words. “Well, I’ll tell you when you get here.”
It was a diffident voice. Usually, he’d be loudly and forcefully debating with me on subjects like topology, relativity or parallel universes – so much so that I could hardly get a word in edgeways.
“You in a hurry then?”
“Yes. Well, no. It’s not particularly urgent. But if you’re free… Well, you know. It would help if you came over right away.”
His voice sounded even more hesitant now, almost apologetic. But his odd tone had the opposite effect on me – it made me think something really serious must have happened. So I agreed to go over right away.
His shop was on the main street. As I walked in, he greeted me with an “Oh, hi,” gazed at me with an expression of utter gratitude, and led me to a small reception area at the back of the shop. There, Saita and I sat facing each other across a table.
“What’s up, then? What’s happened?” I asked with deliberate nonchalance, taking out a cigarette. He was clearly finding it hard to come to the point.
“Well,” he replied, then hesitated again. For a while, he rubbed his palms together, drew circles on the table with his fingertips and stared into space. “Well, it’s not such a big deal, really…”
“But you said I should come right away!”
“Yes, that’s right.” He was cringing with embarrassment, squirming in his seat. Then he glanced up at me with a coy look. “Well, actually,” he said, and started to giggle.
It couldn’t be anything serious if he could laugh about it. But why on earth was he so embarrassed? I’d never seen him like this before.
Though now quite irritated, I was beginning to catch his giggles.
“What? What’s it all about? Tell me, quick!”
His face turned red. “All right. Well, I’ll tell you,” he said in a throwaway tone, giggling again. He glanced at me briefly before averting his eyes. “I’ll tell you. But please. Don’t laugh.”
“You’re laughing, aren’t you?!” I said, laughing.
“Am I? Oh. Well, anyway…” This was all quite unlike him.
“What, then?”
“Well, I’ve invented a time machine,” he said.
He clearly didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
I said nothing for a moment. If I’d opened my mouth, I would have exploded with laughter. But I could do nothing about the uncontrollable ripples that were spreading all over my body – bad though I felt about it.
Saita glanced at me sideways and writhed in embarrassment. “D-d-don’t laugh. Don’t.”
In the end, I let out a suppressed snort.
Saita, still with his half-laughing, half-weeping expression, now laughed aloud.
“Wahahahahaha!”
I laughed too.
“Wahahahahaha!”
Saita stopped laughing abruptly. He looked at me rather forlornly as I continued to laugh with no apparent end.
I eventually managed to control myself.
“Sorry,” I said, trying my hardest to suppress the chortles. “Tell me again. What have you done?”
As if to contain his embarrassment, Saita rubbed his palms hard over the surface of the desk as he answered.
“Er, invented a t-t-time machine.”
“Wahahahahaha!” I gripped my sides.
“Wahahahahaha!” Saita started to laugh like a madman.
We contorted our bodies, bent ourselves double, bent backwards, then contorted our bodies again as we continued to laugh. For a long time we continued to laugh.
At last, our laughter subsided to a point at which we could speak again.
“Have you invented a time machine?” I asked.
“I’ve invented a time machine,” he answered.
We burst into laughter again. We continued to laugh even more insanely than before. For a long time we continued to laugh.
“That’s ridiculous,” I said in a wheezing voice as I held my aching belly, my face still contorted with laughter. “You’ve gone and invented a time machine!”
I was virtually laughing my head off. “And where is it, then?” I asked with heaving shoulders.
Still laughing, Saita pointed to the ceiling with his chin. His workshop was on the upper floor, which resembled a loft. He got up and started climbing the stairs to the upper floor. I followed him. In a corner of the workshop was a time machine.
“Is this a time machine?” I asked.
Saita nodded. “Yes. This is a time machine.”
We both exploded with laughter at the same time. We pointed at the machine and laughed, pointed at each other’s faces and laughed, squatted on the floor, coughed convulsively, and gripped our aching sides as we continued to laugh.
“That’s ri-ri-ridiculous!” I said, as wheezing sounds issued from my throat. “How does it work? Go on, tell me!”
Saita, also with shoulders heaving, still managed to climb slowly into the time machine. “Come on in,” he said.
“All right,” I answered. The laughter had finally subsided, but it was not without the occasional giggle that I got into the time machine and sat next to Saita. “So, are you going to explain?”
“Yes. Well, first of all…” he started in his timid little voice. He scratched his head in embarrassment, and sheepishly pointed to one of the dials with his chubby index finger. “Th-this dial, you see, well, it’s for going back in time.”
“Wahahahahaha!” I was already gripping my stomach before he could finish.
“Wahahahahaha!” Saita opened his mouth wide and laughed too.
We contorted our bodies and rolled around with laughter as we sat there in the time machine.
Still laughing, Saita casually pointed to another dial. “And this one’s for going forwards.”
“Wahahahahaha!”
“Wahahahahaha!”
I laughed so much that I thought I would die. Eventually, we stopped and looked at each other’s half-crazed faces in the time machine, our face muscles floppy with fatigue from laughing.
“I thought I was going to die,” I said.
“So did I,” said Saita.
“Just now, when you said you’d invented a time machine,” I said with another involuntary snort, “that was b- b-brilliant!”
Saita also let out a snort. We continued to laugh for a while.
“How about going back to see it,” I suggested through my giggles, pointing to the dial with my chin. “You can do that, can’t you?”
“Yes, I can. Shall we then?” Saita agreed with a giggle of his own.
Still giggling, he turned the dial very slightly, then pressed a button and gave me a nod. “Right. Let’s get out.”
“All right.”
We got out of the time machine, lay flat on the floor, and peered down into the shop below through cracks between the floorboards. I hadn’t arrived yet. Saita was on his own, pacing up and down nervously inside the shop.
“Someone’s pacing up and down.”
“It’s me,” said Saita.
We were both about to laugh, but hurriedly covered each other’s mouths with our hands. Our eyes widened. Only our bodies continued to laugh.
