by Ryan P. Kinney Assembled from works by J.M. Romig and Chuck Joy
I glance out of my driver’s side window and see a boy trudging miserably down an expanse of windswept prairie big sky, maybe one persistent contrail up there establishing the general era, airplanes fly People, still, do not
a road crosses this windswept prairie a dirt path really with twin ruts a boy came walking up that road many years ago homesick from summer camp he couldn’t be without his mother
If time is fluid, like the oceans then maybe I’m glancing over as a wave breaks I couldn’t tell you how many times I made that journey on foot my heels throbbing, my legs begging to be broken my hitchhiker’s thumb, had given up all hope at that point
Later a teenager passed in the other direction his essence radiating awkwardness this long haired kid, just turned thirteen wore hand me down boots that are too big for his feet, ripped jeans, and a bookbag slung across his shoulder in the dying days of July whispering under his breath maybe reciting poetry or telling himself a story running fast, he couldn’t wait for his bright future
I think about giving him a ride to wherever I may be going where more drive than ride some have stopped driving, for various reasons some lose the ability to drive before they pass
but then I remember all the lessons I’ve learned from time-travel movies the one universal rule being not to meddle with the past something about a butterfly’s wings flapping in Beijing and a tsunami in New Orleans so, instead I honk my horn and the traffic light turns green
I watch the boy, who might have been in some distant past, look on with curious anger as the car passes for a moment then returns to the story already in progress
not much traffic on this path anymore but yesterday a guy came by riding a Segway said he was on the way to visit his mother’s grave said she died a pioneer to this lonely country
he grows tinier and tinier in my rear view mirror no longer even special here in the middle of nowhere until he is yesterday again