Time Drifters
Chapter Twenty-Three: Perception

The solstice festival was actually fun. I’d reset my alarms for 11am that next morning and then had a nap. I hadn’t been totally wiped out this time. Weird, considering that I’d almost fallen to my death and then practically fried my insides in the power plant. Maybe it was because I knew what it felt like, or my Drift hadn’t included an overnight stay. Or, maybe, the excitement and adrenaline just balanced it out.

I wanted to cover my tracks and not be a zombie when it came time to go out with Mom and Dad so they wouldn’t get suspicious of me roaming around the house at nighttime. I made certain I was dressed and ready. Mom was pleased. She even said I seemed “chipper.”

The park area was all done up with banners and balloons, with floodlights pointing up into the trees and Christmas lights strung amongst branches. Their light slowly began to take over once twilight set in, and this longest day of Summer Solstice became even longer.

I played some of the carnival games and did ring-toss with Dad. We all listened to the minstrel musicians who were dressed in Medieval costumes, and I got my face painted with a green scorpion design while Mom had her fortune read. In retrospect, I likely should have paid more attention when she reported that she was going to have a personal wish come true very soon. It just seemed so general and, as Dad said, “Hardly worth the donation to the Tarot reader.” The woman kept looking at me with a knowing smile and I thought she had that Sleepy-Hollow feeling around her. It was the first time I realized that I’d made a distinction between good weirdness and not-so-good weirdness. So I made it clear that I didn’t need my fortune read. I didn’t want to mess around with her, and there was no way I wanted to have her reveal anything about going on a long trip… or worse.

I remember the beginning of the movie they were showing in the park – the ribbed and scratchy feel of our tartan blanket on the grass and the smell of damp dew settling in around us. The next thing I knew, I was in the car, putting on my own seatbelt, and then Dad was waking me up and helping me inside, back home. And then I finally slept.

The problem with being good and doing chores is that you can also set a precedent for what is expected. I soon found out that my lack of school schedule meant that other things were now available to me on a more regular basis—namely, the lawnmower and the dish washing. Not that my parents were slave drivers, but I was certainly learning about Mom’s theories of balancing work with life, something she discussed with Dad, to their mutual annoyance. In my case, I had lots of life at the moment, so I had to add in the work part, too.

That spurred me to research horse riding lessons. I knew that Suzanne Legon rode at a fancy stable outside of town, but I didn’t think it’d be a good idea to call her up. If she suggested something that we couldn’t afford, I’d feel pretty stupid saying I couldn’t follow through on her advice. Plus, I was a newbie. Thomas had made that point clear. And proving him wrong was the real reason for wanting to go anyway. I thought horses were cool, but mostly for other people.

It was no small feat to look it all up. Even once I found some programs that had a lower price tag, I still had to get the brochure and figure out how I was going to get there on my own. I wanted to eliminate the objections before my parents shut me down.

The YMCA had something called Riding Camp, although it wasn’t really a camp where you stayed overnight. It was held over in the actual district of Sleepy Hollow, next to Tarrytown, during the daytime on Thursday and Friday, two weeks in a row. I left the brochure out on the table to let Mom and Dad see the pictures first, so it wouldn’t be a shock when I brought it up.

In the meantime, I found a chance to go and visit Miss Prankle. She had left a note with Mr. Danby, which he gave to me as he was driving me back to the house the night of the Drift to Niagara Falls. She said she was going to go away for a few months and asked if I might come to have a visit beforehand.

She had dug up the beginning of a flowerbed next to the picnic table in her backyard. She said she was planning on putting in a patio, eventually. She’d planted two rose bushes already and she pointed out how fragrant the few blossoms were, holding them for me to smell just before we sat down to drink iced mint tea together. It was a humid day and I was happy for the cold, sweet drink.

As I described the events of the Drift, I kept looking for her eyes to get big when I talked about the Future Ones, but it didn’t seem to faze her. In fact, she appeared happy but also cautious and a bit distant. She assured me everything was fine, but I wasn’t convinced.

“You don’t seem very happy,” I said. “Do you think we did something wrong?”

“Heavens, no,” she said. “Aside from what I think, more importantly is the fact that you felt good about it. And, to be brutally frank, the fact that you were able to return meant that you did accomplish what was needed.”

“And who determines that?” I asked. “Is somebody watching?”

“It’s mysterious, isn’t it?” she smiled. “The best thing I can tell you is that it was all resonant. Everything clicked into place… like spikes of static electricity being smoothed back into a curve until they all fit together.”

She shrugged and gazed back at the roses. “It’s something you have to feel, more than describe. And I have faith in you, Liam.”

“So what’s to stop the kids from the future from changing what I’m doing?”

“What’s to stop you from changing things in the past for the others you Drift with?” she answered.

“Oh!” I exclaimed, shifting around on the bench. “It’s all mind bending sometimes.”

She laughed. “It’s always as complicated or as simple as we make it. Really, ultimately, the only thing we can change is what we choose to do in each moment. Frustrating, isn’t it?”

“I’ll say,” I said. She sighed as she used her finger to wipe drops of condensation from the outside of her glass. They tumbled down to the surface of the table and pooled in a wet ring.

“One thing leads us to another,” she said, absently.

“But you don’t seem very happy,” I repeated. “Is it something to do with why you’re going away?”

“No, no,” she said. “Don’t worry about me. I’m actually looking forward to my trip. I’m off to Europe to spend time with friends. They’re much more accustomed to longer visits over there. A month is not an unusual time to stay in each place.”

“Could I die? During a drift?” I asked. It popped out of nowhere. I’d wondered about it, but I hadn’t planned on asking. She looked very surprised, but I also noticed that she wasn’t denying it quickly either.

“We’re humans, my dear,” she said softly. “We’re all strong and incredibly fragile. I can’t tell you what isn’t true. I’ve heard that there are instances where things happen, and I’ll let you find out about those, as you need to. I believe that we’re all uniquely qualified to deal with our lives, and I believe that’s true when you Drift. But, we make choices… some for our own good and others…”

She stopped herself and then smiled at me.

“I believe in you, Liam,” she said. “Remember that.”

“I get scared,” I confessed. It was something I wanted to tell her. When I was in the shimmer arc there were moments I felt such freedom and other moments when I felt a kind of terror that I’d never known before I Drifted. I worried I might not live through the feeling of the sound crushing me, like I experienced shimmering back from this last Drift. It had been as though the sound of the Falls had become part of the noise in the Drift Arc.

“Fear is a healthy thing,” she said firmly.

“The guys in the X-Games—like the ones on the trick bikes—they don’t look like they’re afraid of anything,” I said.

“Everyone has fear,” she said. “It’s not a matter of pretending that you don’t. It’s a matter of how you face it and work through it.”

“And how do you do that?” I asked.

“It’s called living,” she said, breaking into a long and chuckling laugh. Her face creased in a broad smile and she reached over and embraced my hand on the table, giving it a firm and assuring shake.

“I think you’re embracing it in a wonderful way,” she said. “You’ve followed your instincts that there’s more to perceive in the world and you’ve stepped forward to experience it. That’s living. So congratulations.”

“I still feel like something’s coming,” I said. “Something not good.”

“Then it may be,” Miss Prankle nodded. “All you can do is be aware. Be flexible. And deal with it when it arrives. But I will tell you not to expect bad things, because you’ll end up seeing them. And very often, an event can appear to be bad, partially because it’s not what we expected. And it might lead to a positive… in the long run.”

“I see,” I said, trying to put an example to what she was saying so I’d be able to test out the theory.

“You will,” she said. “You’re very young. And you’re lucky to have such a long run ahead of you.”

“I hope so,” I said. And I really meant it.

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