Summer of Yesterday (8 page)

nine

E
xhaustion catches up with me, and I sleep on the couch until it's dark out. I have no idea what time it is when I wake up. The day's events come back to haunt me. Waking up on the beach, my tongue hurting, realizing where I am . . .
when
I am. I'm stuck in the past, with nothing but a dead cell phone and fifty borrowed bucks.

Part of me wants to get up and join the world. Another part of me, the part that's winning, wants to keep sleeping. I'm vaguely aware of my muscles. I'm sore and probably bruised. Did I really slide down a waterslide when I passed out? Was it the action of sliding that got me here, or the seizure itself, regardless of where it happened?

Thinking about it makes me doze off again. I'm not hungry nor do I have any desire to get up. I just sleep. And dream about an empty baseball diamond as the sun descends into an orange field. A dream within a dream. And of my dad sitting up late into the night, regretting letting me drive off alone, hoping to see his baby girl one more time.

***

There's a knock on a metal door. Again, and again. I hear it for a while before I realize it's not a dream. My eyes pop open. “Haley?” Someone's calling me from outside. Then, a sharper tap on the window. “Haley, you in there?”

I stumble to my feet. Feels like someone hit me over the head with a two-by-four. “Coming,” I mumble. Where am I again?

“Haley?” He doesn't hear me.

“I'm coming, I'm coming.” I shuffle over to the door in the darkness and peer out the window. Jason—now I remember. He's in his River Country uniform, holding a drink cup and some clothes. From the lavender-and-golden sky outside, it looks to be about dusk, the same time he dropped me off. So I must've slept only a few minutes. I open the door.

“Well, good morning, sunshine.” He's looking fresh and gorgeous as ever. He hands me the cup and what appears to be a folded shirt and shorts. “You want some Coke? Those are my mom's, by the way. I need them back.” He switches on a lamp, and I'm almost blinded.

“Thanks.” I take the cup and let him in. I sip the Coke, plopping back down on the couch. “How long was I asleep?”

He sits on the edge of the couch cautiously, as though gauging whether the proximity would bother me. “I don't know. What time did you go to sleep?” he asks.

“Right after you dropped me off.”

His eyes and mouth fly open. “You've been asleep since yesterday? Holy crap, woman!”

“I have? I guess my body needed to recover,” I mumble. My stomach feels tight and rumbly. “Yesterday? Really?” I wince at him.

He nods. “You must be starving. I'll go get you something to eat. Unless you want to keep me company.”

As much as I want to go with Jason and have another bite to eat, the thought of my dad, and maybe even my mom by now, worrying about where I am slaps me back to reality.
I can't, Jason. I have to go home now
, I want to say. Somehow I have to make it happen. “How about I meet you near Pioneer Hall later. Or wherever you'll be,” I tell him.

“Sounds good. The shower works, by the way, and there's toothpaste and an extra toothbrush in the bathroom.” He points down the hall of the trailer.

I smile at him softly. “Thanks. You've been really nice.”

“Hey . . .” He peers into my face. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I'm just . . . I don't know how much longer I can be here. I think my dad might be worried.” I press my palms against my forehead and rub the sleep out of my eyes.

“I can imagine.” He's quiet for a minute. “A daughter that looks like you. I'd be terrified.”

I look at him. “What do you mean?”

“Well, I'd flip if you were my daughter. I mean, look at you. It's not like you're hard on the eyes. Any number of sickos would love to get their hands on you. It's scary.”

His words pierce my heart. They really hurt. One, because my dad would never have left me on my own, but it was the only story I could think of. Two, because he thinks that of my dad, and three, because my father is probably fearing the worst right now. It's not fair to keep him waiting like this.

I can tell this isn't easy for Jason, either. On one hand, he probably wants to do the right thing by getting me back to my family, and on the other, he seems to like me, as much as I like him, and probably wants me to stay. “I'll find you later, after I've had a chance to freshen up. Is that cool?”

He smiles and stands up. “Cool. See you later, Haley-Haley.”

“Jason-Jason.”

I think he's lingering, maybe to see what my next move will be. It really kills me, because in a different time, I would've made the next move and maybe even kissed him. But it's not the right time, nor place. “Thanks for the drink. And the clothes,” I say, holding them up in my hand.

“I hope they fit.”

We stand there a moment more looking at each other, and it occurs to me that I may not see him again. If I find my way home tonight, that is. I record his face in my mind so I can always remember the boy who went out of his way to help me. Then, I lace an arm around his neck and hug him hard, feeling his arms squeezing me back.

After a moment he slips away down the steps to his cart. “Later, Haley.”

“Bye,” I whisper.

I close the door behind him.

Don't cry. Do not.

I unfold the clothes. There're a pair of pink elastic-waist shorts, a Mickey Mouse T-shirt, and something else that falls to the floor. I pick it up. A pair of white panties. Ha-ha. I can imagine Jason's mortification at rifling through his mom's stuff just so I would have something clean to wear. They smell like someone else's drawer. Clean, but not mine. Better than me right now, that's for sure.

I take a long shower, letting the hot water rinse the soreness away, and towel off in the dark brown-and-beige bathroom. It looks so old, but it serves its purpose. His mother's clothes fit me okay. The shirt fits fine, but the shorts are a little tight. I decide to keep the underwear on but to wear my shorts instead.

I pocket my dead cell phone and venture outside, leaving the key to the trailer underneath the mat. Logical enough place for Jason or Jake to find it again. I have the fifty-dollar bill in my pocket in case I need it. My stomach is really rumbling now. Maybe I should've gone to eat.

Too late.

In the hot evening, I walk to the nearest station and wait for the silent tram to arrive. It's full of people returning to the Magic Kingdom for the nighttime parade and fireworks, I'm guessing, since we've done the same so many times. I hop in and enjoy the whoosh of the silent takeoff. We snake through the streets until we reach the Pioneer Hall station.

I jump off the tram and stand there, as everyone else around me walks ahead. Where exactly was I when I fell through time? Standing at the top of the Whoop 'n' Holler slide in River Country. I have to make it back there.

I have to try to make a seizure happen in the same place again. Maybe there was a—what do you call it?—like, a vortex of energy there. I've heard of places like that, where there're extraordinary amounts of energy, and strange things happen in these spots. Maybe if I re-create the same conditions, it'll happen. I know it sounds crazy, but it's the most logical solution I can think of right now.

Except I can't just walk into River Country. It's closed now. I could go in the same way I did the first time, swimming through the lake. But it seems to me there're easily five times as many people here today than there are in the future. I guess River Country kept the campground busier in general.

To my left there's a petting zoo, and behind that a service road. A truck is turning into the road. It seems to lead behind Pioneer Hall, which means behind River Country. I check around to make sure no one is looking, then run through the petting zoo under the curious stares of chicken and sheep.

A little goat saunters up to me. I pat him on the head but keep moving. There's a noise behind a shed. I run to the edge of a barn to hide. Someone is walking out with someone else, a man and a woman, in blue plaid shirts, talking about what they overheard some guest say earlier. They don't see me.

I bust through to the back edge of the petting zoo, straddle the wooden fence, and climb out onto the service road. The truck I saw before is up ahead, stopped, with lights on. The driver is hanging out the window talking loudly and laughing with someone throwing away garbage behind Pioneer Hall.

“Later.”

“Later, buddy!”

I need an excuse in place in case someone finds me snooping. My only defense is to say I got lost and ended up here quite by accident. Scooting along the road, I pray I don't run into anybody, and eventually I reach a fenced-in area that says
KEEP OUT
. I've become quite the professional trespasser!

Behind it are the sounds of motors and machines, and I see the back-side, concave openings of the rock boulders from River Country. They hide water pipes and pumps. Leave it to Disney to make the world a stage. Great, so I got this far. But now I have to venture inside without anyone seeing me.

I hear employees inside, moving around, banging garbage containers, the swish-swishing of water being moved around by pipes, brooms, and who knows what. I'm behind the chlorinated pool with the two steep slides, but I can't get in through here. I have to keep moving down this street. It's hard to know exactly where you are when you've seen a place only once, but
if
I remember correctly, the Whoop 'n' Holler slides are farther down that way.

My nerves are on high alert. I make it all the way to the end of the road without being noticed and slide through an open gate in the chain-link fence. Peering from behind a large reddish rock, I see someone coming carrying garbage bags. I scoot back behind a recess.
Please, please don't see me. Keep moving. . . .

I hear the fence gate close, then the sound of a Dumpster opening and closing.
Phew.

To my right is the edge of Bay Lake. I'm close to the waterslide I need to find. But how do I get up there from here? I hope there's a way to access it that's not from the general-public side. Inching along the rock, I come around the curve and find a set of stairs roped off with a chain.
CAST MEMBERS ONLY
.

Why, that would be me. . . .

This is it. This leads to the top of the rock formation where I fell. Carefully, I step over the chain and head up the stairs. What if there's someone up there, cleaning? My heart beats in my throat, and I feel the saliva in my mouth turning hot, as if I'm going to throw up, but I don't feel a seizure coming on.

And, for once, I'm disappointed.

When I get to the top, I catch my breath and take in the view. It's easier to understand the layout of the park now that there's some light still left out. The winding slides are fresh and clean, not consumed by trees and dead leaves like when I last stood here. There's actually a sandy beach where there was nothing but shrubs and clumps of trees before. River Country employees are lining up the chairs nice and straight and getting the whole place ready for another day of fun tomorrow.

It's not a big water park like Blizzard Beach or Typhoon Lagoon, but it's quaint and private, and I can see how a kid—how anyone—could spend a whole day here
having a blast.

I move over to the top of the slide, which now has a chain across it, too, closed for the evening.
Okay, universe, God, or whoever is in charge . . .
I hold on to the rock wall next to me and close my eyes, trying to feel the vibrations of this place.
I really like 1982, seems like a great time. But I've learned my lesson. So . . . can I go home now?

Nothing happens. A warm breeze comes in from the lake, wrapping me in a summery glow, but that's it.
Please, this is killing my parents, I know it. I really like Jason and could definitely get to know him better, but . . . I need to go home.

Nothing.

Maybe it needs to be nighttime. Maybe my cell phone, interference, or electrical stuff had something to do with it. My phone was on at the time. I slide it out of my pocket and try turning it on again.

Dead. Deader than an abandoned water park.

I sit down cross-legged in the spot I last remember before I fell. There was someone—a security guard, most likely—chasing me; I won't forget that.

I'm in the same spot I was two days ago but light-years away from home. Suddenly the stress of it all hits me. A wave of sadness rises into my throat. The anguish stings my eyes. Why is this happening to me? What do I have to do to get home? If my parents eventually accept that I'm missing or dead, how do I continue to live in this place and time?

Come on, seizures, when I finally need you for something, you're nowhere to be found!

Inadvertently, I kick on the fiberglass slide, and the sound carries a short way, like a muffled gong. A moment later it's like a genie appears behind me.