What if I ain't no violinist?

150. Twoset Timetravellers

"Look, can we change course then? Let's go to.. say 1996. I wanna see myself when I'm 4."

"Okay.. that ought to be a place we could get to much faster..."

"Oh, but are we gonna end up spending a lot of time coming back since we'd already made a start to the Jurassic period ?"

"No, I can do a control Z on that."

"What's that?"

"The undo command."

"Cool"

"Brett sweetie, would you like a snack?"

"Yes please mummy."

Brett and Eddy stood and watched from a distance the little boy and his mother at the park. Eddy had gone completely UwU as he repeatedly slapped Brett's shoulder.

"OMG just look at him. He's so cute...!! I just wanna go pick him up and cuddle him"

"Easy Eddy, you might get arrested. Or worse, piss off my mum."

Eddy recoiled in horror.

"Okay I won't do that."

"Y'know what Eddy, we should go and catch up with you, too."

"Me? Oh you mean the 3 year old me? Yeah that's not a bad idea. He won't be that far from here y'know. Not that the distance matters that much..."

"Okay.. according to the coordinates map, he's in this supermarket. Sh*t I actually remember this place. You know what, while we're here, I wanna grab a few things."

"Eddy, are we allowed to interact with people in the past and do shopping and stuff?"

"Yeah, I can check the travel log and make corrections if we need to."

"OMG Eddy look at this!? Remember these !? I used to love them. I wonder why they took them off the market.. so disappointed when that happened.."

Brett gleefully grabbed a couple of packets of red lollies he used to love eating as a young child.

"That's because the red artificial colouring was found to be carcinogenic in 2003."

Brett frowned as he quickly put the packets of lollies back onto the shelf.

"Holy sh*t, Eddy how do you remember that sorta stuff!?!?"

"It just says that here on my time scanner."

"What do you mean time scanner, that's just your iPhone."

"Yeah I made a chronological events time scanner app that synchronises with the time machine and I installed it on my iPhone. I hate carrying cumbersome devices"

"That's pretty genius, Eddy."

Brett got stuck in the magazine aisle when he started reading a gossip magazine.

Eddy was in the next aisle when he felt a tug on his trousers. He looked down.

"Daddy...?"

He saw the little boy looking up at him. He looked about age 3. He must have been crying, with tear streaks on his chubby cheeks.. Their eyes met and the boy whispered again.

"Daddy..??"

The little boy looked confused.

Eddy stammered.

"I... I'm not your Daddy..."

"Daddy..."

The little boy started sobbing.

"Eddy..!!"

Both the little boy and Eddy turned around at the same time. They both tilted their heads in synchronisation, their angle of tilt were identical. They both then opened their mouths at the exact same timing. Eddy could not vocalise anything but the little boy did.

"Daddy...!!!"

The little boy let go of Eddy's trousers and ran up to the young man who had called out to his little son. Eddy's eyes followed the little boy and he saw him getting picked up by the young man who was now casting a glance back at him.

It was as if Eddy was staring into a mirror.

Their clothes were different and their glasses were different. Their hairstyles were different. But the shape and size of their hands, observed by the hand placed on the back of the little Eddy as the young man held up his son, looked so much like Eddy's own. Their jaw and neckline were made by the same strong strokes if a sketch artist were to prepare an artist's impression.

Eddy stammered.

"I.. I'm glad he found his dad."

And he turned around and walked away.