Under the tagline, a call to action urged citizens to contact the American Health Bureau at #99-17-18384.
Hannah stared at the poster for a long and restless minute before forcing herself onward. At the next corner, she mindlessly averted her gaze from the clear glass front of a newspaper box. She was overstocked on calamity at the moment. The last thing she needed was another dose of disruption in the form of a brain-busting headline. “Gelatinous Man Wins Congressional Nod,” or “Tentative Accord Reached Between Humans, Apes.”
A half block later, she suffered another pins-and-needles attack, forcing her to rest on a bus stop bench. She opened her handbag and was soothed by her familiar belongings—her wallet, her makeup, a Trader Joe’s granola bar, a recent issue of Entertainment Weekly. Most cherished of all was her little pink iPod, which looked as dead as her cell phone.
As she idly nibbled her granola bar, a blue-and-white city ambulance came to a halt on the opposite side of the street. The driver, a stocky young man in a royal blue jumpsuit, stepped out of the vehicle and stretched. Hannah wondered what would happen if she went up to him and explained her predicament. He’d probably take her straight to the municipal nuthouse, where overworked clinicians would feed her big words and little tablets until she realized that her whole life up to this point was just a schizoid dream.
A tinny voice beckoned the paramedic from his belt radio. He rushed back to his seat and started up the ambulance. The rooftop lights spun bright and red. The motor sounded more like a hair dryer to Hannah than a gas engine.
With a steamy hiss, the vehicle floated to second-story altitude. The wheels folded inward until the hubcaps faced the pavement. The engine emitted a final roar, and then the ambulance shot down West Earl Boulevard like a cruise missile. Leaves and litter fluttered in its wake.
Hannah sat frozen in dead-faced torpor. A piece of granola fell out of her hanging mouth.
Inside her head, a stadium full of little Hannahs erupted in riot. They screamed, they sobbed, they pounded the floor. Only one managed to stay in her seat. Amidst all the chaos, she looked up at the sky and calmly suggested that she find a quiet place to gather her wits.
Hannah collected her belongings with shaky hands, then continued in the direction she believed to be west. Soon her sage little helper offered new advice. The next time you see a newspaper stand, try to stop and look. You don’t have to read the headline, sweetie. But you may want to check the date.
—
The marina was a short hop away, just as the pony-haired girl had said. Hannah had to walk two more blocks before she caught the blue water of the bay between buildings.
Soon she found her nesting spot: a long granite bench at the base of the pier. The view was remarkably similar to the one she remembered from her coveted reality, her terra sana. Beyond all the docks and bobbing white yachts lay the long green shore of Coronado. The sky was blue, the air was warm, and nothing soared through the sky but seagulls.
The actress folded her legs in a calming lotus pose while she drank in passing strangers—three joggers, two lovers, one mother. Hannah did a double take at the woman’s baby stroller, which was nothing but handlebar and chassis. Despite its missing parts, the carriage floated steadily along the walkway, as if rolling on invisible wheels. That’s not right, Hannah’s rational self insisted. That is a crazy, sci-fi, future-world object, which makes no sense because this is not the future. A newspaper and a digital bank sign had both confirmed the accuracy of Hannah’s inner calendar. It was the same year, same month, same crazy Saturday as the one she woke up in.
A gangly young man entered Hannah’s field of vision. From his wavy brown hair, his Dustin Hoffman proboscis, and the unsure way he carried himself, she reflexively filed him under Nerd, Jewish. He wore an untucked black button-down over jeans and carried a large spiral-bound book. Unlike the other amblers on the concrete strand, he shined his anxious stare in all directions. Soon it found Hannah and stayed there. She was close enough to see that he was focusing on her middle bits. Scowling, she crossed her arms over her chest. Go away, go away, go away.
Mercifully, he went away. Hannah returned to her thoughts.
Of all the dark and troubling aspects of the morning, the part she wanted to revisit the least involved the white-haired man who’d wrapped a bracelet around one wrist and a bruise around the other. Hannah knew it was crucial to revisit all the things he’d said, since he was the only one who seemed to know what was going on.
Tragically, the audio portion of her memory had been scrambled by trauma. His words hung in fragments, like poetry magnets. Keep your head. Keep your head. This is the end. For them, not for you. [Something something] plans. [Something something] strings. Help will come.