Time Traveler's Second Chances

Realistically no one asked me if I even knew how to time travel and everyone in my village acted like it just came so naturally to them. My family was one of five that lived in a small gathering of huts just outside the Appalachian Mountains. Many generations ago we were given the “awesome responsibility” of traveling through time and setting things in motion but no one remembers how we got these powers or who gives us our instructions. At the end of every year we get an envelope with a list of things that were supposed to happen but didn’t and we end up going back and making sure they do.

For example; this year there was supposed to be a skateboard left in front of the driveway of a specific woman in North Carolina. If that had of been done, she would have stopped her car to move it and subsequently been late for work. This would have caused her to speed through a red light and get in a major accident; therefor causing her to be out of work and removing a certain chain of events that leads to a highly dangerous chemical getting released. Thousands of people died, but because one of the members of my village went back in time to correct it everything turned out fine.

Of course no one remembers anything and we get no praise for it since no one even knows we exist. Luckily we have the power that if anyone accidentally stumbles onto our land we can just go back in time and redirect them before they get there. It’s been so long though since the first families found out they had the power that no one even bothers to explain it anymore, we just do it. Unfortunately… I couldn’t do it.

It’s not to say that I hadn’t tried because I had tried hundreds of times. I closed my eyes and concentrated really hard on a time before when I was needed – we're time travelers not space travelers, so we usually take the bus – and thought about going back in time. But no matter what I did I could only ever go back to about five minutes before I tried to time travel. I even asked my grandma how to do it but at that point she was so senile she barely knew who I was.

My parents were the chiefs of the village, they were the ones who got the list and handed out the jobs and if someone fell behind and couldn’t get their jobs done they would pick up the slack. No one would ever suspect that their offspring was incapable of successfully time travelling. It didn’t really matter up until that day though since the next day was my birthday. Once I turned 21 I was in charge of taking over the tasks from my parents, which is totally cliché but there was nothing I could do about it. But I figured that talking to them would be a last resort, I still had a whole day to try and get the hang of it.

After a few minutes to calm my nerves I went into my room and locked the door. I had an old list so as long as I stayed in my room I wouldn’t bump into another time traveler. The clock on my wall said October 22^nd, 2021 at 1:15 pm, and all I needed to do was go back in time to August 11^th 2020. With a deep breath I closed my eyes and imagined the date in my mind. All I had was the letters and numbers since my memory of the previous year was almost gone, but I did my best to focus on August type things. I pictured the yellowing leaves outside, the heat, sun shining down on the people playing outside during the last couple days of summer. This is it, I’m going to travel back to August 11, 2020 and not five minutes ago. Five minutes ago? What was happening five minutes ago? A tingling feeling told me that I had successfully moved through time. Opening my eyes I feared the worst, and it was easily verified by the clock on the wall reading the same date at 1:10 pm.

Stomping my foot on the ground in anger I tried again; I had to be able to move back far enough. Again I focused on the date August 11, 2020; poured my whole heart and soul into thinking only that date and nothing else. I couldn’t think of anything else, not five minutes ago… not even six minutes ago. But that would be silly, imagine going back six minutes… a tingle passed through me. Drat! Another glance at the clock showed me that it was exactly 1:04 pm on the same day.

With an angry breath I closed my eyes and practically screamed the correct date in my head. I needed to go back to August 11, 2020; not five minutes ago, not six minutes ago, not even seven minutes ago. This was important and I needed to go all the way back to August 11, 2020! I could feel it this time, it was an almost painfully strong sensation that passed through me; I had focused on the correct date so hard I was sweating. When the feeling stopped I sat with my eyes closed for a moment, almost scared to open them. I cracked one eye open and glanced at the floor; it looked the same as it always had so that didn’t help much. My nerves raced as I slowly looked up the wall to the clock before I cried out in anguish. “October 22^nd 2021… 12:57 pm”. I had gone back seven minutes… the fleeting thought of only going back seven minutes had stuck in my brain long enough to ruin my time travel.

Thoroughly exhausted I sunk to the floor and tried my best not to cry. The only choice I had now was to either talk to my parents about my failures or run away. For a moment I seriously considered the second option; I just couldn’t understand how the child of the village leaders would struggle like this especially when everyone else could do it so easily. After a few moments of moping I ran my hands through my hair and wandered out of my room. My mother was in the kitchen cooking dinner and my father was sitting in the living room reading various newspapers to ensure everyone did their job.

“Mom… I need to talk to you.” I kept my voice down and addressed her when I got to the kitchen. I figured my mom would be less upset than my dad if I had to talk to someone about my lack of abilities.

“Alright, is everything okay?” She paused at the concerned look on my face and I paused while trying to find the right way to break the news.

“Well… not exactly… I can’t seem to travel back in time more than a few minutes…” This really weird look spread across my mom’s face and I tried to read it but she didn’t say anything. “I really tried though, I mean I did everything I could to travel back a year and a couple months but it didn’t work. The longest I could go back was seven minutes… I’m really sorry mom, I don’t know why I can’t do it.” My mom sighed and walked over to the living room while gesturing for me to follow. Once we were standing next to my dad she shot him a look and he immediately put down his paper and grew serious.

“There’s something we need to tell you… we were hoping that we wouldn’t have to but since you haven’t been able to travel as we feared then you should probably know. Your father and I had some troubles having kids. Turns out your dad doesn’t quite have what it takes, so we got a donor. We had no clue what would happen but we were warned that you probably wouldn’t be able to time travel. However the fact that you can even a little bit is really exciting!” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. My mom and dad started talking about how I could go back a few minutes at a time and how happy they were. I wasn’t really paying attention though; I couldn’t get over the fact that I was only half time traveler and it had been such a problem throughout my life.

The more I thought about it though the more it made sense; my parents were both tall with dark hair and brown eyes and I was a short blond girl with bright blue eyes. They could never understand why I liked pickles on everything and they could hardly stand the smell of them, and why I was the least graceful out of the group. While they talked I walked back up to my room and lay down on the bed. It felt like my whole world had been turned upside down and sideways. It wasn’t my fault that I had been struggling so hard to master a craft that so many people intrinsically knew from the moment they were born. My whole life I felt like I was doing something wrong when it was all just a matter of faulty genetics.

A year later, knowing what I learned then, I have taken over the business from my parents and am in charge of handing out jobs to the village. I myself take the shortest jobs with the smallest time jump and after working hard on my time traveling I can go back about an hour at a time. It’s hard and exhausting but I manage to go back a couple days and travel to where I need to so that I can fix what I need to. The secret had come out about my mysterious donor dad but everyone in the village was surprisingly helpful and often fought over the longer jobs to ensure that it wouldn’t be an issue. Altogether the community has grown closer, everyone going to each other for help and offering help before it’s needed, all to make sure the jobs get done. With my story of difficulty time travelling there has been an extra class added in the local school to help students work on their own time travelling. More than anything it is encouraged to talk about your shortcomings so that you can get help.

Under my watchful eye I saw the village prosper and turn into something that I was very proud of. Everything ran smoothly and everyone was happy. After all, what could possibly go wrong when everyone can make their own second chance?