iRobotronic Page 6

  Seffy followed Gareth from the room and out into the hall, noticing the unyielding lines of his back. She picked up the pace until she was at his side. Peeking up into his face as they made their way to the computer lab, her heart careened against her ribs. “Do you think it will really work?”

  He kept his face straight ahead. “Eugene thinks so, but I just don't know.”

  “Will you be upset with me if it doesn't?”

  He glanced down at her, frowning. “What does that mean?”

  Seffy had to suck in a lungful of air to hang onto her emotions. She turned her head, because looking into his eyes would make her crumble. As they passed a corner, she caught a flicker of movement. Clay was there in the hall, watching her progress. His expression was solemn, his gaze encouraging. She nodded in response and put her shoulders back. She could do this. “Nothing, I guess,” she said, belatedly remembering Gareth's question.

  A few minutes later, they arrived at the lab. Eugene was there to open the door. His smile was nervous, as if he was worried she might bite. Or sneeze. She looked around the room and saw Fiona, her face blank, and the nerd herd, their expressions apprehensive.

  Eugene cleared his throat. “Miss Carter, we're glad you agreed to this experiment. We've gone through every mathematical calculation and I'm confident that this will be a successful trial.” He handed her a piece of paper. “This has all the information you will need. Do not lose it.”

  Seffy tucked it in her front pouch and nodded.

  “You have to be back to the point where you originally left.”

  “I was at a tanning salon.”

  Eugene pursed his lips. “You already gave us all those details. You will need to return to that point at 2:00 p.m. By our estimation, that gives you approximately three hours.”

  She glanced at Fiona, knowing this wasn't nearly enough time to accomplish what was needed.

  Fiona handed her another piece of paper. “I have a little experiment of my own for Seffy, Eugene. She will need at least forty-eight hours.” Fiona stepped away, her elfin eyes narrowing at the head scientist.

  “Forty-eight hours! But then there's a risk she'll affect the future.”

  “Nevertheless, Fenn wishes it.”

  Eugene pulled off his glasses and gave them a vigorous rubbing before sliding them back onto his face. “We will need a few minutes to recalibrate our calculations.” He turned to his staff and they began running numbers on a computer screen.

  After about fifteen minutes, he turned back. “Okay, we have the updated numbers. Miss Carter, you will still need to be at the tanning salon by 2:00 on the 13th. That doesn't change. We shall simply be sending you back further in time.”

  Simply. Seffy glanced at Gareth, wondering what he was thinking. His dark eyes reflected nothing.

  Eugene continued. “And, this is of equal importance if you want to return, you must get your friend—”

  “Verity?”

  “Yes, Verity. Get her to say the phrase 'it's not the end of the world' to you. Even if you just ask her to repeat the words, it should be enough. That way we'll be replicating what happened when you left the first time. Understood?”

  Seffy nodded, still half expecting that she was dreaming. The door to the lab opened and her friends came in, along with Jared and the girls.

  “I thought I made it clear an audience wasn't necessary,” Eugene said, sounding shrill.

  “You can't expect us to not be here when Seffy leaves,” said Lani, indignant.

  “It's fine,” Fiona snapped, ending the discussion. “Just stay out of the way.”

  Seffy looked at all their faces, some sad, some anxious, and some, like Gareth, unreadable. She wondered where Trent was, then figured he was with Fenn.

  “Do you have any questions, Miss Carter?”

  She heard the crinkle of paper in her pocket. “Thousands.”

  Eugene emitted a hollow chuckle. “Just remember, this is an experiment only. The real test will be when and if we can get everyone home. The success of that depends on success today.”

  That and the universe. She suppressed another hysterical giggle. But if Gareth was right, she'd be back in her room within a few minutes, mission not accomplished.

  Seffy looked at Fiona, whose face was expressionless except for flared nostrils. Next, she looked at Gareth. His brown eyes had been the stuff of her dreams for so long she didn't know how to cope with the fact that he was in some way displeased with her.

  Eugene cleared his throat. “Okay, if you'll step right here onto this spot. We call it the launching pad.”

  Seffy glanced down to see two pieces of yellow tape forming an X on the floor. She stepped on them, staring down at the tips of her shoes, feeling so tired, she honestly didn't care what happened next. Eugene motioned to his team. They began punching computer keys. She raised her gaze once more to Gareth, wondering if he could read her need for him in her eyes.

  And then he was gone.

  Chapter Six

  Seffy felt weightless, then gravity returned with a vengeance. She hit something hard, which knocked the wind out of her. As she sucked oxygen, she opened her eyes and looked up. And shut them again. The sun just about blinded her.

  A yellow sun.

  As her lungs inflated, Seffy slowly looked around and realized she was lying in soft, green grass. Easing to a sitting position, she saw she was in a park. Not just any park. Elysian Park. Adrenaline thrummed in her veins.

  It worked!

  All around her dogs barked, kids ran, and joggers jogged. She widened her eyes to take it all in. Seffy fell back in the grass and spread her arms and legs back and forth in a not-so-snowy snow angel while happy tears streamed into her ears.

  I'm home. Oh, thank God I'm home!

  A golden lab ran up and licked her face. Seffy sputtered and pushed it away, but nothing could upset her in this moment. She slowly got to her feet. The familiar metallic smell of L.A. was like honeyed perfume. She glanced at the watch on her wrist. It was eight in the morning. Was she technically late for work? Was it the weekend? After a moment, she remembered she'd left on a Friday.

  Seffy turned around to get her bearings, then began to jog to her house, which she realized was nearby. All around her, life went on as normal. It was as if she'd never left. If only she could pop back and snatch her friends. But she couldn't...so she didn't need to feel too guilty about how friggin' happy she was to be back.

  I'm really back.

  Seffy allowed the fact to seep through her system. For the first time in a million years she felt hopeful. Maybe she'd get the happy ending that always seemed so elusive. She pulled in a deep breath and absorbed her surroundings.

  Her neighborhood looked the same. Same cars in the driveways. Same lawn maintenance crews hard at work. She arrived at her block, then saw the house she shared with Gareth, Lani, and Addison. Her beautiful home was there waiting for her. As she headed up the ivy-draped stone stairs to the Tudor-style bungalow, her heart overflowed with joy. The French doors were unlocked. She sailed into the kitchen and stopped.

  Strangers sat at her table eating breakfast. A man stood up, dropping his paper into his oatmeal. “Who the hell are you?”

  Seffy didn't travel across space and time to cower before a bunch of squatters—even if they did look relatively prosperous. She planted her hands on her hips. “Who the hell are you and what are you doing in my house?”

  A woman, apparently the wife, skinny as a rail with an improbably-sized bust, wrung her hands. “Oh, I knew the price was too good on this place. That's why it was so cheap. Riffraff!”

  “I am not riffraff. I'm the owner of this house!” Well, technically a co-renter.

  “Listen lady. You're going to get out now or I'll call the police!”

  The two blond kids sitting at the table stared in awed stupefaction. Seffy wasn't sure what to do. She hadn't expected complications. Damn Eugene and his crappy calculations!

  The man reached for the telephone.
Seffy lunged across the room, grabbed the cable and ripped it from the wall. She swiped a knife off the table, then raced up the stairs to her room, followed by the sound of outraged shouts.

  But instead of the tasteful art prints and stained-glass she'd decorated her room with, she found alternative rock band posters all over her bedroom walls. Deciding to deal with these people later, she concentrated on priorities. Money. Using the knife, she made a slit in the wall next to the built-in bookcase. Peeling back the wall paper revealed a place where she kept her emergency credit card. But the card wasn't there.

  Oh no.

  The man appeared in the doorway, followed by his wife. “Listen, you need money for drugs?” He threw a wad of bills at her. “Just take it and go! Please!”

  “You think I'm a druggy?” Seffy then noticed her bony wrists sticking out of the ragged track suit, and at the steak knife in her hand. She made a very unladylike comment, grabbed the cash and rushed past the startled couple. Once she was outside, she ran for several blocks until she felt sure no one was following.

  Breathing like a freight train, she slumped against a brick building and counted the cash. Nine hundred bucks! Seffy made a mental note to act whack the next time she was low on funds. Still, that whole episode was weird. What had happened?

  Everything seemed right. Everything except the squatters in her house. Gareth and the girls would be furious when they found out. But it didn't make sense. If Eugene said she was being sent further back in time, that meant she wasn't months later than when she originally left. She was back two days before the day she'd left. So why would new renters be in her place? Instead of a flash-back, was this one of those flash-sideways things? Probably Eugene just put in the wrong day. Heck he probably punched in the wrong year. With his aversion to her cooties, maybe he sent her to hell and gone and good riddance. She shoved her hair out of her sweating face, unable to follow her own time pretzel theory.

  Seffy turned and saw a door next to where she was standing. A shoe store. She decided to do something concrete and linear, like get some answers. Seffy went inside and looked around. All the styles seemed right for the year and season. A saleslady approached her with caution.

  “Can I help you?”

  Tucking her cash in her pouch, Seffy smiled. “This might seem like a crazy question, but can you tell me today's date?”

  “July 12.”

  “But what year?”

  The woman's eyes widened. “2006.”

  “Oh, thank God,” she exclaimed. “I got a little mixed up there.” So what was the deal with those renters? She scanned the shoes, glad to see an assortment of athletic styles. First things first. Shoes...then reality. “So do you have any Asics in a size seven?”

  Fifteen minutes later, she left the store with a snazzy new pair of cross trainers, which would offer more support than her pilates shoes. Plus the gold accents would match the gold artwork on the new tracksuit she was determined to buy next.

  Seffy headed down the street, but a display in an electronics store caught her attention. Had the store been here before? A flat screen television in the window had on The Hollywood Diss, a show hosted by a catty couple who reported on the daily entertainment dirt. She used to watch it religiously, absorbing all the scandals and business bites to stay on top of what was happening in the Biz. Now she just felt sorry for the latest actress stupid enough to get caught in their verbal cross-hairs.

  “Today's naughty buzz revolves around Krista Sweeney, the newest starlet caught on tape rolling in ze hay with a competing director.”

  “Now how did that get on tape, I ask you? Somebody wanted to be se-en,” the co-host said in a sing-songy voice.

  “These days, it's practically a résumé enhancement. What really thickens the plot is that the director she's under contract with? Well, he thought 'he plus she' meant true lurve and now he wants her fired from the project!” The host leaned forward. “No class.”

  The co-host made a tsking sound. “Krista, honey, Tinseltown may be tarnished, but at least it still shines.”

  Seffy felt sad. It had long been a hope of hers to be featured on the show—a positive story carried a lot of buzz. A negative one was often a death knell...like for poor Krista. For so long, this had been the focus of her world, the ins and out of the the business, the highs and lows, who was in, who was out, all the backstage drama. Now, watching the hosts trash the poor girl du jour somehow lost its attraction.

  Shrugging it off, she walked down the block to one of her favorite stores, and enduring the horrified looks of patrons and shopkeeper alike, purchased two pink velour tracksuits. She changed into one in the dressing room after paying for it, but decided to keep her old one in case it had some magical time travel powers. Next, she went into a perfume store and made a beeline for her favorite fragrance. Seffy grabbed a tester and closed her eyes as the dewy cloud of bergamot, mandarin, and artemesia yumminess descended upon her.

  “Can I help you?” A sharp-nosed saleslady with a French chignon and white cosmetic coat approached her.

  Seffy sent her a bright smile. “No, I'm good.”

  And she was...almost, with the butter soft fabric against her skin and a heavenly nimbus of aroma floating about her. Maybe time travel didn't have to be apocalypsey. Maybe it could be fun.

  Seffy exited the shop and headed down the block to her regular salon. She cried out with happiness when she saw her beloved hairdresser through the window.

  Pushing the glass door open, she went inside, her bags getting caught for a moment in the entrance. She yanked them free and burst into the tastefully appointed lobby. “Bruno! Oh my God, are you a sight for sore...everything!”

  A willow thin man in tight pants and harsh blond highlights looked up from adding the finishing touches on a woman's coiffure. His hazel eyes were kind but confused. “Do I know you, sweetie?”

  Seffy gripped her bags, her smile dissolving. She swallowed. Um, this cannot be good. “Well...we did know each other...in another time, I guess.”

  He stared at her quizzically, then winked. “Tell you what, I was going to go on my lunch break after Sheila here—” he blew a kiss to Sheila's reflection in the mirror, “but I believe in loving thy neighbor, and honey, your hair is about as lost as a red-headed stepchild at the wrong family reunion. Have a seat.”

  Seffy stumbled over to a chair and blinked hard to keep tears at bay. What was going on? Her house existed. Juicy existed. Bruno existed. The store clerk told her the correct date. But why did strangers live in her house? Why didn't Bruno recognize her? Her face cleared. Of course! She no longer had the blonde hair and blue tint contacts. She must look like a stranger with her dark brown eyes and awful brownish hair. Bruno would get a kick out of his confusion when he realized who she was.

  After Sheila paid and left, Bruno patted the stylist chair. She walked over and sat stiffly, looking up into the familiar face of the man who'd been doing her hair for the past two years. “I look a lot different than I used to. But you do know me. Seffy Carter?”

  He shook his head sadly.

  Seffy deflated. Oh God. She had no way to deal with this. The exhilaration of successful time travel was fading fast, with despair on the ascendancy. Something must be horribly wrong.

  Wheeling her about to face the mirror, Bruno picked up a long tress of her hair and studied her reflection as if he was trying to make the connection. “You look like you've been ill. I don't want to be rude, hun, but is it terminal?”

  Seffy covered her face with her hands and started to blubber. She shook her head and cried for several minutes until her sobs turned to hiccups. “It's just been a hard...time.”

  Bruno patted her shoulder. “Well, I'm going to turn that frown upside down with a gorgeous new style so just relax.”

  She stared at her gaunt reflection in the mirror. The lighting accentuated her eyes sunken in her skull, the deep hollows in her cheeks, the grooves along her windpipe on her throat. She did look like someone suffering from
a long illness as opposed to the usual starving starlet-wannabe. Next, she studied her hair. There was no point in coloring it. The blonde would just have to go. “I...need low maintenance right now.”

  “I understand completely. We'll get rid of the old color and work with what you have. Something wash and wear but fabulous, okay?” He patted her cheek and Seffy had to press her lips together to stop a new bout of tears. Bruno always knew what she wanted before she did.

  As he began to clip away, she gradually relaxed until she felt like she was under a contented spell. Yanni sounded from the speakers, blow driers buzzed, hairdressers and patrons gossiped—it was absolutely transcendental. Bruno prattled about his friends and Seffy was glad she wasn't required to speak. He had always been sensitive to her moods and this time was no exception.

  An hour later, he was done. Seffy scrutinized her new reflection. As usual, Bruno had worked magic. Even though her hair was short, it had body, curl, and little flips to make it fashionable and stylish. She loved it. Seffy grabbed him and hugged him hard. Bruno hugged her back as if she really were an old friend.

  “Thank you,” she whispered.

  He eased back and patted her shoulder. “Anytime.”

  As she slid from the chair, Seffy glanced at the doorway and froze.

  “Uh oh, looks like hubby isn't happy with the new do,” Bruno said under his breath.

  Seffy stared at Trent, wondering if her fevered brain had conjured him up. He entered the shop and looked at her with equally wide eyes. She decided to pretend he didn't exist. Then she wondered if he was Montana Trent or L.A. Trent—the one she'd never met. Just ignore him and maybe he'll go away. She paid for her cut and tipped Bruno fifty dollars.

  “Come back again, sweetie. And I hope you get well real soon!”

  Seffy waved at him, grabbed her bags, and walked past Trent out of the shop. She kept walking, hoping he was just a mirage, even though the hairs on her now-exposed neck told her otherwise. She glanced at a plate glass window and saw his reflection as he followed her. She stopped and turned. “Are you dead like Clay? Like some spirit guide? Have we even met?”