The Pendulum Swings for No One
Deborah, her small feet planted on a fallen tree trunk covered with damp moss, raises her cardboard sword and points the tip at her older brother.
“Billy the Kid,” she says with gravitas, her clear-blue eyes narrowed, “so we meet again.”
The daffodils are budding. The smell of dewy grass, warmed by a mid-morning sun, carries on the breeze and ruffles Deborah’s thick dark hair.
“You won’t get away this time, pirate.” Russell's hand is a blur as he draws his pistol, cocks his thumb, and fires. “Bang!”
“Ping!” Deborah shifts her stance, easily deflecting the bullet with her sword. “This is my ship!"
Russell retreats, alternately shooting from his left and right hands. Deborah weaves her sword, masterfully evading every shot as she forces him back onto the ship’s plank.
“You’re out of bullets!” She steps close enough to rest her sword on his breastbone. He raises his hands in surrender, a wide smile on his chubby face.
“This isn’t over,” he says, affecting a gruff voice, before diving off the plank and rolling into the green shark-infested waters. Deborah stands triumphant with one hand on her hip as her brother flails and screams in the long grass.
But something feels weird.
She shivers as an itch begins in the side of her neck and trickles down between her shoulder blades. The fine hairs on her pale arms stand on end as her gaze drifts over the meadow. A woman in a red coat throws a ball for her dog, a huge long-haired thing bounding ahead. There is no one else. The wooden climbing frame and see-saw are empty, as are the benches… no, wait. There. Behind the climbing frame. A shadow where there shouldn’t be a shadow.
“Russell.”
“Arggghhhhhh! I’m being eaten!”
“Russell!”
He stops writhing. “What?”
“There’s a man.”
He scrambles to his feet and follows her line of sight. “Where?”
As Deborah stares, the figure bends and widens, spreading as if made of wet paint, and then snaps back into focus.
“Debs, where?”
“He kind of… wobbled? I saw… I saw… "
Russell takes a protective step forwards. "Did you hear that? That beep?”
“He’s gone!” Deborah says. “He disappeared!"
Russell gasps. “Like a time traveller?”
“Yeah.”
“Coooool. What did he look like?”
“He was too far away.” She swallows. “I think he had black hair.”
Russell puts an arm around her. “You okay?”
“He was watching us.”
“Don’t worry. Dad says time travelers can’t hurt us. It’s against their rules—”
“But why was he watching us?”
Russell shrugs. Doesn’t he care? Or is he just trying to make her feel better? She looks back to the place where she saw the man and fixes it in her memory. Who was he? What was he doing? She chews her lip; her focus tunneling into that space where no shadow should have been.
"I feel strange."
"That's because you are strange." Russell prods her side. “Wanna be the pirate again?”
She relaxes her shoulders. "Yeah."
Smiling, Deborah climbs on top of the tree trunk and prepares herself, one more time, for battle.
It's a bright Saturday morning as ChronoTek research scientist Brad Henderson slides into the fast lane, half-listening to his dad rambling away on speakerphone. He would get to the point eventually.
“... don’t even believe time travel has been invented. And I don’t blame them! You claim to have gone back in time and seen things and talked to people, but you’ve no evidence. Only reports. Words.”
Brad checks his rear view mirror. "I'd have thought, as an English teacher, you'd be defending words."
"Don't be facetious. Especially while you're driving."
From the screen at the right of the steering wheel, Dad's gaze bores into him over his gigantic, hooked nose. Why does he always have to hold the phone so damn close?
"You look tired, son."
Here we go. "Do I?"
"If you spend too much time in the past, you’ll forget about the present. You’ll forget to live. Your mother wouldn’t want that, God rest her soul."
Where has this come from? He isn’t usually this philosophical of a morning. Then again, he doesn’t make a habit of calling when Brad is on his way to work either. Ah. Of course. "Have you been speaking to Melanie?"
"She's worried about you. We both are."
Brad glances at the clock and speeds up a little. "She shouldn't have told you. It's—"
"You're going to get yourself fired."
Exasperated, but aware that his dad can see him, he focuses on the road, and keeps his tone in check.
"Dad, if I make enough trips and gather enough data, who knows what I might discover? I might find a way—”
“To what? Bring back the dead?”
Brad flinches. He should have known Melanie would call his dad, the 'voice of reason', after he confided in her. When Dad speaks next, it is with the steady, imbued tenor of a seasoned teacher.
“It won't end well.” He closes his eyes and breathes deeply, loudly, as if he is dealing with a particularly difficult student. “We are like bugs tinkering with a grandfather clock.”
“That’s—”
A silver BMW roars past on the inside lane and cuts in front of him with inches to spare. Brad swerves and slams the brake, narrowly avoiding a collision. Grip furious-tight on the wheel, he fights to remain stoic as the muscles in his jaw twitch and the offender zips off.
"Brad? W-What was that? Are you okay?"
"Yep. Just leaving the dual carriageway.” He smiles reassuringly at the screen. “One sec." He indicates, moves into the middle lane, then the inside. The next junction is his anyway, with the turn off for ChronoTek a couple more miles after that. Within minutes, having firmly explained to his dad that a collision did not almost happen, he is flashing his credentials at the first security checkpoint.
“I wish you’d be more careful. Is that so much to ask?"
"I was being—"
"You’re the most important person in the whole world to me. If something were to happen to you—”
“Nothing’s going to happen to me.”
Another barrier lifts — the third and final one — and Brad drives through. The main complex of ChronoTek looms ahead, an expanse of gleaming metal towers and rotundas linked together by high-speed, suspended tram lines. He pulls into the VIP parking area, reverses into his space, and turns off the ignition.
Relentless, Dad says, “Some things can’t be changed and we shouldn’t try, however much we might want. However much we might miss those we’ve lost. You need to stop this. Promise me—”
"Look, I’m really sorry, but I'm at work now. I'll see you next weekend for Sunday lunch and we can talk about it then." He unhooks his phone from the holder and gets out of the car. "I love you."
Big, sad eyes. “Okay, son. See you Sunday. Make sure you wear your winter coat. Snow’s on the way.”
Brad looks at the endless cerulean sky and rubs his forehead. “Is that so?”
"I can feel it in the air. Trust me.”
It’s February.
Miss Brown, Deborah’s English teacher, writes ‘identity’ on the whiteboard and turns to address the class.
“Now,” she begins, “why have I written this word on the board?”
Deborah looks down at page 105 of The Handmaid’s Tale and prays she isn’t called upon to answer.
“Kirsty? What do you think? Any ideas?”
“Um.” Kirsty sits next to Deborah. She helps Deborah with English and Deborah helps Kirsty with chemistry. She’s the one person who treats Deborah the same, as if Russell hasn’t been in the news at all. “Because Offred has lost her identity?”
Miss Brown moves one hand in a circular motion. “How?”
“Well, she’s not allowed to do anything she wants to do,” Kirsty says. “She’s, like, a prisoner. Even her name is different.”
“Indeed. Offred is not our protagonist’s real name, which is symbolic of how she now belongs to her Commander, rather than being an independent individual.”
Deborah’s stomach tenses; it’s been three months and ten days since Russell went for a walk to the local shop and never returned. Three months of police enquiries and speculation. It’s as if he has also lost his identity. No one calls him Russell anymore. Now he is ‘that boy who disappeared’ or ‘vanished’ or ‘is missing’. The latter is the worst: as if Russell is a coin lost down the back of the sofa or a misplaced necklace and not her big brother.
“Names… are important,” Deborah says quietly. Miss Brown smiles encouragement and Deborah swallows the lump forming in her throat. “They’re part of who we are, and how we see ourselves. How we wish to be seen.”
Miss Brown nods enthusiastically. “Exactly. Very good, Deborah! I hope everyone was listening to that.”
After school, at home, Deborah heads straight upstairs to her bedroom and closes the door. Then, after a few minutes to be sure Mum isn’t coming to check on her, she crosses the hallway and goes into Russell’s room. It’s weirdly neat and tidy and smells of citrus air freshener. The bed is made with fresh sheets and the carpet’s been hoovered.
She sits on the bed. He never let her in his room. On some level she hopes her being there will bring him back, outraged and indignant, but it doesn’t work. Her fingers tremor and then her whole body quakes. She clenches her hands into fists. What happened? Where is he? He wouldn’t have run away.
She lies down with her head on Russell's pillow and hugs her knees to her chest. The whole house feels empty, alien. There are too many chairs at the living room table and too few plates served for dinner.
She whispers, "Where are you, Billy the Kid?"
Mum and Dad are different now, distant, quiet, orbiting each other like ghostly satellites.
They're fading, and Deborah understands: without him, she doesn’t feel like the same person either.
Brad’s heart thrums as incandescent multi-coloured light rushes past, bending and weaving, filling his vision. Without exerting effort, he remains in his own neon-green timestream funnel, travelling towards his present. There are several theories about the other coils of light — what they are, what would happen should a researcher move into one — but it remains a mystery, for now. Last year, Philip Bosworth reached out and dipped his fingers into a river of hot pink. He returned unharmed, his findings feverishly recorded, and was then banned from any further missions. Brad won’t make that mistake.
His ChronoTek wristlet bleeps and he braces, preparing to disembark the timestream. The colours flicker and dissolve like a pixelated screen and darkness envelopes his form. There is a smell akin to burning electrical cables and wet earth before solidity forms beneath his feet.
He’s given himself ten minutes.
Calm, casual, he slips on his sunglasses and scans the periphery. The street is clean and well-kept, lined with ash trees and benches and ‘Slow: School’ traffic signs. Students in dark-grey uniforms jostle with each other amidst a hazy, orange, autumnal glow.
Brad sits on the nearest bench and waits. He’s judged it perfectly: she turns the corner and heads his way, still, he can’t take too long. In his mind he rehearses his words for the millionth time, and looks up. She’s crying.
“Hey, Debs.”
She freezes right in front of him. He’s wearing an expensive grey suit and his glasses are mirrored so all she sees is her own reflection. To her, he probably looks like a secret agent.
“Who the hell are you?” She swipes at her tears. “How do you know my name?”
“I’m… a friend. Please, sit. I want to—”
“Urgh.” She spits on the pavement. “I’m fourteen. Pervert.”
Brad leaps to his feet, panicking as she strides away. His mind vomits images of twisted metal and blood spatters on tarmac. A woman in a black top hat, cane in hand, leading a tide of mourners into the church.
“No! That’s not what this is. Wait! Please!”
She stops, turns; her expression is one of utter disgust. He runs one hand up the back of his neck. What can he say? He can’t believe he didn’t foresee her reacting this way. She scoffs and gives him the finger.
“Pirates!”
“What?”
“You were always the pirate.” A pause. “When you were little.”
She lowers her hand. “Who are you?”
“I can’t tell you that.”
“Do you know Russell?” She takes a tentative step forwards. “You look like…”
He waves one hand, cutting her off. “I don’t have much time. I’m here because I wanted to tell you some things, to help you.”
“Tell me who you are.”
“No.”
She folds her arms and leans back on one foot. “Go on then,” she says.
“Okay, the next few years… are going to be tough—”
“No shit. My exams are—”
“Worse than that, I’m afraid.” His heart cracks. “You’ll think people don’t understand how you feel, but they will eventually and, uh, if people don’t see you right now the way you see yourself, know that I— someone will.” He catches his breath, feeling as if he’s drowning; his speech is coming out all wrong. “You’ll also feel isolated and confused but it won’t always be that way. You’ll be alright.”
Deborah blinks, the look of revulsion has ebbed and one of perplexed intrigue has taken its place. Well, Brad thinks, that’s something.
“Debs?” A squeaky voice calls from across the street: Kirsty. “Debs? Who are you talking to?”
“I have to go.”
“But—”
“You’re going to be okay,” he says. “If nothing else, remember that.”
He winks out of time, plunging into the viridian light, and races back to his present, back to ChronoTek, and Melanie. That conversation didn’t go as well as he’d hoped, but at least he had the chance to try it. It wouldn’t always be this way. He can’t be the sole researcher who’s realised that the wristlet records no more than the first exit from the timestream. It won't be long before someone else notices, and tells.
He smooths his face into a mask of professionalism and innocence as he gives his report on the opening of Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre in the spring of 1599. His observations are detailed and precise.
No one suspects a thing.
Deborah is packing for university. Her Ninja Turtles bedspread incongruous beneath her maths degree textbooks: Intro to Electromagnetism; Quantum Mechanics; and Mathematical Philosophy for Beginners.
On her bedside table, Russell beams out at her from a framed family photo: all four of them standing in front of a large silver birch in autumn, a sea of fallen sunset at their feet.
It’s been three years.
It feels longer.
She still dreams of him. Aches to hear him say Hey, Debs in that easy way he had as he would step inside to ramble on about symbolism or semantics, just like Dad. Kirsty complains about her own brother all the time, and Deborah wants to scream and shake her when she does.
“Hey,” Dad says. “Are you ready to go?”
He hasn’t changed much since Russell’s disappearance aside from a few extra grey hairs around his temples. The therapy sessions seemed to work for him, but Mum…
Mum stands to one side, slumped like a broken marionette. Dark shadows mark the contours of her cheeks and eye sockets, and pool in the recesses of her collarbone. She smiles, which only makes it worse.
Deborah knows the reasoning — Doctor Jansen explained it many times — but that doesn’t make it any less heart-wrenching. The worry, the loss, the not-knowing… It takes a toll, but what about Deborah? She’s not the little girl who played at pirates anymore, but she’s still here, isn’t she?
“Yeah,” she says. “I’m ready.”
She tucks her last textbook into her bag, underneath Russell’s old jumpers, and zips it up. At least there is a logic to maths, she thinks. That’s something to cling on to.
Brad strides into the time travel hub, clenching his teeth so hard his jaw aches. The cylindrical time portal is operational, its monitor showing that there are currently three researchers in action. Sweat beads along the rivets of his spine as he presses his right palm down on the sensor and speaks his name for voice verification. He stutters and has to repeat himself.
The machine hums.
“What are you doing?”
It’s Melanie. She’s sitting at a console a few metres off to his left. He doesn’t dare look at her.
“Last minute change to the rotation,” he says.
He resists the urge to actually say Come on under his breath. His wristlet is primed, the coordinates fixed. All he needs is for the portal’s doorway to slide open and allow him access.
“Bullshit,” Melanie says. She stands and makes her way over. “I saw the update. The wristlet’s anomaly has been identified and they’re fixing it. It won’t take long.” Her voice drops to a whisper. “Can’t you let it go? You’ve gotten away with a lot as it is.”
Brad shakes his head. “I need you to pretend you don’t know that. I should never have told you. It was selfish of me.”
The machine pings and the doors open. Brad steps forward but Melanie grabs his arm.
“What are you going to do?” she asks.
“Please let me go. This is my last chance to try something different.”
“Brad. You’re scaring me.” Her grip eases. “But if I can’t stop you, at least tell me your plan. Just in case.”
He considers this a moment. She has a point, so he hastily explains his idea. Melanie’s eyes bulge as she takes an involuntary step backwards.
“That’s insane! Brad, we know something weird happens to people when they’re approaching their own death. They become… less tangible… as if time is skirting around them or beginning to accept their non-existence, but we don’t in fact know anything—”
“Have you ever buried someone you loved?” Brad hates doing this — using their deaths — but he can see no other way to convince her. “No. You haven’t. Burying a sibling… a child is… My mum never recovered. There’s no hope when that happens. Emptiness takes over.”
“If you do this,” she says, her tone thickening as if the words are hard for her to get out, “you might not come back. We don’t have enough data. Compared to the whole universe… we’re ants.”
“Huh, that’s funny. My dad said something very similar: that we’re bugs playing with a grandfather clock.”
“He’s not wrong.”
“Yeah, well, bugs outlasted the dinosaurs” — Brad steps into the warm turquoise light and gives Melanie his most cavalier smile — “I'll take my chances.”
Deborah and her dad are drinking beer on the garden patio. The summer sun is a burning disc in a pale-blue sky. Scents of lavender waft around them. She’s on her fourth, working up the courage to say it, to get it out and into the open. Dad is grumbling about a fox that keeps coming into the garden at night and crapping on his vegetable patch. He finishes his beer, goes inside and returns with a fresh one, cracks it open.
“So,” Dad says, settling back into his deck chair, “are you going to tell me your new name then?”
Deborah chokes, spits as bubbles fizz up her nose. Then she meets his eye and realises that he knows.
Of course he knows.
“If there’s anything I can do,” he adds. “Any, I don’t know, meetings? I’ll come, if you like. I mean, if that’s what you want…” He trails off.
Deborah’s chest constricts. “That’d be great. T-Thanks, Dad.”
He nods. “Well, then, don’t keep me in suspense. What is it? Alexander? Raphael?”
“Those are Ninja Turtles.”
“Right, yeah. Sorry.”
She smiles. “It’s Brad.”
He cocks his head. “After Brad Pitt?”
“No. It’s, well, those letters are already in my name…”
“Ah, yes. I like it.” He sips his beer. “It’s symbolic.”
“Is it?”
He grins then. “You’re so like your mother,” he says, and then adds, “Aside from the whole penis thing, of course.”
There is a beat of silent panic before the laughter starts. It digs deep, shaking Deborah to her core, drawing tears and battering her ribs. Dad hoots, his face a rictus of mirth. All the nerves, tension, pain and heartache evaporate as Deborah locks eyes with her dad.
There’s only one thing there: love.
Brad exits the timestream at the corner of Mill Street and Wigan Road, exactly where the accident happens. He moves as though in a dream, through a mist of detached inevitability, the sense of deja-vu is overwhelming as a red Vauxhall Astra drives past with a chocolate-brown Labrador sticking its head out the rear window.
He has two minutes.
Russell turns the corner, sauntering with the self-assurance of the achingly young. Many times, Brad has prevented his brother from stepping into the road, convinced him to turn back, but it never changes anything. In the future, the crash still happened in the same way, as if Brad’s trip didn’t exist.
But there’s one thing he hasn’t tried.
The speeding truck is visible now at the end of Wigan Road. The pedestrian crossing signal turns green and starts beeping and Russell begins to cross. Sunlight glints on metal.
Brad sprints into the road and grabs Russell from behind. He pulls him close, gripping him with all his strength as Russell fights, presumably thinking he’s being mugged. The truck’s horn blasts out. Tyres screech. This is the moment Melanie was talking about: Brad can’t see it, but Russell’s essence will be wavering and becoming transient.
Someone screams as the truck’s bumper makes impact with the base of Brad’s spine. He convulses as all the air is knocked from his lungs. Every muscle in his back spasms; each individual vertebrae tremors and strains. He thinks he hears a snap. It’s far worse than he imagined. He realises, suddenly, unequivocally, that he won’t recover from this. He misjudged the timing.
The world winks out.
And they’re hurtling back up the timestream. Brad steels himself for what he needs to do, but how can he? Russell is here. Now. Alive in his grasp. As perfect as a memory, as real as a name.
But it won’t last. Not the way things are. Gathering his remaining fragments of strength, Brad shoves Russell away from him, out of the neon-green and into an adjoining stream of purple light. Brad stays conscious just long enough to see Russell sink into a blaze of rich magenta, and disappear.
Sounds come to him.
Tickling his eardrums like a light, hesitant rain: quick footsteps on hard flooring; the swish of curtains. All of it underlaid by an indistinct roar, reminiscent of the ocean. He smells bleach and something else. A familiar muskiness. Orange peel and bergamot.
Dad.
He opens his eyes to a searing white light and winces. Turning his head to one side, he scrunches up his nose and tries again. Colours swirl. He blinks, and his vision sharpens.
A few paces from his bed, a doctor is talking to Dad. They’re absorbed in conversation, their bodies close. Brad looks on, perplexed, as Dad raises one hand and holds it against the other man’s face, palm to cheek. Brad wheezes and coughs.
“You’re awake?” Fingers slip around his right hand. “It’s alright. I’m here.”
Brad’s voice cracks. “Hey.”
Dad looks ancient, gaunt, every wrinkle made a cavern by the harsh hospital light. Red spotches betray that he’s been crying: he could never hide that. But his eyes are the same.
“How long…”
“Five days.”
“What… happened? Is Russell—”
The doctor approaches and stands shoulder to shoulder with Dad. As one, they affect a concerned head tilt with identical frown lines.
“Hey, Debs.”
Oh my god. Not a doctor. Heart racing, Brad attempts to sit upright but slumps back down: he’s too weak. Without a doubt, this man is Russell, but he's too old. He's bald with a trim pale-grey beard and a tender regard crimped by scores of crow’s feet. He looks even older than Dad.
“Russell?” His voice wavers. “It worked? You’re here?”
“Yes, and no.” Russell reaches out and clasps Brad’s hand, as does Dad, forming a three-way bond. “You moved me into a parallel reality. The other me, there, still dies in that car crash. You've been creating alternate realities all over the place. I also work for ChronoTek, though we’re a little farther along… I know it’s all a touch mind-boggling.
“In one of the threads, I met a version of you who claimed they met a time traveller when they were a teenager. Gave some much needed personal advice which helped them in the difficult years to come. Was that you?”
Brad’s eyes widen. “Yes.”
“Well, well. You have been busy.”
Russell checks his watch with his free hand and Dad trembles.
“What’s wrong?”
“He can’t stay.”
“B-But—”
Russell shakes his head. “I don’t belong here. Fate seems to require that I die. It’s dangerous for me to be here at all, but I wanted to let you know that you succeeded in saving me, well, a version of me.”
Their hands flex, gripping each other tighter.
“So many different versions." Brad groans. "What have I done?”
“Time isn’t linear, you know. You’re a stubborn, swashbuckling pirate,” he says, grinning. “You’re also my brilliant, incredibly dumb sister” — Brad raises his eyebrows — “Yes, that’s right. You’re my sister, and my brother. You’re Deborah and Brad and anything else you care to call yourself. It doesn’t matter. You’re still you.
“And I have always been with you. So keep me up here” —he taps the side of his head, and then moves his hand over his heart— “and in here.”
Fresh tears brim in Dad’s eyes. He sniffs. “I love you, son. Take good care of yourself.”
“I will.”
Brad clears his throat, but he isn’t fast enough. There is a faint bleep and just like that, Russell’s gone.
“No!”
Brad chokes on his unsaid words, still feeling the warmth from his brother’s hand on his own. Dad’s chin quivers for a moment before he rolls his shoulders and closes his eyes, concentrating; his body stills; his breath steadies. Brad watches him, consumed with pride, in awe of this wonderful man’s inner strength.
After a time, Dad leans in to kiss Brad on the forehead, and says, “Look out the window.”
He does, and a smile creeps across his face. Winter’s first snow is beginning to fall in brilliant-white sugar-spun flurries.
“Let me guess,” Brad says. “It’s symbolic, isn’t it?”
Dad returns the smile and gives Brad’s hand a little squeeze.
“I certainly hope so.”
Zelda C. Thorne has been published by Off Topic, shortlisted for the Olga Sinclair Prize, NYC Midnight, and Writer’s Playground. She has also featured on the science fiction podcast Tall Tale TV. She lives and writes in Norfolk with her family. Find out more at www.zeldacthorne.com.