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Eventually, the tribe settled down to sleep. Selah assigned a rotating watch amongst the women of the cave to be sure the fire kept burning through the night.

No one wanted to wake in the morning with their fire gone once again.

Billy lay awake for a long time. He understood through Teba’s memories that the people of the tribe typically awoke with the dawn and fell asleep when dark came again. Because, especially in winter, this meant many hours were spent in darkness
trying
to sleep, many of them woke up part way through the night. This frightening part of the night was spent listening fearfully to the denizens of darkness and imagining that horrible beasts prowled about.

However, Billy was used to staying up in the evenings. He would have been watching TV or going out to bars in the evening back home. This night, he lay thinking about what other ideas he might introduce to improve the life of the tribe. He knew that Teba and the other tribespeople were looking forward to breaking open the wolf’s bones and sucking out the marrow in the morning. Then, now that they had fire, the bones would be heated in water to make a soup. Billy was hoping that if he/she twisted the bones until they broke, some of them might break in a spiral fashion to produce a sharp point.

Maybe he’d be able to jam that point on the end of the staff he’d cut earlier today, making a spear.

He thought, I need to do something about this damn tooth…

Maybe…

Billy woke the next morning in his own bed. Kim was gone. She’d left a note, “Not as easy as you thought, was it?”

Despite searching for her, or anyone who’d ever known or even seen her, Billy never managed to make contact with Kim again.

I said, “But you
did
find it easy, right?”

Billy blinked at me, a look of bewilderment on his face, “Weren’t you
listening
?!”

“Yeah. You were only there for a day, and you fed the tribe ‘til they were stuffed
and
brought them fire!”

He shook his head, “Those wolves came this close,” he held his fingers up, an eighth of an inch apart, “to eating me!” He thumped his jaw, “That tooth that hurt? It probably had an abscess and could easily have killed me. All these things I thought I could introduce—from swords, to knives, to metallurgy and blacksmithing, to spears, atlatls, bows and arrows—I couldn’t even
start
!”

I shrugged, “Yeah, but you taught them how to start fires! That had to be huge! Teba gained a lot of prestige from it, so you sure as
hell
made a big difference for her.”

Billy shook his head back and forth for a moment, then eventually shrugged acceptance. “Yes, it
was
huge. And I still kind of believe that if I’d stayed there for months, I
could’ve
given them better spears and maybe a spear thrower of some kind.” He got a distant look, “Maybe with
years
I could’ve figured out how to make a bow and arrow. Metal and swords though,” he shook his head. “Maybe in a lifetime, if the tribe were willing to feed me while I piddled around trying to figure it out.” He looked deep into my eyes, “But lives were short back then man! That bad tooth? I had other teeth in rough shape, they just weren’t completely rotten like the molar that hurt so bad. The people in my tribe were
all
missing teeth here and there, so Teba wasn’t particularly worse off than they were. Their skin was pockmarked and unhealthy looking. Several of them limped. If I understood their system right, Teba counted eighteen summers and thought she was
old
, because only three people in the tribe had lived to count twenty.”

“Well,” I said, “I
still
think you beat Kim at her little game. Introducing fire in just one day had to be huge.”

“Yeah…” he trailed off a beatific expression on his face. “It was.” Then he shook his head, “But it was nothing compared to what I
thought
I could do. And I am
so
grateful to be back here…”

He sat a moment, staring into space, looking… wistful. I couldn’t get over how different he looked. A changed man, so to speak. After watching him for a minute I said, “So, what. You look like you’ve got more to say—or maybe some deep thoughts to relate? Maybe you want to go back there?”

He looked up at me with a startled expression, “
Hell
no
, I don’t want to go back there.” He paused for a moment’s thought, “But on the other hand I feel ashamed…”

He didn’t say anything more for a bit, so I prompted, “Ashamed of what?”

He turned to look me in the eye. “Teba’s still back there, hungry, downtrodden, getting raped by that asshole Bant. Her son Gano—who
I
love because Teba loved him—Bant hits him too. A lot. I didn’t solve that problem,” he shrugged, “maybe I made it worse.” He looked off into the distance, “And I really don’t know
how
I could have solved it. The guy’s a monster by modern standards, someone who taught me just how much of a jerk guys have been down through history…” He looked away, then back at me, “And still are! I’ve been a manipulative bastard myself and it makes me… ashamed. And angry. I’m not as bad as Bant, but… still, I regret the way I’ve acted…” He glanced at me again and gave a little grin, “I
really
want to go back and give Bant a little attitude adjustment.” He shook his head, “Actually, I
want
to go back and kill him, but the tribe really can’t afford to lose him.”

He snorted, “I’m not so good at these moral judgments…” He looked up at me, “But, by God, I’m gonna get better.”

He stared off into space again for a bit, then concluded by saying, “And, if that’s what Kim really wanted, then
she
won… didn’t she?”

The End

What if - you went back in time?

Would
your modern knowledge really make you king of the hill? And even if it did, wouldn’t you still wish you were back in modern times? Even those who we think are
poverty-stricken
here in the United States actually live
better
than the kings of yore (warmer housing; better, cleaner clothing; more varieties of food, with priceless spices easily obtained; flush toilets; heated water; bathing; telephones; televisions; music on demand; fast transportation; far less disease; and free basic education), but we seldom give it any thought.

Actually, most of the time, we just complain…

GUITAR GIRL

Keith walked out onto the patio of the Piña Colada Bar where his band, The Sons of Beaches, had been gigging for the summer. Typical for this time of day, the patio was nearly empty. A young couple had their heads bent together over a big umbrella drink they were sharing with a pair of straws. Over to one side, a slender girl sprawled back in a chair that faced out toward the ocean. Her body looked cute, though Keith could only see it from behind. What caught his attention was the fact that she had an electric guitar in her lap. She plucked idly at the strings, eyes on the surf, listening to her instrument through a pair of earphones.

Giving her little thought, Keith busied himself uncovering their equipment and powering it up. His band had a little stage at one end of the big patio. By the end of a typical evening, they’d have a pretty good crowd. Some sitting at the bar near the back of the patio, some at the tables scattered around the patio and some out on the nearby beach. Early in the evening, they’d play mellow stuff for the people having dinner. Later, people would be dancing and the band would try to play stuff that fit whatever kind of crowd they had that night. They took pride in being able to play a wide variety of music and usually being able to find a groove that made the crowd happy.

Dave showed up and checked on his drum kit. He took his cymbals home every night, so he had to set them back up. He settled onto the throne and ran through a very short drum solo that made sure everything sounded okay and confirmed that the kit was miked correctly. By then Bernie had arrived, tuned his bass guitar and jacked it into the sound system.

Satisfied, Bernie gave Keith a nod. Keith played a sustained D chord on the keys, bringing the volume up slowly with his pedal. Bernie bobbed his head a couple of times, then started thumping strings on the bass. Dave brought in a beat on the drums and a few seconds later, having finished the intro, Keith leaned forward and sang, “Nibblin’ on sponge cake…”

As they worked their way through Margaritaville, Keith saw the girl reach up and pull out one of her earphones. It looked to him like she wondered what she was hearing. Earphone out, she turned to look back over her shoulder and saw the band. Curious as to how she would react, Keith kept an eye on her.

The girl turned back to look out to sea, then looked down the beach to the right and the left. He got the impression that she was looking for some convenient quiet place to go, now that the band had taken over the patio. Evidently, she didn’t see anything satisfactory, because she kind of shrugged then leaned her chair so that it rose onto one back leg. Shuffling her feet, she pivoted the chair on that single leg until she was facing the band. His eyes widened. He’d thought she might be cute when he’d seen her body from behind. Now he saw her from the front—the girl was hot!

She settled the chair, then adjusted her earphones. She reinserted the one she’d pulled out, but Keith thought she’d put it in loosely. She tugged on the other one, Keith suspected to loosen it as well. Fitting his impression that she’d loosened both earplugs so she could hear the band, she started playing the guitar again. She changed chords when the song changed, so Keith felt pretty certain that she was playing along with them.

At first, Keith felt surprised to see that she had the chord progression of Margaritaville down pat. Keith mostly played keyboards, but he also played guitar on a few songs. He’d certainly played enough that he could see that she was fingering the correct chords. She didn’t hesitate as she played, or make sudden moves on the fretboard suggesting that she’d played something incorrectly, so, even though he couldn’t
hear
what she was playing, he was pretty sure she was playing it well.

His surprise only grew as the band played song after song in a wide variety of genres and styles. Either she knew
every
one, or she faked it better than anyone he’d ever seen.

By the time they’d finished their first set, Keith’s curiosity was overwhelming him. Their little band played a little something for everyone, new to old, classic rock, to pop, to country, to reggae, to hip-hop. After all, they were trying to keep a broad variety of customers happy, though he worried sometimes that it meant there was something in their set list for each customer to dislike as well. In any case, it seemed to him that it had to be
extremely
unlikely that anyone would know
all
the songs they’d played unless they’d had the set list and studied them.

He wondered if their little band might have just captured itself a groupie. Someone who’d listened to them many times before. It seemed highly unlikely that a good-looking young girl like this one could be interested in a three piece band made up of guys in their late thirties, but he could dream, couldn’t he?

As they took their break, Keith wandered back to the bar where Nicole had his soda water and lime ready. Usually, he went back in the band’s dressing room and checked email on his phone, but this time he wandered out to where the girl was sitting, wondering how to strike up a conversation. She’d turned back to face the surf and was staring out over the water, still idly playing her guitar.

Standing to the side and just barely closer to the beach, he turned and watched her out of the corner of his eye. The first thing that struck him as he saw her close-up was that she wasn’t just pretty, like he’d thought.

The girl was stunning!

Trying not to stare like a creep, he focused his eyes on the guitar. He didn’t recognize it. It didn’t have a brand emblazoned on it and didn’t look like any guitar he’d ever seen before. Nonetheless, everything about it seemed to be very well-made with excellent fit and finish. He was put off, though, by an extensive array of switches and knobs and buttons practically covering its body. His first impression was of a guitar made for some kind of technophile who couldn’t really play. The kind who thought that if his instrument had enough fancy tone controls, it’d make up for a lack of talent.

Then Keith’s eyes tracked to the fingers working the neck of her guitar because she’d just bent the strings like a blues guitarist. Then her fingers started flying around the fretboard like a classical guitarist.
It really
looks
like this girl can play!
However, he felt a little put off by the fact that she had a large ring on her ring finger. It was plain silver and covered much of the back of her finger. It didn’t seem to get in the way of her playing very much, but he found it odd that a serious guitarist would wear such a large piece of jewelry on their playing hand.

Keith could faintly hear the notes on the unamplified electric guitar over the sound of the surf and the customers who’d started filling the patio bar, but what he heard sounded good. It wasn’t a song he’d ever heard before, but he already liked it.

Wondering how to get her attention, he looked at her face and realized she was eyeing him. He gave her a little two-fingered wave.

She reached up and pulled out an earphone. “Hi. You play keyboards in the band, right?”

Keith nodded, then gave a little wave at the guitar, “You look like you play pretty well yourself. What kind of guitar is that?”

“I’ve got a friend who makes them.”

Keith’s experience with instruments made by guys in small shops was limited, but the ones he’d seen had been big on gee-whiz and low on actual sound quality. Still, it looked well-constructed, as if whoever’d made it was technically competent at least. Maybe her buddy really did turn out a decent instrument. “It looked like you were playing along with us in our first set. Did you really know
all
those songs?”