Pre-Destiny

Flynn had spent his whole life running. First, from bullies. Then, from cops. Always, from a grumbling belly gnawing a hole in the pit of his empty stomach. He had learned to just keep going, no matter the cost.

As the 14-year-old swung around a lamppost, he palmed a newspaper from the stand on West Broadway, tugging at the brim of his Yankees cap. At the moment it was covering a mop of greasy blonde hair; Flynn couldn’t remember the last time he had showered. For a time, he had used the school showers, but that was before the lunch ladies caught him emptying all the cash from the till when he thought they were on a smoke break. After a string of smaller offenses, the principal wasted no time in deeming the lunchroom robbery “the final straw.” No more school showers. Since then, Flynn had been going to the “Y” where he could get a hot shower, and sometimes a hot meal if he was charming enough to the receptionist.

“Where are your parents, hon?” she’d asked, one hand covering the mouthpiece of the phone. Flynn shrugged like he really didn’t know, casting his eyes up and down the linoleum hallway as if to look for them.

“My dad told me to meet him back at the desk after his swim. He could still be in the pool.”

He could, if he weren’t at the bottom of the Hudson river. The last class Flynn had gone to before his botched burglary was an English lecture on the subjunctive case and gerunds. Damned useful phrases for not telling a lie when you didn’t want to tell the truth either. But the receptionist wouldn’t care about gerunds or what had happened to Flynn’s dad. She just needed to know she could trust him to be a normal teenage kid.

The woman nodded, smiled at Flynn and motioned him through the turnstile.

“Pool is down the hall, last door on the left. If he’s in the men’s changing room, you can wait for him in the multipurpose room.”

She pointed and Flynn nodded his appreciation at her, tucking his fingers through the belt loops on his jeans. His grimy tennis shoes made a faint slapping sound on the floor as he walked. He made a point of looking in on the adults swimming laps in the turquoise water before ducking into the room she had pointed out.

The multipurpose room had a fridge and freezer set up next to a kitchenette. Inside were three microwavable meals. He polished off the mac n’ cheese before it had fully defrosted and then turned his attention to the other two packages. For a brief moment, the hole in his stomach felt patched as he headed to the men’s lockers to hit the showers.

Flynn had turned the knob in the shower stall up to max. The hot water would leave his skin pink for the next couple hours, but it was the first time he had really felt warm in a long time. He stood under the stream of water, letting the spray of decent water pressure work at the knots in his shoulders.

This could be a game-changer, he had thought.

After almost an hour that felt more like mere minutes, Flynn braced himself for the chill before turning off the tap and toweling himself dry. He slid back into his jeans and black t-shirt before pulling on socks, shoes, and a navy jacket which he’d picked up from the school’s “lost and found.” It was a narrow cut meant for a woman’s physique, but he didn’t care. Flynn tucked his father’s Yankees hat in his back pocket. The locker room was empty, though Flynn had distinctly heard at least one person come in and change while he’d been showering. He turned the water back on, hoping the sound of the spray would mask what he was about to do. Scanning the room, Flynn climbed up onto the bench and opened the first locker in the row.

Empty.

Undeterred, he moved down the line. Some of the metal doors had masterlocks on them that Flynn did not feel like messing with in the small window of time he estimated he had. Finally, he came to a locker that swung open with a suit folded up on top of a gym bag. Flynn checked the room once more before diving into the bag. Water bottle, towel, ear buds…those he could sell, but not for much. He unzipped the side pocket and hastily nipped the cash out of the wallet--$47 dollars. Then his eyes fell on the watch. The brown, leather strap with gold fastenings and roman numerals on the clock face. There was something else on the face…not a symbol Flynn recognized. It looked like a serpent eating its own tail. As Flynn squinted at the timepiece he heard the wet slap of flip-flops on the tiled bathroom floor. He had to make a decision now.

He pocketed the watch, leaving the locker ajar. Before he could be seen, he slid into an unoccupied shower stall and pulled the curtain. When he was sure he was alone again, he slipped out of the locker room through the door that exited to the outdoor pool.

The next couple weeks, Flynn found himself fiddling with the watch rather than trying to find a place to fence it. The $47 was enough to get by if he bought a Subway $5 footlong and split it into two halves—one in the morning and one in the evening—especially interspersed with some of the day-old Chinese he plundered from the bins outside of Proud Pagoda.

At night he would lie under the train tracks, away from the other street kids. It was a mild summer and so sleep came easier with the rumble of wheels lulling him to sleep. He turned the watch over and smoothed the shiny surface with his finger. The self-cannibalizing snake was imprinted on both the front and the back of the watch with the year “1985.” That was another reason it had looked so attractive to Flynn; it was new, made this year. Flynn wasn’t a magpie by nature, keeping as little on him as possible. The less he had, the less people could take from him. But nothing he had was new, and none of it was shiny. Something about the watch tugged at Flynn’s memory as he fell asleep and dreamed of his father sleeping in the waters beside him.

When Flynn hit Broadway, he was feeling disheartened. Everyone at the “Y” knew an expensive watch had disappeared from the men’s locker room and, consequently, they all had locks now. Flynn was on his last Subway sandwich and hard up for cash. Though it killed him, he was going to need to pawn the watch or come up with a different solution if he wanted to eat. After he snagged the copy of “The Times” he headed up Fifth to try his luck with some questionable lo mein. The dumpsters hadn’t been filled yet. Flynn walked around the back of a McDonald’s but found only a dead alley cat and kept moving.

He was going to have to sell it. Flynn sighed, ready to turn back onto the main drag when he walked headfirst into a man going the opposite direction.

“Sorry, mister,” he mumbled. But the man lurched for him, and Flynn stumbled backward in surprise. Most of the vagrants in the city kept to themselves, not wanting any more trouble than was strictly necessary. But this man had flown into Flynn, knocking him backwards and onto the pavement. He felt the face of the watch hit the cement sidewalk. Looking down, there was now a star fracture in the glass emanating from a single line where it had made contact with the ground.

“What the hell, man?” He looked up and felt a violent shudder pass through him. Flynn was staring into the face of a man who looked exactly like his father. The man reached out for him again, his step uneven. Flynn caught the man by the wrists and felt his veins turn to ice. The man was holding an exact replica of his watch down to the fresh crack in the glass.

“You can’t sell it—” the man wheezed, and for the first time, Flynn noticed the red stain blossoming out over the man’s chest. For a moment, Flynn thought he might be sick. The man was gasping for air now and tumbled to the ground at Flynn’s feet. “You have to make this right.” He was clawing at Flynn’s hands, grabbing for the watch. Flynn thought of his father, the river, as he grappled with the stranger who could be family. The dial on the watch spun and before Flynn’s eyes the serpent began to glow, rotating counterclockwise. The air began to pick up, spinning in a gale force around Flynn, who threw up his arms to shield himself from the flying rocks and glass gusting up from the sidewalk.

When the air had stilled again, he lowered his arms and opened his eyes.

The sun now beating down on Flynn’s face had instantly intensified. The mild summer afternoon in Brooklyn had melted into a sweltering heat wave. Flynn unzipped the jacket and tied it around his waist, looking around for the man he was sure had to be his father. But he was nowhere to be seen. Older makes and models of cars made their way down the main road as Flynn watched, stymied. He clutched the broken watch in his hand willing that emerald-green serpent to come to life one more time, just to prove to himself that he had seen what he thought he had seen. No such luck.

“’ey! Get outta the road, bud!”

A taxi laid on the horn and Flynn just about jumped out of his skin. He was no longer standing on a sidewalk, but in the middle of a side street riddled with potholes. He figured he was lucky not to have been run over immediately. Hurrying to the safety of the storefronts across from him, Flynn walked to the corner where he had gotten the morning paper from. He riffled through the racks of magazines with dated hairstyles before extricating another copy of “The Times.” Plastered across the front was a bold headline: “Son of Sam Serial Killer Continues to Terrify Citizens.” Just under that was an op-ed, “The .44 Caliber Killer Still At Large.” With a lump in his throat, Flynn’s eyes began to digest the words printed on the page.

“Buddy, you’re gonna have to pay for that.”

The stall manager had walked around to face Flynn, arms crossed over his chest. He held out a hand. Flynn felt around in his pocket. He only had a little change left from the money he had pocketed at the “Y.”

“How much?”

“Read the sign, kid. That’s the only free read you get from me.”

Flynn looked up to see the prices labeled on a painted sign over the rack. The newspaper was just twenty-five cents. But that couldn’t be right…dazed, he fished a quarter out of his pocket and handed it to the man, who huffed off back to his folding chair and cup of coffee.

Flynn turned his attention back to the newspaper just long enough for his eyes to pass over the date stamped in the upper-left corner: July 13, 1977. No; it couldn’t be. He was living in the year 1985. But even as his brain protested the thought, Flynn’s stomach was tying itself into knots. July 13th. This was the day he lost his father forever. Flynn thought back to the man who had nearly tackled him on the sidewalk, how he had implored Flynn to “make it right.”

Had Flynn really been sent back in time? Had his father found a way to send him back and stop the tragedy Flynn knew would be coming in a matter of mere hours? His head spun with the ideas now chasing themselves around his brain. Flynn’s stomach gurgled, bringing him back to the present. Whenever that was.

Flynn’s stomach protested again. He needed to find something to eat. Walking down the row of shops, Flynn was beginning to believe more and more that he had, in fact, traveled back in time. The older models of television boasting out-of-date antennae were all playing the same crackling news stories about the heat wave that had plagued New York for the better part of the summer. Flynn shook his head and dragged a deep breath in through his lungs. What was he going to do? It wasn’t as though anyone in his time would notice that he was missing. He staggered to a vendor manning a booth outside the local bodega at the end of the street. The man looked up from under the red and yellow umbrella sporting a “Nathan’s Hot Dogs” sign. Thank god hot dogs were the same no matter what year you lived in. This time, Flynn had the presence of mind to look up. Only thirty-five cents. He was going to be able to stretch this last dollar further than he expected. After accepting the hot dog, bun, and a heaping portion of relish, Flynn devoured his lunch before thinking over his options.

The clouds overhead added to the haze of heat as Flynn walked the town he had once known as a little boy, so similar to the one he was used to living in as a teen. Somewhere down Broadway was the old red-brick apartment where his six-year-old self was probably busy playing with his Luke and Darth Vader figurines. His father would already have left for work at the power plant owned by Consolidated Edison. Flynn closed his eyes, trying to recall all of the details of the last afternoon he had seen his father alive.

It had been hot, their small one bedroom in Yonkers had been boiling by mid-afternoon. His father had stuffed a second box fan in the window opposite to the kitchen. Flynn remembered him bending over, hugging him like it was any other day, and then heading out the door for work. The skin around Flynn’s eyes creased in concentration. He had said he’d be home late. That there was leftover spaghetti in the fridge. Flynn loved cold spaghetti and dug into it almost before his father was out the door, though in hindsight, he knew his father had probably intended it to be for dinner. And that was it.

Flynn had stayed in the apartment long after the lights went out across the city. He had double and triple checked the locks on the front door when the lights didn’t come back on again and the sirens began going off. He had heard his neighbor, Mrs. Willoughby, crying through the wall at one point. Two days had passed before the knock on the front door when two policemen had announced themselves and Flynn had let them in. They came to ask where Flynn’s dad was; he had never shown up for work.

No, Flynn had tried to explain. His father had gone to work. Flynn had seen him leave the apartment and everything. But still they had taken Flynn down to the station and called some lady to take him to a house with no spaghetti or box fans or Star Wars toys. Flynn had lasted just long enough in the system to be there when a second set of uniformed officers came to the strange house and sat him on the floral couch that belonged to his third foster mom. They had found Flynn’s father, they had said. Great Flynn had thought. Now things can go back to normal.

But that wasn’t what they had meant.

Flynn’s father had been a victim, they explained. The best they could figure, it had been a wrong place, wrong time situation. They asked if Flynn had heard of a man named David Berkowitz. Flynn hadn’t. They asked if he had heard about the Son of Sam murders. Flynn hadn’t heard of that either. The officers explained as clumsily as possible about a sick man who had shot several people using the same type of gun for each killing. Berkowitz had admitted to killing Flynn’s father the night of the 1977 Blackout. More precisely, he had killed him before the power outage as Flynn’s father had approached the Consolidated Edison building. Tossed him in the river, one of the officers explained, which is why they had not found a body. Flynn’s father had never made it to the power plant operations building. If he had, there likely would have been no power outage. The officers explained that Flynn’s father was a manual operator for the company and after the lightning strike that took down the grid, the manual operating booth had been empty. His father’s booth. After the remote start failed, Flynn’s father could have flicked the whole grid back to life with a single finger. But he hadn’t. As they talked, Flynn began to realize he would never be able to eat spaghetti again. He thought back to the night he had cowered in the dark, waiting for his father to come home and put him to bed. How he had pounded the button on the back of the Star Wars action figure for the momentary glow that came off the lightsaber. Then he knew, his father was never coming home.

Flynn tossed the hotdog wrapper into a green trash can on the corner, thinking. Could it be that the cops had gotten it wrong? They said they had never found a body… Berkowitz had been famous for enjoying the attention his murder spree garnered on the local and national news. Maybe when they presented the idea of another victim to him, he admitted to it just for the attention. Maybe. How else could Flynn explain his father showing up years later, bedraggled and begging for help on Broadway?

Maybe this time, Flynn could get to his father in time and find out the truth of what happened the night of the Blackout. It was certainly worth a shot. He wasn’t getting back to 1985 anytime soon. Flynn paused at one of the bus stops and debated the best route to get to the power plant. Rubbing the last few coins in his pocket together, he boarded the next bus to arrive at the stop and began the trek north. Using public transportation, it was going to take at least two hours with the many stops and one change between Flynn and Consolidated Edison. Flynn passed the time trying to look like he fit in with the many adults moving with purpose through the city. For the first time in his life, Flynn felt like he had a purpose, too.

After one of the bus drivers needed to stop to take a leak, it was closer to three hours by the time he reached his stop. The sun had begun to set even though they were swiftly approaching the longest day of the year. Flynn hopped off the bus about a half mile from the power plant. It was as close as the route would take him, but he also thought it would be best if he could case the entrance to the building. He had one shot at finding his father before Berkowitz did.

Flynn took in the impressive compound and the massive cage of barbed wire protecting the space from unwanted intruders. He was definitely going to have to find Berkowitz and his father on the perimeter. Even from a quarter mile away, Flynn could see the guard on duty manning the entrance. Maybe he could do more than save his father’s life, Flynn thought, adrenaline beginning to flow more freely. Maybe with his father safe at the helm they could prevent the whole 1977 Blackout and the ensuing rioting and crime that had rocked New York for the entire night and day after. Maybe they could save the lives and property lost that hot night when Mrs. Willoughby couldn’t stop crying. Flynn squared his shoulders and ducked into the shrubs near the power plant, waiting for any sign of movement. After almost an hour, he worried that he was already too late. What if his father had been taken closer to home? No, a small voice reproached him, the cops had said right outside the station.

It was nearing 7 P.M. now and Flynn was beginning to lose feeling in his right foot. He began to shift his body when he saw a flicker of movement in the trees off to his left. Then he heard the sound of raised voices and he was off like a shot through the undergrowth. Weaving between the tree branches he caught a glimpse of two men facing each other and his heart plummeted into his stomach.

There was his father; hearty, healthy, hale. And there was the man whose face Flynn would never forget.

Berkowitz.

“Dad!” he shouted, bursting out of the trees and running pell-mell toward his father. Both men wheeled around, his father with his arms raised above his head, briefcase at his feet. His father stared straight through him before collapsing to the ground, a bullet in his brain.

He was too late.

“What have you done?” Flynn shouted, running to his father, but the man with the gun was already gone. Flynn knelt beside his father, felt for a pulse, but it was too late. Flynn could feel the tears burning in his eyes as he cradled his father’s face to his chest. Surely, he had not come all this way just to fail. There had to be another way.

Flynn yanked the watch out of his pocket and spun the dial to recalibrate the side. The snake came to life, spinning in that dizzying circle as a gust of wind surrounded Flynn and his father. Flynn ducked to avoid the leaves and twigs in the whirlwind transporting him once again. Then the wind quieted, and he looked up. He was in the same spot on the path in the clearing and to his horror, the body of his father had travelled with him. Disgusted with himself, Flynn dragged his father behind a bush where he would not be immediately discovered and checked his surroundings. He would be back to dump the body in the river later.

He had only spun the dial a fraction, hoping to go back just the few minutes required to stop his father from ever making the treacherous walk up this way to the power plant. But even as he watched the empty clearing, a small part of his mind wondered just how far back in time he had gone this time. To his immediate horror and relief, he saw his father walking up the path alone. Before he could think it through, Flynn was running again, his arms windmilling the air as he reached his father.

“Dad!”

His father looked up, surprised, then frightened.

“I don’t know you—get away from me!”

“No, it’s…it’s me! It’s Flynn!”

His father stared at him for a moment, then put a hand to Flynn’s cheek. A moment later, he jerked back, the incredulous expression frozen on his face. Flynn wheeled around to see a man running away from them, up toward the spot where another version of him would be waiting for another version of his father in just a few minutes. Flynn looked back to his father, but once again, it was too late. Flynn’s father collapsed in front of Flynn on the spot, dead. Flynn scurried away from the body and vomited behind the bushes.

No matter how many times Flynn spun the dial back, he could not get to his father in time to save him. With each successive effort, Flynn found himself falling further and further back in time, forcing himself to live forward to the moment he might yet save his father. The third time, he landed in 1976 and had to wait a year before trying to save the only person who had ever really cared about him. The next time, he was thrown all the way back into the 1960’s and waited more than a decade for his chance. No matter how many times he failed, or how far back in time he travelled, he always found his way to clearing where death was waiting for his father. When the night of the Blackout would draw near, he would go to the clearing, alone and without fail, would watch his father die in front of him.

Weary with age and past failure, there came a time Flynn felt he had just one last chance in his aching bones and aged body as the date of the Blackout drew near. He took a new route from the many other Flynns that would be running loose in New York that day and found himself in the familiar spot. This time, he came early. At 6:30, he positioned himself on the path, prepared to take the bullet intended for his father. As he watched the figure of Berkowitz walking up the hill to meet him, Flynn steeled himself for the final confrontation of his life.

As he took a deep inhale, he heard the padding of feet flying down the hill behind him.

“Dad!”

Oh, no…it couldn’t be…Flynn gulped as the young version of himself grabbed his shoulders and spun him around. He saw his younger self standing there full of resolute determination. Flynn knew this boy believed him to be his father in the way he stared into his own eyes. He remembered this moment. He knew what he needed to say, though it broke his heart.

“I don’t know you—get away from me!” he cried, trying to be convincing.

“No, it’s…it’s me! It’s Flynn!”

This whole time it had been an older, though not much wiser, Flynn, not his father, who he had confronted as a teenager. If only he had stayed back then and waited for his actual father to come up the hill later, he could have stopped the murder from the beginning. As Flynn cursed his past decisions, Flynn heard the crack of the gun go off behind him. Felt the impact of the bullet as he fell on the spot, the bullet trapped inside the safety of the Kevlar vest he had brought knowing the outcome before it happened.

Though he wanted to console the past version of himself now retching in the bushes, he played dead until he heard the unmistakable whirl of leaves signaling that his younger self had gone. Flynn staggered to his feet and tossed the now useless Kevlar in the undergrowth. Distantly, he heard the gun go off further down the hill and knew his actual father would be lying dead several hundred yards in the opposite direction. He had to go back one last time and remember to bring two Kevlar vests along…one for himself and one for his father. But as he turned the dial on the watch, the serpent lay still. The battery of the watch had finally run dry.

Flynn felt the humidity of the growing clouds overhead as panic welled in his chest, saw the first flicker of forked lightning and realized everything had been driving him toward this one moment his entire life. He had run out of chances, but perhaps there was still a way to get the watch to someone who had more time. He took off running up the hill toward the power station.

Flynn tore around the side of the building past the guard who called after him, but Flynn could not be stopped. Pounding down the hall inside, the guard fired a single shot and Flynn cried out as he felt the burning begin between his ribs. He fell, stood up, limped on leaving a trail of blood as he entered the room his father was meant to be in this very second.

Panting now, he sat in his father’s chair, barricaded in the workstation even as he heard voices on the other side trying to break it down. He held out the watch and closed his eyes, waiting for the lightning strike that he knew was only seconds away from taking out the station responsible for the Blackout. If anything could recharge the watch, this was it.

The blood flowed onto his white shirt though he tried his best to staunch the wound with his left hand. As the rumble overhead grew louder, he put one hand on the open conductor, one hand clutching the watch straight up to the sky. He focused on the single crack in the watch face that had spiraled out to so many subsequent fractures before the bolt jolted him out of his seat.

The electricity flooded through him with a force that nearly rendered Flynn’s soul from his body. The dial began to spin, the serpent flying around the face of timepiece. It flew faster and faster, this time rotating clockwise. Flynn could not help but feel the pain of the animal forever choking on its own tail even as it tumbled through a predetermined cycle it would never understand.

When the guards finally opened the darkened booth, they would find no operator or intruder. The Blackout was always meant to happen. Flynn smiled and closed his eyes as he fell forward into the future ready to meet his 14-year-old self for the last time.