain Drive disappeared as a new world popped into existence around them.
They could not believe what they saw, and both were grateful that the other was there to experience it with them. There was no way they were going back now. Not even if they could.