LatinosUSA

2002

Shoe’s eyes snapped open, and he tipped up his head, but was struck with such dizziness and lightheadedness that he immediately fell back on the mattress and shut them tightly again. What in hell had he drunk or smoked the night before to be this hungover? he wondered bleakly. He discovered that he was lying on his bed with his body bisecting the length of the mattress, his bare feet resting upon the floor. Great, he thought, now my back will ache.

He opened his eyes again when he heard the hissing. Curious, he stared down the length of his body at the television, where an old-style test pattern was emblazoned across the screen. White noise crackled from the speakers. That’s weird, he thought. With 24/7 TV, he hadn’t seen a test pattern in many years. Nowadays, after the regular programming was concluded, the 300+ stations would always run infomercials on combustible laxatives or penile dysfunction or something. God, he felt tired. With a sigh, Shoe fell back asleep.

Shoe was experiencing a terrifying dream, a common occurrence for him. He was back at school, in a class for which he was wildly unprepared. Calculus. All the other students, precocious children who immersed themselves in textbooks of complex numbers, seemed to thrive, but Shoe couldn’t make heads or tails of the material. The teacher, Mr. Velloff, had just asked him a question and Shoe struggled mightily, flashed back on all he had learned in the course, and dredged up an answer.

“Wrong!” barked Velloff and all the other children screamed with mirth. This was rich. Eric Shoe was screwing up royally again. Each child was elated at that moment not to be him, and it showed in their feral expressions. Even the teacher boomed out in laughter, and Shoe wanted to fall through the floor.

Suddenly, he awoke, sat up in bed. The vertigo was gone. He had slept off his hangover. What time must it be? he wondered. He heard voices and looked again at the television. A panel of important-looking persons was speaking in a serious tone. Then the program went to commercial, an ad about Ajax laundry detergent being stronger than dirt. A knight in glistening silver armor charged through a suburban neighborhood on a white horse and leveled his lance at a little boy covered in mud. With a lightning flash of magic, the toddler was clean again.

Shoe blinked thoughtfully. He’d seem this ad many, many times, but God, not since the 1970s, when he was an infant. Suddenly the busy cadence of the program’s theme music came back up. Shoe recognized it: it was Meet the Press, the venerable Sunday morning current events show that had been on since the 1940s. When he glanced at the screen, he spied the emcee and he nearly lost it. The program, broadcast in black and white, showed an elderly gentleman whom Shoe recognized but couldn’t name. Then the on-screen caption revealed the host to be Lawrence Spivak.

But Lawrence Spivak died many years ago. Tim Russert was the host of Meet the Press now; everyone knew that. Then it hit Shoe: this must be a nostalgic look at TV programming from the 1970s. What was the occasion? he wondered. Hell, he thought, shaking his head, he needed to get up, grab a shower, and eat breakfast. In the bathroom, he picked up the toothpaste, squinted at it. “Ipana?” he murmured, confused. “Must be something new.”

After showering and once again feeling more or less human, Shoe padded into his kitchen, fashionably decorated with vintage chrome and vinyl table and chairs. Shoe was often nostalgic for the days of his youth. He dumped butter into the cast-iron skillet and expertly fried up some eggs, and dropped bread into the toaster. Seconds later, he extracted the toast and applied butter and jam, then wolfed it down.

A Hole in Time

As Shoe walked to his car, the sky suddenly grew ominously dark, and he looked up to find the sun under a heavy cloud cover. After a moment, the clouds dissipated and the sky was as bright as before. Blinking twice, he shook off sudden unaccountable but not unfamiliar misgivings, unlocked his ’57 Tesla X and scooted across the faux alligator hide seats. Shoe eased back for another nap and the car started and then sped swiftly away. At the toll bridge, the X winked in acknowledgement of the fiscal transaction, and the car was soon on its way.

At work, Shoe slipped on the neural cuffs and leaned back in his ergonomic chair and allowed his subconscious to work. Hours later, he arose from his mechanically-induced slumber, walked to the sign-in station and manually clocked out. On the way to the exit, he noticed his boss, Stevenson, trying to make time with an attractive new female employee. Shoe admired her from afar. Another day in the books, he thought. On the drive home, a soft rain began pattering down out of an otherwise clear sky. The drops were obliterated by the X’s windshield ionization strip and in short order the vehicle turned in at the parking lot of the mega-grocery.

Shoe passed through the doors and scanned his zPhone on the handle of a shopping cart, and it fell in line behind him. At length, the cart was piled high with comestibles. Without breaking stride, he walked past the checkout station and received a digital receipt on his zPhone. Shoe sighed. It was good to be finished with the hassle of shopping.

As the X pulled into Shoe’s driveway, he was startled awake. Lights exploded on the dashboard. The car’s propulsion unit was failing, and the vehicle was drawing to a stop. What the hell? thought Shoe. He’d programmed the trip home like he always did. These new Xs were a bit hinky, though, he thought.

The Past

As the vehicle ground to a halt in the gravelled driveway–gravel?–Shoe sprang alert. His vision from the piloting position was occluded by a huge circular device. If Shoe was not mistaken, this was what used to be called a steering wheel.

“Having trouble, Bud?” asked a uniformed man who appeared like magic at Shoe’s driver’s side window. Shoe opened his mouth, but no words spilled out.

“Whatta’ ya’ got here, Fella?» said the man, ”one ‘a them new fangled automatics? I prefer the old-fashioned three-speeds on the column myself,” he went on. “No,” the man continued, “this here’s got a gear shifter.” He turned the wheel, found it locked in place. “Here,” said the man, who by his uniform Shoe pegged as some sort of authority figure, a policeman perhaps. “It’s in neutral now. Press the clutch and fire it up.” When Shoe, still stunned, did nothing, the cop twisted the key in what Shoe intuited was an ignition. The car rumbled to life. “Now,” the cop went on, “put it in gear. What’s ‘a matter?” he asked suspiciously. “You high, mister?”

Shoe shrugged. “I’m not sure.”

The cop frowned.

_______

After he had been taken into custody, Shoe sat in what the police sergeant referred to as the drunk tank and contemplated his dilemma. His companions were in a sorry state. Some of them slept on threadbare cots or on the concrete floor. Others bawled loudly and cursed one another, while still others sat morosely and vomited up whatever was on their stomachs. No one had belts or shoe laces.

“Number 11,” barked a burly man from outside the cell. “That’s you, Buddy,” said the cop, pointing at Shoe. Shoe didn’t possess what the police considered a valid ID or license to operate a vehicle, so he’d been summarily arrested and designated number 11. “Doc wants to see you, son,” said the cop kindly, leading him down a corridor. Unlike the police with which Shoe was familiar, these cops were pleasant, didn’t sadistically rough up the citizenry, and didn’t wear masks. Shoe followed on the heels of the policeman, and soon found himself in an overly bright room. A frail-looking little man sporting a goatee and clad in a white coat sat at a table that was bolted to the floor. The man invited him to sit.

“I read the police account of your arrest,” began the doctor. “It stated that you seemed confused about what time it was–about time itself?” He left the sentence dangling.

Shoe said nothing.

“Tell me,” said the doctor, “when do you think it is?”

“They took my zPhone,” explained Shoe.

“Oh, yes, your timepiece,” murmured the other man. “What I mean is, what year do you think it is?”

Shoe blinked in confusion. “57,” he answered. That was right, wasn’t it? he thought.

The doctor seemed relieved at the answer. “Not so bad,” he declared. “Just five years off.” He scribbled something on an old-school clipboard with an old-school ink pen. “1957,” he murmured as he wrote.

“No,” said Shoe. “2057.”

This drew the doctor up short. “You believe that this is 2057?” he inquired gently.

“Well,” said Shoe, “what year is it?”

“1962,” replied the other man, scrutinizing Shoe’s face.

_______

Eventually, the police had to release Shoe, since he had broken no law. It was not illegal to be generally confused, they reasoned, and so out the station door he went. He found his lack of memory disconcerting, however, and to regroup, he took a seat on a concrete bench outside the police station. Pedestrians passed him by without a second look. They were all dressed in period garb. By this time, Shoe would ordinarily be fixing supper. He discovered that he was hungry. Intent on returning home, he rose to his feet and began walking.

When he arrived, his car–the 1962 version–was still there at the end of the driveway. Extracting the keys from the ignition, he let himself into the house. The TV was still on and a man named Rod Serling was talking about …at the signpost up ahead; it’s the Twilight Zone! Shoe tried to think the TV to cease working, but when that had no effect, he approached the set and pushed in the off/on button. The picture shrank to a dot of light. He sat on the sofa and thought about his day. He hadn’t made it in to work today, having spent the previous 24 hours in lockup, but then, the computer company he worked for didn’t exist in 1962, so Shoe reasoned that he was not truant after all. The interrogations at the police station had been grueling, He wondered when it was now. Pushing off his loafers, he lay back on the sofa and was soon fast asleep.