The Time Travel Chronicles by Robert J. Sawyer, Stefan Bolz, Ann Christy, Samuel Peralta, Rysa Walker, Lucas Bale, Anthony Vicino, Ernie Lindsey, Carol Davis, Tracy Banghart, Michael Holden, Daniel Arthur Smith, Ernie Luis, Erik Wecks Page B

fingers were icy on his skin. She pulled hard. Dutton dropped the box and skipped to the side, the falling books narrowly missing his toes.
    “What happened? Are you okay?” he asked, their earlier transgressions momentarily forgotten.
    “Hurry. I need to show you something.”
    “What is it?”
    “Just come, please ,” she insisted, already turning back toward the house.
    “It’s freezing,” he said. “At least let me go put on some clothes. I’m pretty sure the neighbors don’t want—”
    “We may not have time,” she insisted.
    “Seriously. Pajamas here.”
    “Doesn’t matter. Let’s go!”
    “Talk to me,” he said. “You’re freaking me out.”
    “It’s—I don’t even know how to describe it. Just hurry .”
    “I—okay, whatever.” Dutton chased after her, down the hallway, past the living room, through the kitchen, and into the mudroom. She paced eagerly while he slipped on a pair of sneakers and yanked a jacket down from a peg. “Where are we going?”
    “Down the trail. We have to hurry before it’s gone.”
    “Before what’s gone?”
    Jess didn’t answer. Dutton followed her through the open door, jogging into the chilly morning, the cold air finding a way through his thin plaid pajama bottoms, blowing against exposed ankles.
     
    The neighborhood was too serene for a Sunday morning. Dutton put one foot in front of the other, chasing his wife as he studied the surrounding houses, each structure similar and familiar in layout and design. The contractor had an unimaginative mold, the only difference being the shade of white, brown, or gray on the exterior.
    Odd that things were so quiet.
    With the threat of snow, the locals often raided the grocery stores and hunkered down with popcorn and movies, hot chocolate and books. Dutton glanced up at the sky. Snowflakes fell, yet it wasn’t enough to cause a dusting, let alone accumulate. The bulk of the storm was hours away.
    The absence of activity was almost surreal, magical, on their busy street.
    Jess ran effortlessly while he struggled to keep up, the breaths he took coagulating in his lungs like thick maple syrup. His chest burned and his thighs ached even though they had only gone a quarter of a mile. It was no surprise how much his body had deteriorated. He hadn’t exercised since the day after the funeral.
    “Down this way,” Jess said, making a sharp left.
    Dutton knew the trail well. It had been his favorite place to run.
    A worn, hard-packed dirt path cut through the dense forest of pine, maple, and oak, winding along for a mile before it sidled up against the river. The path widened there, leaving enough room to run two abreast as it followed the peaks and valleys of the hillside, the river crawling along below.
    They didn’t make it that far. Another half mile into the forest, with Dutton heaving for air, his chest feeling tight and compressed as if he was buried with Lucy six feet under the topsoil, Jess stopped and pointed toward a small cluster of rhododendrons.
    “It’s still there,” she said.
    Between gasps, Dutton asked, “What… what’s down there?”
    “Can’t you see it?”
    “Jess, I… No. What am I looking for?” He suspected she was going to show him a dead person. Hikers and joggers were always on the news, forever stumbling across bodies in the woods. Just last week, some woman in upstate New York had been hiking with her golden retriever and found that young mother who had disappeared in August. National news. He wondered if the same had happened to Jess. Had she found something?
    Or, for a dark, horrid moment, he considered the possibility that Jess had grown tired of his shit and planned to leave his body here for someone else to find.
    “Just there,” she said. “Next to the biggest rhododendron.”
    Dutton squinted, trying to see anything out of the ordinary. “The biggest rho—wait. Right there?” He pointed.
    “Yeah, right there. I told you. I just happened to look over and there it