180 Days in Montauk

I'd faced danger more times than I could count. I'd been shot at and was stabbed twice. I'd had showdowns with kings and presidents, but never had I feared for the love of my life. Dammit. I wasn't going to fucking cry.

"Cynthia, you there?"

I took a deep breath and held my emotions in check. "Hold on, George. Jennifer, where's Finn right now?"

"He dropped me off and said he needed to do some shopping. You don't think..."

"George, I need to see you immediately. I'm at the clinic." I hung up and spoke to the phone. "Call Finn."

He picked up on the third ring and I could hear his echoey voice. "Aunt Cynthia, I'm driving, so I need..."

"Finn, I need you to get back to the clinic, right now."

Voice growing sharp, I could hear his sudden intake of breath. "Is Jennifer okay?" There was panic in his voice. I should have expected that reaction.

"Yes, she's fine. I need..."

"She told you what happened." He sounded disappointed. "I'll take care of it, she shouldn't have involved you."

"Involve me? Finn, if anything happened to you... Just get back here, please." My heart thumping fiercely, I looked up to see Jennifer staring at me. How obvious was I? What was she seeing?

"I'll be back to pick her up for dinner. I'll be fine. I love you, but I can take care of myself."

He hung up. I couldn't believe he just hung up on me. My eyes widened as I suddenly understood. I was being replaced. I had a position in Finn's world. I understood the pecking order of the women in Finn's life. There was Siobhan, his mother and then his Aunt Cynthia. I had been supplanted... by myself. It was what I wanted, but it still hurt.

Jennifer and I were going to have to talk, sooner than I had hoped.

George walked through the door no more than five minutes later. His movements were smooth and measured, but there was no way he could've gotten there that quickly if he was taking his time. Uncharacteristically, he rested his hand on my shoulder as I sat, and we talked. I explained what Jennifer had told me and he had her repeat everything twice. His questions came quickly, without hesitation.

Did she hear mention of their names? Did the man at the fish market seem to know them? Did the fish market have security cameras? Did she get their license plate number? Would she recognize a photo of them? Panic quelled, I felt safe, somehow, with George at my side. He exuded confidence and competence. Not for the first time, I wished that things were different, and I could be more for him.

George stood, smiled at me and patted Jennifer's hand. Pausing at the doorway before leaving, he looked back at us.

He wasn't smiling when he spoke. "I'll call when it's taken care of. Don't worry, I've got this."

Jennifer and I waited. We played rummy. And waited. I showed her how to use a Kindle. And waited. I mentally yelled at Finn or George to get back here. And waited.

Five hours later he called. I answered immediately. "George, what do you have for me?"

"I took care of it. I had to withdraw some cash. Nothing major, but I had to spread some money around to people that worked with them and Finn. The men who approached him understand the position they're in and they don't have any friends anymore. They've been isolated and understand their mistake."

"Are you sure that..."

"I may think that you spoil the kid, but you know I like Finn. It's taken care of."

"Thank you. I shouldn't have asked."

Pete drove me home. They hit Finn. I strode back to my office, slammed the door behind me and tore the rug from the wall. Almost scrawling the X through todays date, I pushed down the urge to scream or make sure those men were given a permanent, physical reminder to leave him the fuck alone.

Time was slipping by and all my hopes were pinned to hypotheticals I could barely understand.

JENNIFER

Cynthia was crazy. She had to be. This made no sense.

"I don't know what you're trying to do, but you have to know I don't believe you. That's ridiculous. You're not me. I'm me. I'm sitting right here."

"Ask me whatever you'd like. Something no one else would know, but keep in mind that I'm sixty-eight years old. I may need a minute to remember."

"Okay, I'll play along. What's my dog's name?"

"Which one? Chester or the first dog, when we were a toddler? Tippy, the mutt. Remember how she wouldn't let the babysitter near us?"

"I... okay, that was too easy. Someone could have told you. What's my favorite aroma?"

"Oh, that's good, Jennifer. Nice choice. Your actual favorite, or what you told everyone? You always said it was fresh cut grass, and we always loved that, but it wasn't my favorite. We thought it wouldn't be cool to tell people the truth. It was the combination of bacon and coffee, because it reminded you of sleepovers with Gran and Grandpa Charlie."

She just sat there, serene in the way old ladies can be. Unperturbed, stirring her tea as she dismantled my world. Until now, she had been a nice eccentric rich lady. Now, I really saw who she was. She was made of iron and I was a cog in a wheel she needed to keep spinning. And yet... there was nothing false about her. Cynthia was too damned assured.

Could she be right? I had no idea. Maybe. If she came from 1968 the normal way, year by year. But how could that be? I sort of, I don't know, teleported here. So, if she's me, she couldn't have lived through the years, right? But she was so freaking convincing. At that point, what did I have to lose by at least pretending to accept it? I'm in 2018, for crying out loud. What's one more bit of insanity?

This was too much. Head spinning, I placed my palms flat on the table. "Stop! Just... stop. You need to leave." No, this was Finn's house. I couldn't tell someone else to leave. I had to get up. I had to go. Why wouldn't my legs listen to me?

As I sat there listening to her lunacy, Cynthia continued, unperturbed. "Remember Grandpa teaching us to swim at the lake? We've had some great men in our lives, Jennifer, but none for long enough. We're going to fix that."

I screamed in my head. Why wouldn't she shut up?I'M NOT YOU! SHUT UP!

CYNTHIA

A month later, Jennifer and I were in Finn's backyard. We spent most of our time there, watching him work on his oyster farm while we talked, read and learned. He never minded, invariably grumbling, trying to sound put-out as he would make us dinner. I knew that he enjoyed having me there, but his lack of complaints about us taking over his home had more to do with not wanting to be far from Jennifer.

She had an insatiable curiosity. By now she knew about the boomerang effect of our time travel. That day she was interested in my history, or what would have been her near future. "Tell me about the seventies. What did you do with your time? How did you cope with losing Finn?"

Well, that was direct and to the point. I'd be as honest as I could, but some things are private, even from someone who was me. "I'll start with the coping. The fact is that I didn't. I spent two years in a mental institution. Part of it dealing with those creatures we sensed and the whispers, the gibberish stuck in our brain, part of it dealing with the loss of Finn. It was the worst time in my life."

I grabbed my glass from the table and refilled it from the pitcher of lemonade. She waited patiently for me to continue.

"I met some wonderful people there who helped pull me out, mentally, and put me back together, but I don't like to think about that time. What else? Well, I made few investments due to the value of the gold I held. The investments I did make did well. I gave some candidates some information before it was available elsewhere and made sure they remembered who put them in power."

I paused, looking out over the water, remembering friends and colleagues lost and those still with us.

"And then I got involved in the weird stuff. I think it was the guilt from the poor dog in the cage. I've never been able to forget him. I developed acquaintances who grew to be friends. They had the same goal as I did. Shut down idiots experimenting with things that should be left alone. That goal was expanded, though. Soon we were just dealing with all sorts of weirdness and making sure it wasn't dangerous."

"Like what?"

"Well, let's see. Elvis and Jim Morrison actually did die. They weren't in hiding. But Jack Parsons? Still alive in the seventies."

Jennifer was taken aback by that. "Jim Morrison is dead?"

"Yes, sorry. I keep forgetting how much is new to you. So, Parsons who supposedly died in the fifties was alive and well during a flood in 1972. Working with some members of the Order of the Golden Dawn, he was trying to use the deaths of the flood victims to power a spell. He actually did die that night."

"He was an inventor, right?"

"He founded Jet Propulsion Laboratories. He was brilliant, but nuts. A few years later we found out that there was no Hall of Records under the sphinx. We ran into some trouble there. That was the first time I had to shoot a man. It was also the first time I met George. He was working for Mossad. Some cultists were incensed that we were intruding on their turf. It got pretty ugly. Oh, those days were wonderful. Adventures had, friends made. But it's much better looking back on it than it was living it."

More time slipped by, like water through my fingers. I used the red marker that morning. Three months. July eighth.

Jennifer rested her hand on my forearm. "You know he loves you, right? Every conversation we have where other people would talk about their parents or grandparents, he talks about you."

Trying to reassure her with a smile, I replied. "I know. I'm just not used to him being angry with me. After seeing him growing up, I'm not used to his being his own man."

It had been months, but Finn was still a little upset about George's interference. He had a young man's pride and didn't like someone else settling his accounts on any level. Other clammers now avoided him. He could tell they were afraid. Finn was no longer a colleague. He'd never again stop off at a local bar to lift a pint with the men who also made their trade on the water.

Of course, he blamed me, and he was right to do so. Finn knew who George worked for. What irked him even further, was knowing Jennifer tipped me off. He trusted us and we were supposed to trust him.

And here we sat, Jennifer and I, day after day in Finn's backyard. He'd look up and glower when he saw us looking at him. When he thought I didn't see him, there was love in his eyes. For both of us, but different for Jennifer than for me, and that broke my heart a bit every time I saw it. Those looks of wonder, the gaze of a hunter, the tender glances were mine my first time through 2018 and now they were hers.

Dink would run about, chasing butterflies and the occasional seagull as Jennifer sat on her wooden chaise lounge devouring book after book on everything she termed math. We had tutors come and spend time with us. They were patient when we would pause to bring Finn lunch or lemonade, as he alternated between smiles and scowls. With the amount I was paying the tutors, they had a vested interest in being patient.

I tried to absorb as much as possible about genetics, gene therapy and how I could make myself as biologically close as possible to my eighteen-year-old version. George had flown in experts from everywhere. Money wasn't an issue, and having my own jet helped. I'd spend hours with them asking my questions and taking notes. I accumulated a murderer's row of leading figures in the field and filled their pockets as we went along.

If everything went to plan, I would be gone in a few months. Finn and Jennifer needed a George. A fixer. Someone discreetly capable. I had my George look into it. He would stay a few years and oversee the training of whoever he thought they would need. I'd be back once more in 1968, but George would be here to guide them and then retire a very wealthy man. Contingency planning took up a great deal of my time.

I had Jennifer on-board with all our weirdness and was teaching her as much as possible about power and how to wield it. She would be inheriting most of my money and holdings. Things were progressing better than I thought possible until that startlingly beautiful day, without a cloud in the sky and a cool breeze rolling off the ocean.

The pain rolled over me like a tsunami. Blocking out the screams became easier when I realized I was the one screaming. My hands clutching my head, I was leaning forward in my chair staring at the ground as the red splotches stained the green grass. Blood drip, drip, dripped from my nose and I took deep, ragged breaths.

Jennifer lay on her side on the ground, Dink whining as he pushed his huge head against her shoulder. His pressure caused her to roll over on her back and I saw the amount of blood on her lower face. Mine were drips and hers looked like a torrent.

Through all the pain, through the yelling of Finn as he ran our way, through the concern for Jennifer, I heard them. The whispers were back.They were pushing through andthey were hungry.

JENNIFER

I stood in Finn's backyard. The grass was blackened and lying close to the ground, trees were withered and bare. A chilling zephyr floated off the water. His cabin cruiser listed to its side, the pier to the oyster farm in disrepair, missing planks like teeth in the irregular smile of a meth addict.

Alone. No sound. No Dink. No Finn.

The sky was a cloudless maelstrom of dark oranges and reds. The colors shifted and slowly collided, forming a muddled mélange of hues. My eyes were pulled to the indistinct sun, an oily smear blocking its radiance, muting it. As I watched, the smear moved, propelling itself forward. Huge beyond compare. A floating leviathan claiming dominance over all that crawled, swam or flew. The whispers emanating from the creature were no longersotto voce.

There was clarity. I finally understood. The whispers were no longer a foreign language. They spoke of alienation, death, feeding and cold indifference. It laid claim. We were vermin on its world, inconsequential and beneath notice. I could sense everything, but there was almost nothing to sense. Life everywhere was diminishing, growing faint. They feasted.

There was no Finn.

I awoke screaming, tearing one of the needles out of my arm in my flailing.

There was an older gentleman sitting in the chair in my room. His voice was light, gentle and precise. "Your young man is speaking with your doctor. He will return to you soon. He will always return to you. Do not fear. They feed on fear." He raised his hand, holding up a finger as if to signify a thought of great significance. "Their time has not come. It may never come."

Diminutive and bald, the man's age was beyond determining. He could be seventy. He could be a hundred. His eyes. Something in his kind eyes reassured me, calmed me. He was dressed in a cotton suit that would have been appropriate for the Kentucky Derby. His tie matched the yellow of the suit and his shoes matched the blue of the shirt. The look was... incongruent. He had a sing-song way of speaking, odd lilting of words. I assumed he was Indian or Pakistani by his appearance, but it was hard to judge. He was dark of skin and straight of hair.

He had the strangest way of speaking. No contractions and somehow formal phrasing. "Someone will have to see to your arm. You had lost some blood. You needed fluids. Now you lose more. Cynthia is doing better. In some ways, age has helped. She is in Wardenclyffe. She has mentioned this place to you?"

My left hand clutched my right forearm where the IV had been. My voice was raspy. "No." I coughed lightly and tried again. "No."

"It is where your scientist Tesla did his experiments. He was a man who saw far. Cynthia has a plan. She always has a plan. She is good in that." He smiled at me, his teeth large, full and pristinely white. "I'm good with people. She is good with plans. I am Duhnagaham, Miss. I have been waiting to meet you. We will go to Cynthia when you are able."

Debilitating pain rolled in and receded in cycles. It felt like something had torn in my brain. Nausea fought against understanding and I felt like I was pushing my thoughts through cheese-cloth.

"It will pull back, Miss. You are young and resilient. Cynthia is old and strong. The pain will leave soon."

Finn stormed into the room, looking as if to launch into my arms. He drew himself up short and stood at the side of the bed, leaning forward, arms outstretched, hesitating and then pulling back. Reaching forward again tentatively, hand eventually resting on my arm, his eyes red.

"I'm fine, Finn." I reached up and cupped his cheek. "I'm fine. We need to leave." I looked over at the small man that I had never met nor heard of, nodding towards him. "He's going to take us to Cynthia."

CYNTHIA

It felt as though the days were giant dominoes, each tipping over the next as time marched on. Today was day one-hundred-thirty-four and there was so much left to learn, so much more to do. I would have been upset by any distractions, but if this wasn't resolved, there wouldn't be a future for Finn and Jennifer, or anyone else for that matter.

George stood by my wheelchair as I spoke to the foreman. Sitting was frustrating, but the migraines would come suddenly, stripping my legs of strength and stealing my balance. Vertigo was a frequent visitor.

As always, he sensed my concerns. "Is it useless for me to suggest that you stop worrying? I made some calls. We technically shouldn't be here, but no one's going to question us. Your donations after Elon Musk backed off bought us a lot of leeway."

The money to restore Tesla's laboratory originally came from the cartoonist that runsThe Oatmeal. He started the crowd funding. I covered everything else. My people told them that we were working on a surprise that would attract visitors from around the world.

I couldn't help asking questions to which I already knew the answers. "All the pieces are up to snuff?"

Without looking at him I knew that he was rolling his eyes. "Yes, Cynthia. They've been sitting in storage for three years. They've been checked time and again. It's the most detailed erector set ever completed.

We had hundreds of men and women moving about as plans and schematics came to life. Cranes lifted huge metal sections and craftsmen affixed them in place.

Tesla's wireless tower was being brought back to life.

George had our people hire as many tradespeople as possible. Speed was of the essence.They were pushing and the membrane keepingthem from our world grew thin here. Mort's people could map the striations and see the weakest point. To no one's surprise, it was the area of Camp Hero.

"Where are we meeting Mort and his men?"

He pointed over to the future site of the main public attraction. "I thought the museum building would be best." He rolled me over there and we entered, seeing a gathering of about ten somber competent looking men. Just men.

Clearing my throat, I got their attention. "Gentlemen," I paused, looking at each face. "and Mort, I know this isn't the place or time, but there's a dozen of us here and I'm the only woman. Really?"

I went back to addressing the group. "Anyway, I'm sure you all know something about what is going on. Our best understanding is that other realities stack up right against ours and are separated by the thinnest of barriers. Incredibly strong barriers, but thin. If something breached them, it would be catastrophic."

The testosterone filled room was filled with nodding heads. I stood and went on. "Nikola Tesla knew this. His tower was publicly described as being created to distribute wireless energy. In reality, it was designed to strengthen those barriers. Wireless energy was a nice bonus. We're going to get his tower running and hopefully keep our reality here and other realities there. Say a prayer, rub a rabbit's foot, whatever you believe in, do it. Something is coming. If we don't stop it, everything ends."