Remember the Future (6 page)

16

As they approached downtown Houston, Maddy watched the tall buildings and let her mind drift into neutral.  She gently grasped at the loose threads of potentiality, glimpsing all the alternatives like road signs passing outside.

The feeling of not knowing was glorious--of luxuriating in all the possibilities, instead of calculating the path of least potential danger.

She glanced over at Grant when she was sure he wasn’t watching and observed his profile.  His stately, larger than average nose.  His rugged jutting chin.

Stop what you’re doing, right now
, she chastised herself, and returned her attention to the city flying by outside. 
Can’t afford attachments like that.

Attachments equal confusion.  Confusion equals dead.

“I still can’t figure it,” Grant finally stated, fracturing the silence between them.

Maddy lifted her chin inquisitively, a peaceful smile on her tired face.  She had almost fallen asleep a moment ago, that’s how relaxed she had become in this warm, protective space.

“You knew what they would say,” Grant said, the confusion slowing the pace of his words.  “Did you know him?  Is that how you knew he would say what he did?”

“Who?”

“The cashier at the gas station?” Grant replied.  “He said exactly what you’d said to me before I went in the store.  How..?  I mean, how could any mathematical system come up with something so specific as that?”  Grant peered at Maddy, staring at her with a look of utter helplessness.

Please help me out of this gaping hole of logic that I’ve tripped and fallen into
, his look seemed to say. 
Because every time I try and get a grip, I keep slipping back down again.

Maddy gave him a conflicted look and considered telling him the truth, something she had not shared with anyone in years with good reason.  Instead, her stomach growled loudly, breaking the silence and giving her an excuse to avoid addressing the question a while longer.

“I’m hungry.   Are you hungry?” she asked him.

Grant’s eyes briefly went out of focus, then sharpened again to read the road signs ahead of them.  “Yeah, it’s just off the highway here.  A place I’ve eaten once,” he responded.  “Nice and public.  I can drop you there if you’d like.”

Maddy felt a hole rip open deep within her and spray ice-cold fear into her guts.

No, you can’t let him go
, she screamed at herself. 
Right now, he’s the only thing standing between you and the Blank Men.  He’s your ace in the hole.

She thought suddenly about the hundred-dollar tip Grant had given her and the portion of the conversation she had heard between him and Rudy and understood a small part of what was going on here.

“You never expected to walk out of the airport tonight, did you?” she asked him.

Grant continued driving without a response.  “It’s just up here,” he muttered under his breath.  To Maddy, the voice sounded tired and so very sad.

Maddy knew then that he needed her as much as she needed him.  Without her presence tonight, he would have given himself up and let the dogs drag him under.  She could never let this man give himself up on her watch.  That would just be wrong, she decided.

Grant pulled the Mercedes into a truck station parking lot, rolling past a line of semis parked in a row.  Grabbing Rudy’s jacket off the floor, he shut the engine off, climbed out and headed for the entrance to a restaurant called the The Space City Depot.

Maddy hung back and stood beside the open passenger door with her satchel at her side.  “You left the keys in the ignition,” she informed him.

“Yeah, I figure this is as good a place as any to leave it,” he said, holding the door open and waiting as an older couple passed outside, the gentleman giving him a smile and a nod.

Maddy rushed over to him.  “I don’t understand what you’re doing.”

“Well, it’s stolen,” he explained.  “Otherwise, I’d give it to you.”

Grant dug the cell phone out of the pocket the Argentinean leather jacket then crammed it halfway into a nearby trash can.  Turning his back on Maddy, he continued inside the restaurant.

Pausing at the entrance, Maddy looked up and noticed for the first time a long-haired man with an overgrown beard sitting on a bench in a thin grey Houston Astros t-shirt, a bulging backpack sitting on the ground at his feet.  She gave a quick whistle to get his attention and pointed at the jacket in the trash can just before she stepped into the restaurant.

Maddy joined Grant at a booth near the entrance where he sat focused on Rudy’s phone.  He located the call log on the phone and flipped through the list of numbers and their corresponding names until he found one saved number listed only as “A.T.”  He sighed and set the phone aside as a waitress stepped up to them.

“Hello, my name is Thalia and I’ll be your server tonight,” a young waitress with multi-colored hair and a nose stud told them as she handed them menus.

Grant accepted his menu then after a cursory glance, set it face down on the table in front of him.  “Thalia, what would you recommend for someone who’s been violently threatened and may not live to see the morning?”

Without the barest of hesitations, the waitress answered: “Our Space-shot special.  A stack of buttermilk pancakes, two eggs, bacon, sausage, hash browns, and biscuits all covered in country gravy.”

“Sold,” Grant snapped, holding his menu out to her with a satisfied smile.  “Maddy?”

Appearing slightly confused, Maddy replied, “Cakes and coffee would be great, Grant.”

Thalia smiled and hustled away.

“I overheard you and Rudy in the airport coffee shop,” Maddy stated.  “So what I don't understand is why you didn't take his advice and just..”

“Run?” he asked, his expression grimly determined.  “I won’t do that. I’ve never lived my life that way.”

Maddy searched Grant's face.  “Do you think you deserve what's going to happen to you?”

He glanced down at the phone on the table and gave a belabored sigh.

“You don't seem like the suicidal type, Grant.”

“Look, I'm not one of those types who avoid responsibility. That’s why our society's in the shape it is. The jails are filled to capacity with them. They suck up our tax dollars and run out on their children.”

“Yes, the world’s in terrible shape, but can we talk about you for a moment?” Maddy asked, watching as he picked up the cell phone and began glancing through the address book.  “Are you really planning on giving yourself up to these people?”

“I really don’t think that's any of your business,” Grant snapped.

“It is when you're threatening my life.”

Grant looked up from the phone in disbelief.  “Excuse me?”

Thalia appeared again and set two cups of coffee between them.

Both Maddy and Grant thanked her in the same rushed tone.

Giving them a polite smile, she took the hint and scurried away.

An edge entering his voice, Grant said, “I thought we were going to talk about you.”  He scooted forward in his seat conspiratorially and shuffled the phone aside.

Leaning across the table toward him—almost close enough to kiss--Maddy inhaled the coffee's aroma, closing her eyes with a pleasant smile drifting across her lips.

Grant blinked at her uncomfortably and leaned back in his booth.  He glanced across the restaurant at an older gentleman in a Peterbilt cap, quietly sipping coffee and reading a newspaper over his dinner.  He sighed heavily and stared at the man with sadness entering his eyes.

“Grant, for the last two days, I've been trying to cope with the fact that I am dying.”

Grant stared at her in shocked confusion.  “You’re dying?”

“That is, I will be dead,” she sputtered.  “Uh, actually, will have died.”

“I'd say that I'm not following you, but that implies there was a time this evening when I actually did.”

Glancing around suspiciously, Maddy leaned forward and Grant followed suit, down to the quick look over his own shoulder, feeling foolish but also unable to suppress the inclination.

“Two days ago, my memories of the future went blank,” Maddy whispered to Grant.  “Do you have any idea what that's like for someone who's been precognicient since the age of thirteen?”

Grant studied her face then broke into a smile.  “You’re screwing with me,” he responded, leaning back to look around the restaurant for their waitress.

Ignoring his reaction, Maddy continued in her same tone of voice.  “For you, it would be the equivalent of going blind and deaf at the same time. There was no future to see. At least for me, there wasn't.”

Grant sighed heavily and draped his arm across the top of the booth seat.

“Then I wandered into your airport on my own, without any pre-knowledge of what I would find, and I saw… you. I recalled my first memory in seventy-two hours. That was significant.”

Again Grant looked across the restaurant at the old man in the Peterbilt cap.

“I saw myself getting a job in that coffee shop. So I took it on a lark. Figured that way, I might run into you again. And when I did, I had another memory.”

Despite himself, Grant found himself listening to this crazy woman he was sharing a table with.

“I saw your shitty white Toyota with a jazz festival sticker on its bumper and when it was you who slid behind the wheel, I knew
you
were the reason I was having memories again.”

Grant takes an awkwardly sip from his coffee mug.

“Then, just moments ago, when you said that thing about dropping me off here, it happened again.”

“What?” Grant asked.

Maddy's eyes glistened with emotion.

“Nothingness. Darkness.  But when I got out again and started after you, I immediately saw us together, here at this very table having pancakes.  I realized that I could live at least a few minutes longer if I stuck with you.”

Grant studied Maddy closely. His eyes cut furtively across the restaurant to the man in the Peterbilt cap.  He opened his mouth to tell her that he thought that the gentleman might be a good safe choice to catch a ride with from here when Thalia the waitress set a bevy of steaming plates of food before them.

“And here’s your butter and syrup and it looks like you’re okay on the coffee,” Thalia told them.  “Anything else I can get for you right now?”

“No, thank you,” Maddy and Grant again said simultaneously, this time in identical melancholy tone.

As they began preparing their pancakes, Thalia stared at them in silence for a moment with a dumb smile on her face.

Grant glanced up at her expectantly.

Thalia shook her head.  “That’s just awesome.”

“What is?” he asked.

“I mean, you guys are like in perfect sync with each other right now,” Thalia told him in a tone of amazement.  “Me and my boyfriend are like never like this.”  She gave one more disbelieving shake of her head and strode away toward the kitchen.

Maddy continued slathering butter and syrup on her pancakes, trying to hide the smirk on her face.

Grant gathered up a fork and stared down at his own stack, watching the remnants of his cube of butter slowly melt.  “You have no idea the mess I've made of my life,” he said to her.  “Believe me when I say, I can't help myself much less anyone else right now.”

“So far, you've kept me alive and that's enough for now,” she answered, slicing off a chunk and devouring it with a look of total ecstasy.

Loud hip hop music erupted from the cell phone beside Grant’s hand and he literally dropped his fork.

Maddy stopped chewing.

Grant stared down at the phone, his face a mask of indecision.  He reached for the phone, his hand hovering a few inches above it as he cleared his throat.

Her eyes narrowing, Maddy snatched the phone up from beneath his hand and pivoted slightly away from him.

“Yeah?” she answered, pressing it to her ear as Grant rose to step around the table.

“Give it to me,” he stated firmly, holding his hand out to her.

Maddy’s face grew pale as the blood drained away.  Yanking the phone away from her ear, she rose to her feet beside Grant and searched the restaurant.  “They're coming.”

Stiffening, Grant looked around.  “Who?  Mine or yours?”

“For me.  The two from the airport,” she said urgently.  “Dammit!  We stayed too long.”  Maddy hauled her satchel from beneath the table, unzipped it, seized a handful of bills from within, and tossed them to the table.

Grant looked from the open satchel to Maddy, his expression hardening.

“You've just got to trust me until I can explain,” she snapped, zipping up and rushing toward the entrance doors where they entered.

Maddy stopped, shook her head and looked back at Grant, who was standing immobile one step away from the table.  He looked from the man in the Peterbilt cap to Maddy, his face contorting with conflicted emotions.

Maddy swallowed awkwardly and closed her eyes, appearing to be in silent prayer.

“Hell!” Grant growled and started toward Maddy.