The Relapse Door

"So were your ancestors from Mascawad?" Tom asked her. "Is that why your family came back here?"

"No, my ancestors were from a place called, oh, I can never recall the name...Floda? Floridium..."

"Florida?" Tom asked.

"Ah, yes, that's it. Florida."

"I've never been there," Tom admitted. "But I've heard the beaches are terrific. Have you been?"

"It isn't there anymore," Sarah said.

At the corner of 4th and High -- or so it had been called in Tom's day -- Sarah guided him into a restaurant on the spot where Tom recalled the post office. As she led him through the swinging doors between the white pillars that marked the building, a cheer came up from inside. "It's him!" "Welcome!" And all sorts of oohs and ahhs from the children.

"I'm afraid you'll have to get used to that," Sarah told him, pushing him quickly towards a stairwell to the right while Tom waved at the grateful strangers. "I hate to put so much pressure on you, but it's just as well you know what you may be up against."

"Against?" Tom asked. I didn't see anybody against me there!"

"There are certain things I haven't told you yet," Sarah admitted, guiding him up the stairs. "That's what breakfast is for." Atop the stairs, she directed him along the balcony to a private dining room with glass doors. Inside the room, a bald man with a dark beard was sitting at the table, dressed in a blue coat and work pants, with his hat beside him on the table. When he saw Sarah and Tom, he jumped up and came to the door to greet them.

"Tom! It is an honor, sir," and he held out his hand for Tom to shake. "I am Professor Baron. I'm here to brief you."

"Brief me on what?" Tom asked. "Sir, I'm happy to help if I can, but everyone here is treating me like some kind of hero and I don't even know what I'm supposed to do!"

"I'm afraid that's partially my fault," Sarah said. "Have a seat, both of you, and I'll fill in some of the blanks for you, Tom. Have you ordered breakfast, Baron?"

"Of course," the older man said. "Now just what does Tom know and what doesn't he know? We haven't got a lot of time."

Sarah poured two glasses of water from the pitcher, Baron having already helped himself, and bade Tom sit beside her. "Tom," she began, "I'm afraid I was less than completely honest with you last night. Everything I said was true, mind you, but there were things I left off, and now that we have had our fun I must tell all. One reason -- mind I say one reason -- why I was so eager to make love to you last night was --"

"Sarah!" Tom exclaimed, pointing at Baron.

"It's perfectly fine, Tom," Baron reassured him. Many of the things that were taboo in your day are perfectly acceptable to discuss today. Including sexual relations. Is that not correct, Sarah?" he added with a knowing grin, reaching out to touch her hand.

"Indeed it is," Sarah replied with a similarly amused grin. "The stories I could tell you about each other...but I digress. Tom, one of several reasons why I was so uninhibited last night is that there may be very little time for our idyllic little world. You may well be our savior; but if not, I fear we may be in the ground stages of another apocalypse."

"From the door to the past," Tom said, suddenly putting certain pieces together.

"So you did tell him about that," Baron said.

"No, actually," Sarah told him. "Tom, I think you're smarter than you give yourself credit for."

"Thanks," Tom said. "No, certain things just came together for me. Last night you said Darcie -- I mean Margarethe -- had caught a lot of men coming through the door, and not good ones."

"That's right," Baron confirmed.

"I think I just realized who those other men were. And my son of a bitch boss not only lied to me about it back in my time, he also set me up to disappear just like they did. Maybe I was a guinea pig to see if it was safe to go in those woods."

"Yes, we understand the door to the past opens into what was a forest just before the apocalypse," Baron said. "Is that right, Tom?"

"Yes, and that forest was about to be destroyed. And it's partly my fault. I knew I shouldn't have taken that job!" Tom was near tears.

"What job?" Sarah asked.

"Please don't hate me," Tom began, but he was interrupted by a rap at the door. There stood a plump young woman in a blue dress with a tray full of food. Sarah got up and let her in.

"Breakfast is served," the young woman said cheerfully, setting down her tray. It was loaded with scrambled eggs, grilled ham, fresh bread and butter, and a steaming jug of what Tom hoped was coffee.

"Thank you, Sally," Baron said, standing up and withdrawing a billfold from his pocket. "What is the charge this morning?"

"Oh, none, sir!" Sally said nervously, grinning down at Tom. "Mrs. Rogers saw who Sarah brought in here and she insisted that it all be on the house!"

"Really, Sally..." Sarah began.

"It's not my decision, ma'am, though I agree with it. I'm under strict orders not to accept any money from either of you!" Turning to Tom, she said, "Begging your pardon, Mister Tom, may I have your autograph?" She withdrew a tiny book and a pencil from somewhere in the folds of her dress and handed it to him.

"Why, certainly!" Tom, confused and scared though he was, couldn't deny the perks of his newfound celebrity. "To Sally, is it?"

"Yes, that's right," Sally squeaked, watching him write out the dedication and sign it. "Thank you so much!" To Sarah she said, "Might we be seeing you at the beach today, doctor?" As she asked, she cast an eager look at Tom, who knew she was already imagining what he looked like naked; he eagerly returned the favor.

"You might if you can keep your mouth shut about Tom's future whereabouts," Sarah told her.

"Oh, I can!" Sally reassured her. "Certainly I can! Thank you." Still grinning, she backed out of the room and shut the door carefully.

"Now then," said Baron, pouring Tom some of the hot drink, which obviously wasn't coffee. "Have some floral tea and tell us what you were going to say about your job?"

"Floral tea," Tom repeated. "I've never had that."

"I do hope you were not expecting coffee, Tom," Sarah said. "We understand that was very popular in your time. Nowadays it is rare and expensive in this part of the world. The beans are grown only in the Midwest, and the shipping charges are rather high."

"Coffee in the Midwest?" By now Tom was beyond surprise at such things, however, and he took a sip of the floral tea. Bitter but pleasant enough. "Hmm, that's great, thanks. Yes, my job, Baron. I am ashamed to admit it, actually, and I was even back then, but my best friend Jim, he had a cousin who had contacts with a logging company around here, and I'm afraid we both took jobs with it. I'm sorry. It's just that Jim and I both grew up quite poor, and like everyone else we were in denial about global warming, and...yeah. I'm sorry."

"Tom, there is no need to apologize to us," Sarah reassured him. "Your very presence here proves your heart was and is in the right place."

"Indeed," agreed Baron. "But we may need your help in fighting that logging company now. Allow me to make an educated guess that when you were abducted, this company was attacking the land around the door to the past?"

"They were about to," Tom admitted between bites of his breakfast. "My job was to scout out the land where they were to cut."

"I have suspected as much," Baron said. "As Sarah may have told you, Margarethe has encountered numerous men on similar missions to yours over the past several months. And you say your boss told you of their disappearance?"

"Yes and no," Tom said. "He said a few guys had disappeared, but he didn't say who or how many. And he made it sound like it was only a couple, the sort of thing people tell horror stories about. I thought he was only trying to spook me."

"There have been at least eight," Sarah said, "and those are just the ones Margarethe has chosen to tell us of. We fear there may have been more and she simply did not want to create a widespread panic. People are already feeling very uneasy as it is. It has been a steady occurrence for nearly eight months now."

"Just as long as our company has been cutting around here," Tom confirmed. "Christ, I knew I was wrong to take that job!" He threw down his utensils in consternation. "I'm so sorry!" he wailed.

"Tom," Baron said gently, "No one person bears responsibility for the apocalypse or what came after it. It was a societal failure; everyone failed to take the problem seriously until it was too late. Your mistake was only that: a mistake. Besides, you have the opportunity to help prevent it from happening again."

"How?" Tom asked. Then he turned to Sarah, "You mentioned this too. What is it we're afraid is going to happen?"

"Well, Tom," Sarah explained gently, "As your company encroaches upon the area around the door to the past, there is a very real risk of a deluge of people from your era slipping through. Margarethe may not be able to thwart them all at once."

"We have feared the possibility for some time," Baron added. "But until recently by your calendar, hardly any human being came anywhere near the door. Those who did were mostly of the variety who had a healthy respect for nature."

"Campers," Tom said knowingly. "That's what I hoped it would be like for Jim and me when we came up north."

"Jim?" Sarah asked.

"My best friend. The one who got me the job."

"I see," Sarah replied.

"In any event," Baron continued. "Now is the gravest danger we have had yet. Should the misplaced values of your time -- forgive me, Tom, but your generation did nearly destroy the world -- should they be imported into our own era, they will have a waiting audience with both morbid curiosity and a desire for the creature comforts of your era that got so out of control."

"You saw that yourself down in the street just this morning, Tom," Sarah reminded him. "The past few generations have worked very hard to learn from the mistakes of the past and live in harmony with the earth, within her capacity. But no sooner had the land below the far north become inhabitable again than an undercurrent of greed arose in society. Likely as not, it never really went away at all, but just lay undetected while we were all struggling to keep humanity from perishing entirely. Now that we have succeeded, the desire is growing to return to the old ways. We can trust you not to perpetuate those desires, Tom. But if people like those boys were to meet a real live relic of your era with fewer scruples, I fear we cannot be sure of containing the threat to our sensibility that has enabled us to live in such harmony with nature for these past centuries."

"I see," Tom said with a heavy sigh. He understood all too well, remembering how he had sold out his own principles for the promise of a decent paycheck.

"Sensors, like Margarethe, have predicted for generations that one day a potential calamity like this could visit us from the past," Baron continued. "There is a prophecy, dating at least to the twenty-third century -- long before Mascawad was re-settled -- that one day a good-hearted member of the last generation before the Hot Era would appear among us, and that person would enable a closing of the rift in time, thus ending the risk of the pestilence of the past re-infecting us."

"It could be you, Tom," Sarah said. "The way Margarethe appeared to you indicates it is you."

"What do you mean, the way she appeared to me?"

"Like your ideal woman, you said, the one you had always lusted after."

"That's right," Tom said. "My swimming teacher, Darcie."

"Indeed," Baron continued. "Margarethe always appears to others as the most beautiful woman they can imagine. Of course beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so each individual's ideal is different. Different height, shape, breast size, even her race varies. This Darcie is apparently your ideal, so you saw her in Margarethe."

"The prophecy also states that should the hero prevail, he and Margarethe shall live happily ever after," Sarah told him. "Just imagine, you could marry your very own sex goddess!"

"What the prophecy has never made clear, though," Baron said more soberly, "is whether that person would succeed in closing the rift. It says only that he 'would enable' it. As you know, Tom, we humans do not always accomplish all that we are able to do."

"Story of my life," Tom admitted.

"Don't talk like that, Tom," Sarah said. "That is not the strong, capable young man I knew last night."

Tom poured himself some more tea and stood up with his mug. "I'm afraid that man wasn't who I really have been," Tom said. "Heck, that's why I was stupid enough to take that logging job in the first place. Well, that and Jim, anyway. Hell, I've always followed Jim around like a puppy, if you want to know the truth."

"So you really love this Jim, do you?" Sarah asked, looking a bit surprised. "I wouldn't have guessed that about you after how you admired my body and made love to me."

Tom laughed. "Not like that, I don't love him, no."

"Not that there's anything wrong with that," Baron said with a somber nod.

"That survived the Hot Era, did it?" Tom asked with another laugh.

"It's one of several proverbs from your era that are of obscure origin, but we have found them time and again in ancient books and manuscripts. We respect the scholarly literature of your time."

Tom managed not to laugh. "Wow. Anyway, yeah, I love Jim like a brother. That's one reason why I got in this mess. We've been best friends all our lives, always there for one another when nobody else was, I mean always. From age seven onward, anytime we needed to hide out from one of our mothers because of something we'd done, or if one of them had a boyfriend who was abusing us, or if someone else at school was hassling us, we were always there for each other. Always had each other's back like it was our own. And there was one time when we were eleven, well, we never talk about it now, but I saved him from something really humiliating and ever since then I could count on him to be there for me like no one else. Sometimes he was all I had, life was like that in our neighborhood. We didn't feel sorry for ourselves or anything, we just did the best we could. But we wanted out."

"And this job enabled you to get out?" Sarah asked.

"Yeah!" Tom said. "That's the only reason why I let him talk me into taking it. Well, that plus we got to get out of our crummy hometown and up to the lovely Maine woods, even if we were also going to destroy them. It was only going to be for a couple of years, though, just long enough for us to make some serious cash and then we'd go off somewhere else and make a nice quiet living that wouldn't hurt anybody. Honest, guys, all I wanted in the end was for Jim and I both to find wives and settle down somewhere safe where our kids wouldn't have to put up with the garbage we had back home. A nice big house somewhere where they could ride their bikes after school and curl up in their nice safe bedrooms with their Harry Potter books." He paused for a gulp of tea.

"Harry who?" Baron asked.

Tom nearly spat out his tea. "You lost that?!"

"Lost what?" Sarah asked.

"Tom," Baron said, "It is absolutely impossible to illustrate just how much was lost in the Hot Era --"

"Yeah, well then you just pulled off the impossible, man!" Tom interrupted. "Congratulations."

"I'm not sure what you're referring to," Baron said, "But it sounds like we have made a breakthrough of some sort with you."

"I guess so," Tom agreed.

"Well then," Sarah said with a relieved look on her face. "Are you willing to try to close the rift?"

"I wouldn't know how," Tom said. "I want to help you folks, but what do I know about any of this?"

"The prophecy says the way shall present itself," Baron said. "And Margarethe shall guide you."

"She will present herself when the time is right," Sarah said. "All you need to do in the meantime is live among us."

"And if I do," Tom said. "I get Margarethe but I lose my life back in my own time?"

"Well, yes," Baron said. "But what's to lose? Life as you know it will be destroyed, most likely within your lifetime."

Tom looked out the window at the peaceful, happy streets. He wanted to love them, but there was something in the way. "Yes, but it's what I know. And there's Jim."

"You care that much for your childhood friend, do you?" Baron asked skeptically.

"Jim isn't just a friend. He's my blood brother. The only real family I ever had."

"I find that admirable," Sarah countered. "But tell me, Tom, would Jim support us in fighting for our environment if he were here?"

Tom knew the answer was no. But he also knew Jim was the only soul on earth who had never once let him down. "Probably." It was the strongest lie he could get away with.

"Well if you're right," Baron said, "then the ways of the prophecy suggest you will have the opportunity to bring him to the light along with you. And he'll be welcome in our society if he is as pure of heart as you are. But tell me truthfully, Tom, and recall that our very survival may depend upon this: do you really believe he would be on the side of the good?"

Tom couldn't lie twice, but neither could he accept the truth. "Don't make me turn my back on my best friend, please!" He wanted to cry. "Look, if you think you can ask this of me, Tom, the fuckup runt of my old neighborhood, then surely you can count on Jim too."

"We shall see," Sarah told him, as gently as she could muster herself to sound. "But you must realize there comes a time when friendship cannot reign absolute supreme."

"I don't know about that," Tom said. "Jim or I might have been dead by now if we'd had that attitude back home."

"Perhaps this is a good time for that trip to the beach that Sally suggested," said Baron. "I do believe young Tom could use some time to process all that we have told him."

"Splendid idea, Baron," Sarah agreed. "Come, Tom, we can take the coach there."

"I haven't got any swim trunks," Tom said, half-playfully.

"Very funny!" Sarah said.

On the horse-drawn cart to the beach, Tom caught the eye of several more admirers and a few more troublemakers with questions about television, computers and even nuclear power. Sarah fended them off one and all, and Tom was able to keep quiet until they got to the shore. She pointed to a patch of free sand not far from where the cart let off. "Let's stake our claim there," she told him.

Just as Tom had seen the day before, the beach was pleasantly crowded with men and women of every size and shade, each one unabashedly nude. Tom actually felt slightly embarrassed to be clothed among them. He lost no time in pulling off his clothes, and was delighted to see Sarah doing the same. "It's so much freer like this, isn't it?" she asked.

"I'm certainly coming to enjoy it," Tom said, once again admiring Sarah's wonderfully rustic body in the warm sunshine. His shapely physique caught the eyes of most of the women and even several of the men in their midst, and he even received an approving whistle or to. That was certainly nothing like back home!

Tom was feeling more confident by the minute, but he had one last question before he gave in entirely to his unexpected vacation. Turning to Sarah, who was already on her back and enjoying the sunshine, he asked, "Just what happens next? When do I have to help Margarethe save the world?"

"She will let you know, Tom," Sarah said. "You can be sure of that. Until then, relax and enjoy yourself. You saw the way Sally looked at you this morning at breakfast. She won't be the only one." Sarah patted the sand beside her. "Lie back and just wait, my friend."

Tom did as he was told; but due to the many joyfully nude women to be seen in every direction, there was one part of him for which lying down was out of the question. Sarah let out a good natured laugh at his cock standing at attention when he lay beside her. "Don't worry, Tom," she said. "No one here begrudges you that."