Marlene Dotterer - Shipbuilder

“All? Are ye sure, Miss? Ye’ll look like a boy.”

She shrugged. “That can only help in finding work. Go ahead. Cut it like a boy’s.” She gazed at him in the mirror and relented at the concern in his eyes. “It’ll grow back, you know.”

He bit his lip as he picked up his comb. “Sure ye don’t want to check with yer mother, first? Ye can come back.”

His innocent question filled her with pain and she found herself blinking back tears. She grabbed the bunch of curls, twisted it harshly, and let it fall again down her back. “Cut it!” she demanded, and closed her eyes.

On the way home, Casey used a bit of the two pounds to buy a boy’s pants, shirt, shoes and cap. As she approached the boarding house, her steps slowed. She kept her eyes on the ground, holding her purchases in front of her like a shield. Her head was strangely light and naked-feeling, and she was cold. But a plan had coalesced in her mind at the barber’s protest that she would look like a boy. She had to try.

She had noticed the boys on the streets. Little more than waifs, they darted here and there, doing odd jobs picked up from shopkeepers or strangers, and earning a bit of money. Probably not much money, but Casey figured she had an advantage or two over the young boys. Age was one. Most of the boys were between ten and fifteen, she was twenty. And she had more education than any of them.

Disguised as a boy, she would qualify for all kinds of odd jobs not available to a girl. She’d be safe from people like this morning’s asshole. She could even go into pubs if she needed to. Odd jobs would help in another way, too. Almost any kind of permanent job meant sitting in a dark and dull room somewhere, performing the same task over and over for fifteen hours. A recipe for insanity. If she could pick up enough work, the variety alone would keep her sane.

Casey plopped the cap on her head and gazed in the small mirror. Her curls were cut almost to her scalp and the cap covered them easily. But her skin was too soft and smooth to be a boy’s, her eyebrows too arched, her cheekbones too high. To her, the face looked like a girl’s face, but the definitive test would be Sam. She stepped out from behind her privacy screen. Sam glanced up, then did a double take. Eyebrows scaling up to his hair line, he walked around Casey to examine all sides.

“Wow.”

“Do I pass?”

Sam lifted his shoulders. “I would say yes, but I don’t trust my judgment. So how did you…” he made vague motions around his chest.

Casey grimaced. “Just bound them up with cloth. Squished ’em, basically. Good thing they’re not too big to begin with.”

He just nodded. “It might work, Casey. It’s worth a try, I suppose. People will think you’re a boy anywhere from twelve to fifteen years old.” Then he glared at her. “You’re sure I can’t talk you out of this? You really are taking chances.”

She shrugged. “I’m not getting any work the other way, Sam. Odd jobs are better than nothing.” She reached for the doorknob. “May as well jump in. I won’t go far this time.”

He looked worried and unhappy as he lifted a hand in farewell. “Please, be careful.”

She raised a fist, just to remind him, gave him a brief smile, and darted out the door.

April 20, 1906—May 1906

Sam and Casey went to breakfast early, with plans to continue their job searches. Three other boarders were in the tiny dining room ahead of them, gathered around a newspaper spread out on the chipped and scratched wooden table. They looked at Casey with uncertain glances.

“Ain’t she from there?” one of them muttered, and another nodded.

“Where? What’s going on?” Casey asked.

In answer, they moved aside so she and Sam could look at the paper.

San Francisco Leveled by Earthquake! ran the headline. Casey froze, as did Sam behind her. They read the article amid anxious questions from the boarders. Casey answered as best she could. Yes, she had friends in the area and yes, she hoped they were all right. No, she no longer had family there. Then she burst into tears and ran from the room. Startled, Sam grabbed some scones and tea and followed her.

She was sitting on the bed, head buried in her arms. “Casey,” Sam touched her shoulder. “Casey, this is one of the things we wondered about. The same things do happen in this timeline. But we don’t know anyone there, now. None of your family is there.”

She raised her head and wiped tears from her face. “I know. It’s not that. It’s just… reading about home. And it could happen. It could happen again at any time and I will never know. I’ll never know anything again, about my family or my friends.”

Sam turned and sat against the wall, his face thoughtful. “I’ve been thinking about the future, Casey. What we left behind. Do you realize we left clues about what happened?”

She shook her head, brow crinkled in puzzlement. He continued. “In the park, I had the time machine with me, and a laptop. They were left there. Someone has to notice.”

A look of horror dawned on Casey’s face. “What would they do with it? Could someone accidentally set the machine off again?”

“No, not at all.” Sam felt sure of that. “The thing is, that particular experiment was unauthorized. I’ve told you what was going on. No one knew what I was doing that night. But they’ll be able to trace it. I had the time machine, and I accessed the system to run the experiment. Presumably, when they don’t hear from me, they’ll investigate. They’ll want to get the time machine back, if nothing else.”

“What if a random person found your laptop? Could they boot it up? Maybe get your information and see what you were doing?”

Sam shook his head. “Needs a password. And believe me, it’s well-encrypted. I did, perhaps carelessly, have my business card tucked in the case. Just my name and cell number. My cell phone is with me, so calling that number won’t do anyone any good.”

“The party you are trying to reach is outside the calling area,” Casey murmured.

Sam looked at her, his face serious. “Indeed. But there’s something else you need to understand.”

Her eyebrows twitched. “What?”

“My team has researched this for years. We’ve done hundreds of experiments. None of them has given us positive data. Do you understand what I mean by that?”

“You have no results. All your inferences are made from a lack of data as opposed to empirical results from your experiments.”

Sam nodded, reluctant. “Yes, exactly. When we sent something back in time, we knew it went somewhere because it disappeared. But it never showed up in our past. We were considering the possibility that sending something back in time creates a new and different timeline. A new universe, if you will, with the same history as ours, but only up to the point the object went back to. In our case, January 24, 1906.”

“What happens to the original universe? Is it still there?”

He chewed on his lip, nodding. “I believe so. At least, we never noticed a difference when we ran our experiments. All the timelines could co-exist, theoretically. But my point is, that as far as you and I finding our way back to our own, original future, or even living long enough to get back—that won’t happen. Any future we get to from here will be a different universe.”

“Maybe someone will figure out how to build a bridge,” Casey said.

“A bridge?”

“Between universes.”

Sam looked thoughtful. “That’s a very interesting idea.”

She thought of something else. “We’re the only ones who will know if something changes if you and I cause the future to be different.” She looked uncertain at this prospect and Sam held up a finger.