The 13th Hour

But he would gladly embrace it all, preaching the merits of each, if it would bring Julia back.

He stood and walked about the library in a half-aware state looking at the pictures on the shelves. There was no consistency to Marcus’s past, no stability. Several frames contained pictures of Sheila, several older shots were obviously cropped, excising a former spouse, and two frames were altogether empty. His eyes finally fell on a picture of himself and Julia arm in arm with Marcus prominently displayed on the center shelf. They were all smiling. Nick couldn’t recall if it had been taken by Blythe or Dana of the discarded housewife crowd but he didn’t care. It was of a joyous time, a time before murder and plane crashes, when happiness had seemed eternal.

Nick finally pulled himself away from the photo, in fear of being overcome with grief again, and looked out the window. His fear began to arise anew as he saw Detectives Shannon and Dance emerge from his house, helping the white-haired coroner push the gurney with the black bag containing Julia into the coroner’s truck.

Marcus stood in the driveway, his head hung in sorrow as she was loaded in and the door was closed. The two detectives turned to Marcus and the three began a slow march across the large side yard.

Nick thought about running, but had no idea where he would run to, wondering if his fate was sealed no matter how fast or far he ran. He pulled the watch from his pocket and flipped it open, reading the time, 8:55, and became momentarily lost in the timepiece.

He pulled the letter from his pocket once again, rereading the impossible words, slowly, deliberately, digesting them as if he were reading the bible.

Dear Nick,

I hope the fog is lifting from your mind though I’m sure it is

now being replaced by an even greater confusion as to what is

going on as you have found yourself in the exact location where

you were at eight o’clock this evening.

In life there are moments that are impossible to grasp, to

come to terms with: the injustice at the death of the innocent,

the inexplicable agony and confusion at the loss of those we love,

the impossible cruelty of fate.

NICK COULDN’T HELP looking out the window toward the coroner’s truck where Julia’s body lay in a cold, black bag.

One simple selfish act can reverberate through time, through

life, robbing a stranger of existence. A loved one could meet her

death from the repercussions of a moment or an event she may

never know or understand. Yet if this one moment didn’t occur,

if it could be found, could be taken back, the lives it touched

could be changed, could be altered and that one life saved.

You are now standing in a room, in an instant that seems

torn from your memory, a victim of magic, of some divine

intervention, but I assure you it is neither.

You are in the very room you were in during the eight

o’clock hour this evening, living that hour once again. But this

time you are free to do as you wish, turn left where before you

turned right, say yes where before you said no. No one will

know the difference, nor will anyone else experience this

phenomenon. You are on your own to choose direction as you see

fit, to alter the future you have experienced.

You’ve been given a gift, Nick. A gift to live twelve hours of

your life over again.

You must pay very close attention as time is short:

Every hour, as the minute hand of the gold watch sweeps to

and arrives at twelve, you will slip back in time one hundred

and twenty minutes to relive one hour of your life again.

One step forward, two steps back.

This will occur exactly twelve times, no more, no less,

taking you back by the hour to ten o’clock this morning.

With your actions now, stepping back into each prior hour

of the day, you have the chance to find and save your wife.

I will not bore you with explanations and technicalities,

suffice it to say that as the hour strikes you will be whisked back

to the exact location where you were two hours earlier to live

that hour anew.

But be aware, each choice, just as in normal life, has

consequences that we may not realize in the moment of their

choosing. You have the ability to save Julia, the ability to put

your world back in balance but be warned, it is a precarious

route you now venture on, and your choices must be well

thought out so as not to unbalance the rest of your or anyone

else’s existence.

As to why you are being granted this gift, as to who I am,

and how this all happens, those are not of import in this

moment, but rest assured, all will be made known in time.

God speed, Tempus Fugit,

Z.

PS: Hold tight to this letter and the timepiece, and be

warned, this watch you carry on your person can never leave

you, for if it does, or if it is destroyed, you will be lost to the

moment you are tied to, reintroduced to the forward-flowing

existence of the rest of man, and saving Julia’s life will be

become a lost cause.

OFTEN WHEN FACED with impossible odds, when the future is darkest, a man discards logic and turns to faith, to prayer, to the mystical, convincing himself that a higher power will intervene in his favor. It happens in matters of a desperate heart, in business, even in war, when he is up against an enemy. A soldier will pray to God for victory, often not realizing that his adversary is also praying for deliverance, and in all likelihood to the same God. A man will wish on a star for love, throw a penny into a well with confidence that it will deliver the winning lottery ticket, or rub rabbits’ feet so his favorite team will win the Super Bowl.

And so in that manner, Nick began to believe in the watch in his hand, in the written words of the stranger-though he was at a loss to know what language appeared at the bottom of the note. He believed that somehow, if he fought hard enough, he could stop Julia’s killer, he could save her. If he could just hold out until 9:00, he would be able to confirm whether that hope was hollow, whether his faith was misplaced and he was doomed to relive his harrowing experience in the interrogation room all over again. As silly, as impossible as it sounded, it was all that he had to hold on to.

With a sudden focus, he raced out of the library and across the marble two story foyer to the front door. Throwing the dead bolt, he hurried to the French doors in the living and dining rooms that led to the rear slate terrace, locking them in succession. He locked the side and garage doors and hurried back into the library, closing the heavy mahogany door, locking it tight. He was thankful that Marcus had put a dead bolt on the library door, odd for an interior door, but not odd for a room that contained a Gerome and two Norman Rockwells.

Nick looked again at the watch: 8:58.

And he heard them arrive, pounding on the locked front door.

Nick went to the bay window and closed the slatted wood shutters, flipping them down, sealing any point of vision into the room.

He heard the front door being kicked open with an earthquake-like rumble, and Marcus’s enraged voice suddenly filling the cavernous marble foyer, no doubt angered at the damage and the situation.

A knock sounded on the library door.

“Nick,” Marcus’s muffled voice came from the other side. “It’s me. I put a call in to Mitch, he’ll meet us down at the station. But these guys, they want you to go with them… and they say now.”

Nick remained silent, staring at the room, staring at the watch in the palm of his hand: 8:59.