The Cat Door
Ari woke up. A piece of straw was poking him in his ear. Ari hated straw. Straw usually meant stables, and stables… Oh no! For as much as he abhorred it, only spiky dried wheat could get Ari up to speed this quickly. Having barely opened his eyes, he already had a hunch of where he was. Or, rather, when he was.
It was a good thing, too. His current surroundings wouldn’t give him his usual seven minutes of adjustment time. Right now, he had less than three.
Still lying in what felt like a bed made out of mikado sticks, Ari glanced up. “Aaah!” The yell escaped his mouth before he could think. Less than a foot from his arm, though a good six feet above his head, towered a horse larger than he had ever seen.
The black stallion munched on some hay, his black mane swaying as he occasionally shuffled his hooves. The breath from his nostrils rose like smoke in the cold air.
On another day — and from another angle — Ari might have admired this fine destrier, greatest of all war horses and ancestor to what would become the world’s largest horse breed centuries later. But right now, there was no time, and Ari always struggled to keep his species apart anyway.
No sooner had Ari covered his mouth than he already got the bill for his mistake. “Who’s there?” a raspy voice rang from the far side of the stable, just beyond the wide exit bathed in sunlight. Shit! Ari thought while scrambling to his legs. “Fawkes? Is that you again? If I catch yer thievin’ hands one more time, it shall be the last!”
Ari briefly glanced left and right. The building was rectangular. With the most obvious escape route blocked by whoever was about to turn the corner, he had two corridors to choose from. He went with his gut: left. Ari ducked and snuck along the row of wooden gates. More horse boxes, past the last of which he found a small niche — just wide enough for a lanky 17-year-old in shorts and a Nirvana t-shirt — and slid in. With bated breath, Ari peered around the corner. The shadow of a pitchfork crept into the room, right where he had stood mere moments ago. Then, a short figure appeared.
The farmer had seen better days. His woolen shirt was torn, his dark hair disheveled, and he was missing a large handful of teeth. Even amidst all the horses, the smell of the room seemed to worsen significantly. How long can one guy go without a shower? Ari wondered while retreating into his hideout. Then, he remembered: Oh! Right. They never shower here. He dared cast a second look.
“Fawkes!” the farmer roared. “I know yer in here! Show yerself!” He took a big stab at the pile of straw in which Ari had woken up. He shuddered. It was always a strange sight. Death trailing him by a few seconds. As if the reaper had nothing better to do than to personally chase him across time and space. The farmer grunted at the empty pile and turned to his left. Phew, Ari thought. He’s checking the other side first.
As the farmer rummaged through empty horse boxes and various crates, Ari took stock of his situation. The only item in the niche was a pike about five feet in length, leaning against the corner. “Please don’t make me fight,” he whispered to an unspecified god, and turned to look across. Nothing but more horse boxes. Dammit! Was confrontation really his only option? Ari racked his brain.
The farmer was back to where he had begun his search. He rested his pitchfork, then carefully examined a slim, waist-height container Ari hadn’t noticed before. The remaining crates in the room were crude, a bunch of logs hastily slapped together. This one was different. It looked like the kind of shelf Ari had seen at IKEA that one time. What were they called again? Karlex? Kallax? Actually, the shelf was handmade — and closer to a Billy — but Ari wasn’t an expert in IKEA products either. Back then, he had been busy wolfing down his meatballs with cream sauce. His mom had laughed at how much he liked them. That memory now felt lifetimes away, though it did make his stomach growl. Thankfully, his pursuer didn’t notice.
The farmer inspected the shelf’s various drawers’ contents. Still talking to the air, he issued yet another warning: “If I fin’ one strand o’ henbane missin’, Fawkes–jus’ one! Yer a dead brat!”
Before Ari could repeat that strange word — “henbane” — to himself, a squeak from under him gave him a start. When he looked down, a freckled face peered back at him with a grin.
Ari almost fell over. He bumped into the wooden wall with a loud thump.
“Huh?” The farmer raised his head.
The pike in the corner started swaying.
“Pssst,” the face said. “Sire, can you fit?”
Ari regained his stance. There undoubtedly was a young boy with ginger hair talking to him from the floor.
“I know not why this cat door is so wide, but old Marshal’s cat is rather fat, and you, Sire, are not.”
The pike stopped dancing and crashed to the floor.
“Ha! There yeh are!” old Marshal exclaimed, grabbing his pitchfork with glee.
“Quick, follow me!” the boy urged Ari–and disappeared with a slam of the cat door’s flap.
Old Marshal’s steps pounded in Ari’s ears. Or was it his heart beating out of his chest? Regardless, he didn’t need much of an invitation.
Ari threw himself on the floor and started feeling out the wall. No way! A tiny piece of string held the cat flap in place. Made from the same wood as the remaining wall, it had been perfectly inconspicuous from above.
Ari snapped the flap open and put his right arm through. When it went straight into a pile of manure, he realized not only where the smell came from but also why the boy might end up being right: This hatch was for shit, not cats — and shit needed a lot more space! Fortunately, the pile wasn’t too large. A few feet ahead, the little boy beckoned him over. “Come on, Sire!”
Ari put his other arm through the hole and started pushing. Expecting to be impaled any second, he squeezed hard. Halfway through the hole, his sneakers found grip, and with one final push, he was out in the open.
As the flap fell shut behind him, a muffled “Die!” was followed by the thud of a pitchfork stabbing the stable wall. Old Marshal was not the patient kind. When Ari looked up, his savior was already halfway across the large meadow in front of him. The boy looked back mid-sprint and gestured him to follow. Ari, too, started running. He never heard old Marshal’s curses.
Ari ran across the meadow, then across a muddy field. He ran past another stable and two small farms. He ran and ran, asking himself where that little boy got his stamina from. When Ari caught up with him, they had reached the edge of a forest. “Not far now, Sire!” the boy said. “Worry not, we shall be safe.” He slipped past the pines and soon took a right onto a tiny, easy-to-miss path. The boy now fell into a brisk walk, which allowed Ari to pace beside him.
Finally, he got a proper look at his new ally. The boy was no older than 12. Like Ari, he was tall for his age, but his face was rounder. His red hair shimmered in the sun, and his grin was as bright as his wit, apparently. “Thanks for saving me back there,” Ari said, “and excuse the smell.” His right arm was still covered in manure. “Old Marshal is mean to everybody, Sire. I heard him yelling, so I had to look. A big surprise it was to see you, Sire. Usually no one hides in the stable. Well, except me sometimes!” “Believe me, I was surprised to see you too,” Ari responded with a laugh. “But thanks any — “ The boy had dashed ahead again. Seriously? Do I smell that bad?
The trail kept winding, and Ari caught his breath. Now was as good a time as any to ask that dreaded first question. Better now than later, in fact. He tried to avoid it whenever he could, but some places were less forgiving than others. Clearly, this was one of the worse ones — and he had been here less than half an hour.
Ari caught up to the boy again. “Hey kid,” he said, “this might sound strange, but: What year is it?” The boy’s expression briefly broke with bewilderment, though it was not enough to slow his half-jog back to their former pace, which Ari had enjoyed a lot more.
“That is a funny question indeed, Sire. Sometimes, the squires ask me the same after coming out of the tavern. Have you been to the tavern? Mother says I am too young.” “Uhh, no, sorry…” Ari scratched his head. “No tavern for me yet either.” “I see,” the boy said. “Oh, and it is, of course, the good year of our Lord Jesus Christ, 1273.”
Great, Ari thought. Just as his gut had told him when he had awoken in that pile of straw. The worst had come to pass. Again.
Arikos Palmer, a boy born in 1992, was stuck in the Middle Ages — and nothing good ever happened in the Middle Ages.
The Repeat Exam
Ari was 14 when he first traveled through time.
That night, he went to bed with an uneasy feeling. His sleep was deep and dreamless. He woke up feeling slightly dizzy, but the morning seemed normal enough.
The first indication that something was off came at breakfast, when his mom asked him whether he felt ready for his biology exam. “What do you mean, Mom? That was last week!” “Are you sure, sweetie? You told me it’s today.” “Nah, thank god that’s over, I don’t even want to know my grade.” “If you say so! I’m sure it’ll be fine.”
His commute to his school in East London was odd as well. Everyone’s outfits looked vaguely familiar. The conversations on the bus felt stale. Hadn’t he heard all this before? His friend Seb kept beating around the bush about his latest crush. Ari ran out of patience: “I already told you, Seb! No way Marika agrees to go on a date with you. Zero chance!” Seb’s face lost all its color. “How do you know I like Marika? I haven’t told anyone!” There it was again. That uneasy feeling. Ari played it down. “Uhh, well, it’s…the way you look at her! In class! Yes! You’re so obvious, man.” To his relief, Seb took the bait. “What? Really? Man, and here I am, thinking I’m all slick. Don’t tell anyone else, okay? You knowing is bad enough.” “Fine,” Ari said, content with his impromptu save, “just stop being so obvious.”
The real shock came in biology class, when, lo and behold, Mrs. Ferguson did hand out yet another test. “I hope you’ve all brushed up on your phylogenetic trees over the weekend,” she said . Phylogenetic trees? Wasn’t that…? When Ari turned around the paper, he froze. He was staring at the exact same exam he had taken a week prior. For 15 minutes, he tried to figure out what was going on. Was Mrs. Ferguson playing a prank on them? Why wasn’t anyone else complaining about the repeat? Everyone was frantically scribbling away. For lack of better ideas, Ari began, too. To his dismay, he was no wiser about the genetic strands of birds in the United Kingdom than he had been a week before. And, having lost a third of the period, he would probably score even worse this time.
The rest of the day was less taxing, but the uneasiness remained. At dinner, an overwhelming exhaustion kicked in. Ari was so tired, he bombed his post-dinner duels in Diablo II, a fantasy game he played online with friends. At 10 PM, he dosed off with the lights on. The next morning, he felt better. Lighter.
The only strangeness that remained was his mom’s response when he complained about the prior day’s ambush by Mrs. Ferguson: “Phylogenetic trees? Again? I thought she already quizzed you guys about that last week!”
The Millers
“Here we are!” the boy said, beaming. On the clearing, a small wooden hut rested against its green surroundings. Ari stopped in his tracks. It was as if he had walked into a painting.
The hut was made of near-black logs with a thatched but well-kempt roof. The green grass contrasted with the dark trees encircling the area. Smoke was rising from the hut’s center, caught in scattered rays of sun breaking through the treetops. The scene reminded him of The Cottage in a Cornfield, an actual painting he had seen at the Victoria and Albert once. For all the pain and danger of these times, there was beauty, too, he thought.
“Are you coming, Sire?” the boy asked, already on the doorstep. With a loud “Mother! I brought an esteemed guest!” he barged in. Inside, Ari’s gaze kept wandering. The hut was modest but organized. A large cauldron sat on an open stone hearth in the center. Iron pots and pans hung on the wall. There was a table with a few stools and, in the back, two small beds. On one of them lay a little girl no older than six. She seemed to be sleeping.
The boy’s mother emerged from a storage area. She had long blonde hair and a beautiful face. Her attire revealed she was no better off than old Marshal, but she carried herself with more dignity. “Mother, this is…” The boy tapped his chin. “Oh! I do not even know your name, Sire! What is it?”
“It’s Arikos, but you can call me Ari. And drop the ‘Sire,’ please. Why are you calling me that anyway?”
“But Sire, as a man with such silver hair, you surely must be of the noblest heritage!”
It was true. Though sorely lacking in aristocratic titles, Ari’s hair had been as white as snow from the day he was born. He had never found out why, but after his latest biology lessons, he attributed it to some genetic defect.
“And your name sounds foreign, too,” the boy continued. “Are you from beyond the Narrow Seas?” The mother interrupted. “Do not be rude to our guest, darling. Have you even properly introduced yourself?” The boy sprang to attention, then bowed deeply. “Forgive me, Sire…I mean, Sir Ari.”
“Ha, never mind. You must be…”
“Fawkes, Sir Ari! Fawkes Miller the Younger. ’Tis my father’s name, too.”
So old Marshal hadn’t been chasing ghosts.
“Excuse his manners,” the mother said, “he is usually well-behaved beyond his speech. Wants to be a knight, like his father. My name is Serena. We are honored to meet you, Si…Ari. This is our home. It is not much, but you are welcome to share in all we have.”
The sun was setting. Ari thanked Serena, gladly washed his arm with the bucket of water she gave him, and, soon, they all sat around the fire, eating a kind of vegetable stew he found disgusting but ate with a smile. Fitting in was important, but so was food, and he had grown rather hungry from the day’s events. What month was it? September? October? Feels like October. It was one of the hardest parts of his condition: wherever, whenever he landed, he started from zero.
Fawkes kept pestering Ari with questions. “What is the weather like where you are from, Sir Ari? Are the farmers nice there? Why are you wearing such funny attire? Do you reside in a castle?” The boy was as curious as he was eloquent. As Ari had learned, the best way to dodge questions was to ask plenty of his own.
“Fawkes, the little girl…is she your sister?” Fawkes nodded. For the first time, the brightness faded from his face. “Yes, but…” “Laia is ill, Ari,” Serena took over, much to Fawkes’ relief. Now that she mentioned it, the girl had not stirred once since his arrival. “She has a bad fever, and we know not what to do but wait. Thank the Lord for my little knight-in-waiting.” Serena nodded in Fawkes’ direction, who cheered up slightly.
“Every day, he makes the far trip into town to help the weaver. Cleaning the loom. Fixing broken strands. All so we can afford the henbane and valerian we need for Laia’s medicine.” At the word “henbane,” Ari’s ears perked up. Hadn’t the farmer been yelling about something like that? He glanced at Fawkes, who gave him a pleading look. So he was stealing from the farmer.
But Ari generally tried to keep a low profile on his travels. Therefore, he kept quiet and listened to Serena’s story. “I’m sorry,” he said after she had finished. “I hope Laia will recover soon.”
Perhaps as a thanks to Ari for keeping his secret, Fawkes insisted he stay the night with them. Having nowhere else to go except back out into the cold, now, it was Ari’s turn to feel relieved. That would have been the next awkward question.
Serena shared a bed with Laia, and Ari laid down next to Fawkes, who fell asleep as soon as his head hit the pillow. When he felt his own, Ari couldn’t help but chuckle. It was filled with straw.
The hut was warm from the crackling fire. Ari was tired but safe for the night. This time, a night was all he needed. He felt his legs burning from all the running while replaying the day’s events in his head. The now all too familiar exhaustion took hold, and Ari already knew. “Goodbye Fawkes,” he whispered. “You’re a good kid.” Then, Ari fell into a deep and dreamless slumber.
In the morning, Fawkes and Serena woke up to a shock. Their visitor had vanished without a trace.
The T-Rex
Ari’s first jump took him months to piece together. His second was obvious, though it did him few other favors.
After falling asleep on a cold December night in London, Ari awoke beneath a strange tree next to a swamp. The air was so humid he could hardly breathe, and his long pajamas were already drenched in sweat. Looking around, he saw…a jungle? But all the plants and trees were of odd shapes and colors, many of them comically large. As soon as a tiny dinosaur pecked at his pants, however, he knew roughly when he was. Ari panicked immediately.
He ran around aimlessly, shouting for help with not a soul in sight. But after a curious brachiosaurus poked its head through the tree tops, Ari realized staying quiet might be a better survival strategy. For two days, he hid in a small hole beneath a tree the size of a skyscraper. He didn’t sleep a wink nor dare eat any of the plants, lest they might be poisonous. Ari’s only nourishment was a handful of raindrops he caught with his mouth.
At one point, the earth started rumbling, and when he looked through the bushes of his makeshift hideout, he saw a grown t-rex watering near the swamp. With endless adrenaline pumping through his body, he shrank into a fetal position and waited. The t-rex eventually moved on, and Ari went back to listening for the cawing sounds of velociraptors, which he remembered from sneaking into Jurassic Park III with their neighbors’ son when he was nine. Luckily, he never heard any.
At the 45-hour mark, hopelessness kicked in. That’s it, Ari thought. I’m gonna die here. Mulling in despair over which kind of dinosaur might kill him, Ari didn’t feel his eyes falling shut. He drifted off into a nap…and woke up safely back home, in a small house in Ilford — London, yes, but, more importantly, 2006.
When she heard the shower in the upstairs bathroom, his mother rushed in. “Ari? ARI?! Is that you?” Ari poked his head out, confused. “Mom? What’s up?” Breaking into tears, she jumped into the bathtub fully clothed and hugged him. Two days ago, her son had disappeared, and now he showed up as if nothing had happened.
As he sat in their living room explaining his made up story about a snow adventure in Cambridge with his online friend Xy_Summoner_yX — outside of Diablo II simply known as Frank — Ari realized: Time travel was dangerous — and not just for the people who end up with the dinosaurs.
Upminster
Red. The first thing Ari saw when he opened his eyes was red. On the ceiling, a familiar digital clock was ticking away. 08:27:35, it read. And below, the date: 08/08/2009. Ari had installed it to quickly ground himself after each of his “trips.”
The studio apartment was tiny, but it was enough for now. Beige walls. A small bed. Gas stove and sink. You could take the tour by simply turning on the spot. Ari stretched in his bed. He looked at the date again and frowned. Oh…two years today, huh?
Shortly after his 15th birthday, Ari had run away from home. For a year, he had endured. But his constant disappearances had taken a severe toll . On him as much as his parents.
His father had initially chosen anger as his response. “Where the hell were you?! Why do you keep doing this to us?” But after a dozen disappearances, the latest of which had been an unusually long, three-week jump to Florence during the Italian Renaissance — which Ari had actually enjoyed — indifference had overtaken him. “The kid’s a lost cause, Martha,” he had kept saying to his mother when he thought Ari wasn’t listening. “This isn’t normal teenage rebel stuff anymore. We should have known better than to take him in. Especially given how that lunatic made his request.”
Ari had never heard of this lunatic before, but, deep down, he had always known that Martha and John were not his real parents. His first name. The color of his hair. Arikos wasn’t born a Palmer, but it had never mattered. They had raised him. Fed him. Played with him. And, despite their humble means, done everything a boy could ask for. To Ari, the Palmers were his parents. Which had only made his mother’s misery hurt all the more the longer he witnessed it.
His mysterious disappearances had eaten at her sanity. How could he sneak in and out without anyone ever noticing? The lies were even worse. She knew his stories weren’t real. Saw the cuts, bruises, and strange outfits he sometimes returned in. Why wouldn’t he tell her? Martha Palmer was a strong woman, but she had a soft heart. And when he saw her drinking her weekend treat — two glasses of Pinot Noir — five days in a row, Ari knew: If he stayed, it would destroy whatever was left of the people he loved most in the world. So he did the only thing that was even harder: he left.
Two years to the day. That’s how long he had been in Upminster. They’d lose it if they knew how close I am, Ari thought. And yet, until he had figured out his disease — if that was even possible — he could not go home.
08:30:21. On the ceiling, one red digit kept flipping into the next.
The Rules
Since that awkward, repeat biology exam, Ari had made so many time jumps, he had lost count.
He had seen the aftermath of the French Revolution, the Spanish Armada in the 16th century, and Toronto in the spring of 1988.
He had traveled back a month, a day forward, and 145 years into the future. Between all the robots, drones, and driverless cars, London had been unrecognizable.
Ari had jumped into the Mongol-ruled Siberian tundra in the mid-13th century. That had been a tough four hours. He had jumped into the Egyptian desert when the Great Pyramid of Giza was only half finished. His white hair had saved him. The people had confused him with the deity Wepwawet and treated him well. Still he had almost died of heatstroke before warping back half a day later.
After three years of time jumps, Ari had been to dozens of countries and all across history. If it had its own section in a high school textbook, chances were, Ari had been there. And yet, he was little wiser as to how his ability — if one could call being randomly slingshot across time in his sleep an “ability” — actually functioned.
The jumps occurred randomly but always in his sleep. Whether it was a normal night, a nap, or passing out from exhaustion didn’t matter. Every day, there was a chance he’d find himself back with the dinosaurs, with no clue when or where he would land.
His returns, however, seemed to follow at least some rules. First, he couldn’t force himself back by simply going to sleep again the moment he arrived in a new time. Even if he wasn’t too excited, stressed, or scared to begin with, a nap after a jump was usually just a nap. Sleep alone wasn’t the trigger.
Ari had also noticed that his ability seemed to somewhat try to protect him from harm. Oh, he’d had to run plenty, and not just from farmers with pitchforks. Ari had escaped a crocodile, talked himself out of being held at gunpoint, and learned how to hide faster than a rabbit disappearing in tall grass. But when he felt completely spent and his body wouldn’t move anymore, he tended to pass out and find himself back home. The same happened when Ari was truly desperate. If his darkest thoughts rang loudest in his head, “time-sleep,” as he had dubbed his affliction, would somehow become his saving grace.
Finally, how did his body know when and where “back home” was? It was a mystery, but he always returned to the year he had originally left from, plus however many hours or days he had been gone. And since leaving his parents, he always woke up in his apartment, not his childhood bedroom. Clearly, his ability sensed what “home” was to him.
08:35:17. Ari was lost in thought when there came a knock at the door. Shit, he thought. Not him again. Still wearing his Nirvana t-shirt, which now smelled of horse hair and woodsmoke, he rolled out of bed. “Coming!”
Ronoka
“Hai totosama! Gomennasai!”
Ronoka kept her forehead pinned to the floor. Her father was an imposing man as it was, and when he raised his voice, she generally reacted by trembling in fear.
“These are dangerous times Ronoka,” Osamu said, his voice slowly returning to normal. “Going to the market is no longer merely going to the market. There are samurai in open rebellion against the regent. Promise me you will not venture out again without one of our guards by your side. I simply do not wish for you to come to any harm.” His admonition complete, Osamu left and closed the sliding screen behind him.
Ronoka let out a big sigh. How hard it was to be the daughter of a nobleman! All she had done was to run to her friend Hinata’s stall to see what he’d caught for the day. But apparently even buying fresh fish now had societal implications.
Ronoka sat up. Her long black hair fell down her back. Her round face was usually soft and pale, but right now her cheeks were glowing red. Ronoka’s gaze wandered around their living room. Tatami floors. A folding screen in the corner. The low table in the center. Our house looks just like Hinata’s, she thought. How can our lives be so different?
A thud caught Ronoka off guard. Did that come from the bedroom? She glimpsed a shadow behind the screen opposite the one through which her father had just left. Ronoka tiptoed to the door and listened. Silence. “These are dangerous times, Ronoka…” She shook her head. Don’t be so afraid, you silly girl. Nobody but mice got past the guards anyway. In one swift motion, she slid the door open.
The bedroom appeared empty. Minus one of her dad’s prized swords lying on the floor, that was. The closet door on the left-hand wall was half open, and the remaining swords still stood in their dedicated holders inside. Everything else seemed normal. Except…next to the swords, was that a…?
A sock edged out from behind the closet door. It was a strange sock with a dot pattern on it. Why didn’t it split between the big and remaining toes? Did her father have new ones made? As she tended to do, Ronoka forgot her concern over her curiosity, walked up, and opened the closet.
The air left her lungs so quickly, there wasn’t even enough left for a scream. Her nose an inch from a stranger’s, Ronoka started stumbling backwards. Luckily, she caught herself. “Shhhhh!” The stranger put a finger to his lips. “Konni…” he whispered, “konni…chi…wa?” Her heart was beating out of her chest. Again. But there was no denying it: Right inside her father’s closet stood the strangest boy she had ever seen.
He wore something that looked like a shrunk kimono, and his pants seemed to have been cut in half by a blade. He had blue eyes, a sharp jaw, and hair as white as ash.
The year was 1600 — and Arikos Palmer had just made his most important time jump of all.
Thank you for reading this early draft of The Time-Sleeper. If you’d like to get updates on the book and my other writing, you can be my email friend — I’d love to hear your thoughts!
