“Hello Jeff!” greeted the man behind the sole counter of the one-room, dingy store at the end of the strip mall. Without the greeting, he would have doubted that this was the right place, despite it matching the address. The instructions on the advertisement hadn’t exactly been clear, and there were no signs on the exterior of the building, save for the large Unit 55 above the door.
“How did you know my name’s Jeff?”
“Oh, I’m a time traveler, I know lots of things!”
Shrugging his shoulders, Jeff figured that was a point in the man’s favor. It was thus far the only point in his favor, he thought while looking about the room, unsure of how to proceed. There were no products on the walls, no shelves or advertisements, just grey paint with dust and water damage. The single fluorescent light flickered overhead. There wasn’t even a price list on the counter. He approached it anyway.
“What brings you in today?” the time traveler asked, breaking the silence.
“Nightmares.”
The time traveler held up his hands and started walking out from behind the counter. “Sorry buddy, I can’t travel through dreams. That’s a whole different technology that I don’t fuck with.”
“You misunderstand,” Jeff replied. “The nightmares are memories.”
The time traveler stopped and looked Jeff up and down. “Explain.”
Jeff drew in a shaky breath. Where to start? This wasn’t something he’d talked about to anybody, not even his wife. Which is why he needed to go back in time and fix things, so that he wouldn’t have to talk about it. He didn’t like talking about his problems, but they were eating him alive. The nightmares kept him awake all night and the memories kept him preoccupied all day.
It used to be that every single decision he made was to get further away from his past and try to forget it, but eventually the years had dulled some of the anger and confusion. With that, Jeff had thought he’d gotten better, thought that he’d be able to handle his past, until his first son had been born. Since that night, every moment had been spent in terror. He couldn’t keep living like this.
“Out with it! I haven’t got all day!” the time traveler barked.
Jeff looked around at the conspicuously empty room, but decided against commenting on what other plans the shop keeper might have. Best to just explain what he needed and get the worst of it out now, to this stranger, so he’d finally be able to move on.
“My dad beat me,” he said, all in a rush. Then he looked up, expecting the man in front of him to have some sort of reaction; for him to flinch or his eyes to fill with pity. There was nothing. He continued. “I thought I was over it, until I had children of my own. Now, every night, I wake up from nightmares that I’m hurting them. I can’t sleep, I keep my wife up, I’m—”
“Let me stop you right there,” the time traveler interrupted, “I don’t care about the why. Only the when, what, and where.”
Jeff took in another deep, shaky breath. This information was easier. “1994, 238 Miller Rd, I want to stop my dad.”
The time traveler perked right up and hopped back behind his desk.
“Excellent! Let me see, ‘94, just down the road, easy enough activity… that’ll be $4500, paid up front.”
“Oh, erm, do you take card?” Jeff asked, patting his pockets to find his wallet.
“Absolutely.”
A few more minutes and a much lighter wallet found Jeff in a dark back room with the time traveler. He pushed down the unease that came up, like bile in his throat. He had to do this. For his family.
“Ready?” the time traveler asked, but before Jeff could respond, the room was swirling. His insides were being ripped apart. He bent over and vomited onto the brown shag carpet of his childhood home. He tried to right himself, but only managed to vomit again.
“Rough your first time, eh?” the time traveler chuckled.
Jeff didn’t bother to respond, he was too focused on righting himself and taking deep breaths to quell the nausea. The room stank of stale cigarettes. Home sweet home.
“Let’s get this over with,” he muttered, before leaving the room to find his father.
It was night. The man was sleeping in his room, snores disturbing the air around him. Jeff turned on the light and stormed over to him, waking him up before he got there. The man who used to be his father looked groggily confused until he recognized what was going on, at which point he snapped to attention and opened his mouth. Jeff didn’t let him get a sound out before he punched him in his stomach and leaned down.
“Stop hitting your kids,” he threatened, “or I’ll be back.”
His father wheezed in response. Jeff tried not to feel the joy that flushed through him after hurting his father. He punched him once more for good measure, not because he liked it, and then felt disgusted with both himself and the man in front of him. Turning around, he stormed out. He was ready to go back to his time and forget this ever happened. He was ready to finally live a peaceful life with his wife and be the father that his children deserved.
But as Jeff closed the door to his dad’s room, he noticed that his hands were fading. The tips of his fingers weren’t there at all anymore. The rest of the room was solid, so it wasn’t that he was returning to his own time.
“What’s happening to me?!” he cried out, looking frantically around as more of him began to disappear.
“It worked!” the time traveler replied cheerily. “Your past you changed, so the future you will be different. You can’t continue to be as you are.”
“But my wife! My kids!”
“It’s fine, it’s ok” the time traveler soothed. “You didn’t marry your wife, your kids don’t exist. They can’t miss you!”
Jeff looked like he wanted to argue further, but there wasn’t enough substance left of him to get the words out. The time traveler thought about providing additional comfort, but there was little point with the rate he was ceasing to exist. This was why he took payment in advance. Oh well, another job done, another happy customer. With the press of a button, he returned to the present and stood behind his desk.
A man walked into his small, dingy store front.
“Hello Jeff!” he greeted.
The man looked momentarily confused, double checking the address outside of the shop, before asking “How did you know my name’s Jeff?”
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