I'm far ahead of Sawyer. I can hear him yelling my name, but I'm too scared to stop. I don't have a plan, I just took the damn watch.
I keep running, afraid that if I stop Sawyer would never forgive me or kill me.
It's getting darker the deeper I run into the woods. I slow down my pace. I don't hear Sawyer and I completely stop. I calm my breathing and stay quiet.
I'm lost but the good thing is I lost Sawyer.
I look down at the watch and open it.
"Opal, don't." Sawyers harsh words echo and I look up, startled.
I don't have time to react, my hands shake and the last thing I see is Sawyer running after me, shouting. Then black, nothingness.
I feel like I'm thrown against a wall. My eyes immediately open and I land on something hard.
"Ow.." I groan.
I hear a groan and I look down and see that Sawyer is beneath me.
My head feels groggy and I quickly get off of him. I look around, the air is colder. It's cloudy, smells different to.
"What did you do?" Sawyer seethes and I turn to him.
"What did I do? Where are we?" I question.
"Where's the watch?" Sawyer says, dusting off. I hold my hand out to him and he aggressively grabs the watch from my hand.
He pulls me to him and pushes me against a wall, his hand over my mouth. His body is pressed against mine and that's when I hear it, a horse?
I see a carriage and a horse pass by us, and my eyes widen.
We wait until it passes and we both breath out.
"Stay here.." Sawyer warns and he walks out from the ally way. The street is uneven, muddy and looks like cobble stone.
I walk slowly the opposite direction, but Sawyer pulls me back.
"I tell her stay and she walks away..." Sawyer mutters to himself, pulling me back. His hold on me is tight.
A man with a top hat walks pass us and stops to stare at us.
"Hey, where are we?" Sawyer asks the man. The man isn't much taller than Sawyer, he has a black bushy mustache and he is wearing weird clothing. He seems so old fashion with long trousers and a top hat.
"New York..." The man hesitantly says. He lowers his round glasses and eyes us warily.
"You're not a sneezer?" The man asks, getting defensive. Sneezer?
Is everyone afraid of getting sick?
"No sir." I say, even though I don't know what that word means, but the man disregards me.
"What year is this?" Sawyer asks, and the man eyes me up and down.
"Is that your strumpet?" The man asks, and he pulls something from his belt, a wallet.
My eyes widen, he thinks I'm a prostitute. No wonder he didn't care for what I said.
Sawyer grabs me by the arm and moves in front of me, getting taller.
"What year is it?" Sawyers voice is cold and the man gulps stepping back a little.
"Eighteen hundred forty three." The man squeals out, confusion crossing is wrinkly features. I feel Sawyer physically relax.
"Shit.." Sawyer grabs my hand and we walk away from the man.
"Are you going to explain what the hell is going on?" I question, confused.
"Thanks to you we've traveled to the past. Be happy we aren't in the future..."
"Nope. That's impossible. I hit my head running away from you and I'm just dreaming." I say out loud. Sawyer stops and twists me around to face him, both of his hands on each side of his arm.
"Opal, look around you. Welcome to the nineteen fucking hundreds..." He angrily shakes me.
I look around, his hold still strong on me. There are people walking in different clothes, some fancy dresses and others in dirty raggedy clothes. There are large buildings and tall machines, almost like they're building a new city. Horses everywhere and men selling news papers.
"That's impossible..." I tell him shaking my head.
"Right.." Sawyer scoffs, rolling his eyes. He walks ahead of me.
"Watch out miss!" Someone behind me shouts and I turn around, a man is riding a bike with a large front wheel and a tiny back wheel, and it's coming full speed at me. I scream falling to the side.
The man jumps off his bike rushing to my side.
"I'm sorry..." The man says, his kind smile draws me in.
"It's okay, should have watched where I was going." I smile.
"You've cut yourself..." he moves my leg to get a closer look at my knee and I see the gash of blood.
"I'll be fine." I tell him. Sawyer is by my side within seconds, pulling me off the ground.
"Lets go..." Sawyer rudely cuts in.
"What is that thing?" I ask the man, ignoring Sawyer.
"Where are my manners?" The man shakes his head. "I guess being in the presence of such a beautiful lady, like yourself makes you forget." His long messy brown hair covers his murky blue eyes and he extends his arm out to me. He looks around my age, a bit older. He's covered in dirt, but I shake his hand anyway.
He's an old man, I'm not from this era. I'm not even born...
"I'm Edric...." He smiles.
"Opal.."
"You live under a rock?" He jokes and I nervously laugh. Nope, just in a different time... "It's a high wheeler." He points to the large bike, he looks at the bike as if it were his wife. I start walking toward the bike, but of course Sawyer pulls me back.
"Not a good idea..." Sawyer whispers to me. I roll my eyes.
"Can you please stop hovering over me. I'm fine. I'm not a little kid. Live a little." I push him away. Sawyer looks at me, but eventually steps back.
"What a bricky girl she is..." Edric tells Sawyer. Sawyers features harden, a scowl crossing his eyebrows.
"Is that the man?" I hear a loud voice. I look up as Edric is about to hoist me onto the bike. I watch as the man Sawyer was talking earlier flails his arms in our direction as he's talking to the police. They're not that far from us and I look to Sawyer.
Sawyer pulls me off the bike and we both start running.
"Stop! Police!" The pudgy man shouts. "Stop them!" He screams to people around us, but no one moves.
Sawyer and I weave in and out of people, gasps can be heard from all around. A few men try grabbing us but Sawyer stops them before they can. We run until we find a dark corner to hide in.
Sawyer pulls out the watch, he quickly does something and I hear a few clicks. He grabs hold of my hand and then black, nothingness.
We both are thrown to the ground, the heat returning and I kiss the grass beneath me.
"Home..." I say excitedly. Now I just need to wake up from hitting my head.
"Why the hell would you take off with something that isn't your?" Sawyer looks at me, his stare deadly.
"You got on my nerves...you know what, I'm dreaming. I'm not wasting my energy arguing with you." I tell him and start walking back home.
"For fucks sake, Opal. You're not bloody dreaming!" He yells, a few birds chirp out of the trees. I stare at him, my heart racing.
"What?" I say in disbelief.
"We time traveled..." Sawyer slowly says, waiting for me to comprehend.
Something in me is wanting to believe time traveling exists but I just can't, it doesn't makes sense.
"No." I whisper, shaking my head.
"Well we did.." And I fall to the floor, sitting down. This is too much to handle. A world where time traveling exists and it's in the hands of ...Sawyer.
"Give it to me..." I tell Sawyer.
"It's been a long night. I got what I needed. Go home." He tells me and he starts walking away from me.
"No, the watch can't be in your hands. Give it to me.."
"How does that work?" Sawyer questions, an eyebrow raised. Amusement plays at his features and I roll my eyes.
"You can't be trusted. You can ruin people's futures..."
He scowls and walks closer to me,
"What did you say?" He questions and I eye him.
"Look, you can't be trusted. You're not responsible. You can't even keep it safe, I easily took it from you. It can happen again with someone else who knows about this..." I tell him. He quietly contemplates what I'm telling him.
He slowly walks over to me leaning down to whisper into my ear,
"Who says I didn't let you grab it. After all, you are predictable." And with that he walks off.
"I'm serious."
"Opal, go home." He says.
"Fine leave, but we're not done with this. You have a lot of explaining to do." I tell him, but he just keeps causally walking away.
I sneak back inside without getting caught and I lie in bed. I can't stop thinking about how this whole time travel thing works. It's not even supposed to be real.
Was I really part of a time traveling experience? The only thing I know about time traveling is from the movie Willy Wonka, something about little particles all teleporting somewhere.
Teleporting? Time travel? Are they similar? My mind races as I try to fall asleep, and eventually I tire my brain out.
The next morning Drew leaves in a rush, he kisses me on the forehead and walks out the door. He's late for his flight, he has everything in order except time management. Whit went on a business trip. I got to sleep in a bit, but I still feel out of it.
Guess it's just me... I walk to the store and buy myself a pint of ice cream and sit on the porch swing, reading.
I catch Jospeh walking in through the side. He has a back back on, he must have just got out of school. He smiles, waving at me.
He drops his bag and sprints over to me.
"Hey we're all going to the movies later tonight. You're coming." He nicely demands.
I put my book down,
"I'll think about it."
"I did the thinking for you. You're coming. I'll buy you popcorn.." he bribes.
"Licorice and I'm in..." I stick out my hand for him to shake.
"Deal." He laughs. He looks at me for a second too long and I feel my cheeks heating up and I look down. "Hey, our back door is always open. My mom is making lunch if you wanna join." Jospeh says.
"I think about it..." I tell him again and he playfully rolls his eyes. He pulls me from the bench and we start walking to his house.
"So, how is Sawyer?" I whisper to Jospeh. We're both in the living room.
"He's in the kitchen, helping my mom...I think." He says and then smirks, "Heard you guys had quiet an adventure."
Sawyer must have told him about us sneaking into the cellar. His smirk falls, and his expression seems like he wanted to join.
"Wasn't my idea. It was Sawyers..." I raise my hand up.
Sawyer casually walks into the dining room and I take a seat. He's holding a plate a food and a drink in one hand. Joseph walks over to Sawyer and tries to pick something off of Sawyers plate,
"Fuck off." Sawyer mutters to Jospeh. Jospeh manages to take a piece of meat from Sawyers plate and flips him off.
"So, are you okay?" I whisper. Sawyer turns his head to the kitchen, making sure that Jospeh is out of ear shot. Of course, I thought Sawyer and Jospeh were close but I guess not. Joseph doesn't know anything about the watch.
We both glare at each other. He knows what I want to talk about but the clench of his jaw makes me ask otherwise.
"I'm fine." He mumbles and takes a sip of his drink.
"Opal, nice of you to join us today." Sawyers mom pops out of the kitchen. She's in mom jeans and a white t shirt. If I didn't know she was their mom I would assume she was their sister.
She's holding large plates of food and she sets them up on the table.
"Are Char and the rest coming?" She asks to no one in particular and Jospeh shrugs, as he sets the rest of the plates out.
Jospeh and his mom walk back into the kitchen.
"Well, your father and I have a meeting to attend. So enjoy. Clean up after yourselves." She says and walks out.
"What's wrong?" Sawyer asks. I turn to him, picking at my nails.
"I didn't say anything? What makes you thing something is wrong?"
"No, I can feel your mind racing..."
"It's nothing, my mind is walking..." I counter.
His gaze returns to me after he takes a bite of corn. "Yeah?"
"I'm sure.."
He snorts, but returns to eating as soon as Joseph walks back in.
"Sawyer search up the movie times for the movie theater.." Jospeh says, he walks over to me, smiling down at me and he sits beside me. He goes through his phone looking for movie times.
"You're leaving early right?" Jospeh says, "I don't think you should go. It can be just Opal and Daniel. Avery and Char are having a sleep over thing..."
I catch a look pass between Sawyer and Jospeh and I arch my eyebrow.
"Taking your silence as a no. Next movie is at ten." Joseph taunts Sawyer.
"What movie?" I ask.
"I don't know we'll decide when we get there." Jospeh shrugs. "We can do a movie shuffle and whatever movie..."
As Jospeh continues to talk I feel Sawyers gaze on me, and we make eye contact. He's just staring, studying me.
I glance away before I start thinking too much into it and my face will turn red.
"Char is calling, be back." Joseph says and he walks off somewhere in the house.
"You seem to know a lot about time traveling, don't you?" I start to say.
"Don't start..." Sawyer rolls his eyes and he angrily gets up from his seat. I follow him into the kitchen.
"You obviously have been messing with the watch. And I'm assuming I'm the only one who knows about this. So how does it work?" I ask, my arms crossed.
Sawyer takes his time to answer, he washes his plate, dries it and puts it away.
He breaths out, slowly turning to me. I watch as he runs his hands through his curls, a scowl on his face, thinking of what to say.
"It's simple, really. Starts with the physical idea of a wormhole. In our known universe, we have tiny, minuscule quantum fluctuations in the fabric of spacetime on the smallest of scales. These include energy fluctuations in both the positive and negative directions, often very close by one another. A very strong, dense, positive energy fluctuation would create curved space in one particular fashion, while a strong, dense, negative energy fluctuation would curve space in exactly the opposite fashion. If you connected these two curvature regions together, you could — for a brief instant — arrive at the notion of a quantum wormhole. If the wormhole lasted long enough, you could even potentially transport a particle through it, allowing it to instantly disappear from one location in spacetime and reappear in another. If we want to scale that up, and you know squeeze a fucking human obviously that's going to take some work. While every known particle in our universe has positive energy and either positive or zero mass, it's eminently possible to have negative mass and energy particles in the framework of general relatively. Sure, we haven't discovered any yet, but according to all the rules of theoretical physics, there's nothing forbidding it." Sawyer calmly explains, his lips twitch into a smirk as he sees my confusion. I stand there trying to understand a word he's muttered. All I do is nod.
"So, energy?" I question.
"The watch is creating a wormhole big enough for us to squeeze into. Don't ask me how, it just works..." He shrugs.
"Can we go back to any time era? Say a specific day, and time? Or is it just a specific year, not knowing what time or day?" I ask.
His face goes serious, and he's too quiet.
"Opal, if you want to go back to see your family..." His voice is oddly soft. He's shaking his head no at my idea.
"Not what I was getting at.." I defensively lie, my voice harsh.
In all honesty, I keep thinking about seeing my parents for the first time. If it's possible to see them for the last time, then I'm jumping at that open door. Help change the future somehow.
"It wouldn't hurt to know if I can. I dreamed of the day I can see my mom. And I finally can..." I trail off. "I can try to warn her or something, never mind forget it."
Sawyer leans against the kitchen sink, watching me. "If it were that simple I would. But there are a lot of complications."
"Everything is simple..."
Sawyer just makes life hard on himself and everyone around him.
What's so hard about going back in time to warn my parents? If the roles were switched I'm sure Sawyer would be there in seconds, helping and fixing problems.
"Sorry to interrupt...." Jospeh barges in and I glare at Sawyer.
"He's here." Jospeh awkwardly announces, and scratches the back of his head. Sawyers features harden and walks pass me, his shoulder angrily bumping into mine. I lose my balance and take a step back, looking at the ground.
Stealing the watch, that's the only way. I have to see my parents.
"Hey, you okay?" Jospeh asks and I turn to him.
"I'm fine.."
"We should get out of here. Things are going to get ugly." Jospeh warns.
———————————————————————
I'm gonna do a double update so be on the look out ❤️ hope everyone is doing Okay 👌🏻 💕