Her mom used to say you needed a little distance to get clarity on the big things.Rita half smiled, then it faded.Her mom.She’d never envisioned Rita getting her distance and clarity by traveling to the past.Or how much Rita would see from this view of her life.
It felt a bit like her young life had happened to someone else.
She had memories of parents who loved her.The beginnings of a happy childhood had ended with their death.She frowned.She’d been so young, but sometimes she’d remember a brother…
She’d been taken in by relatives.They’d kept her alive, but remained shadowy figures—more shadowy than her parents.Sometimes she’d have odd, disconnected memories of her past, but she put that down to the time travel.
She had no family left, and now she wondered if there had been some other force at work, clearing away all the people who might ask questions if she disappeared.
It wasn’t a happy thought.
The agency had come to her and she’d accepted their invitation, not to find her family, but to escape the reality of her present She considered this.
This felt true.She liked the past better than her present.
Finding her family had never been an option anyway.Don’t mess about in your own life was near the top of the list of things you couldn’t do.And she’d never been sent anywhere near her own past.Their movements in and out of the base were strictly controlled.
Which made what she wanted to do a little more complicated—even if these people let her help, which seemed unlikely.
There was a knock at the inner door, the one that led to the inside of the hangar.
“Come in?”She made it a question.She hadn’t expected anyone from that direction.
The door opened.It was Red.He slipped in, quickly closing the door behind him.
“How are you doing?”
He looked rumpled and needed a shave.His hand rubbed his chin as if he knew she’d noticed.
“I’m fine.The bathroom is right there.”She pointed to the last door they’d managed to cram into the small room.“Shower works.”
He grinned.“Thanks.”
When the shower started, she returned to her task, a small smile hovering around her lips.It was nice to not be alone.Had he spent the night in the hangar?And where had everyone else gone?She might be tempted to take a peek, but she didn’t.She felt honor bound not to look.And they probably had surveillance in there.That helped keep her honest, so she could mildly congratulate herself for not looking.
She chuckled softly and then heard the shower shut off.Rita had been surprised to find a change of underwear, pants and a shirt on a shelf in there.And now that she thought about it, there’d been a guy version of the change of clothes.So he wouldn’t have to emerge wearing a towel.
A pity that.
She glanced at her notes, but she’d lost the thread and sat back to wait for Red to appear.
When the door creaked open he looked to be a new man.She’d almost think the clothes had been made with him in mind, they fitted him so nicely.
She propped an elbow on the table and her chin in her hand and watched him extract an apple and a bottle of juice, before seating himself opposite her.The table was so small their knees bumped.
“Good morning,” he said, then bit into his apple and munched contentedly.
“Good morning,” Rita returned, noting his glance at the notebook.She pushed it toward him.“I’m not sure you can read my handwriting.”She was woefully out of practice, though travel through time did require the skill from time to time.
With only a slight hesitation, he picked it up and squinted a little, then gave her a grin over the top.
Her toes might have curled just a tiny bit.She did like him.A lot.Too much?Probably.
“Locations I’ve heard about,” he read.He glanced down, then read the next heading.“Locations I’ve visited.”Another quick look and then his eyes widened, most likely because of the dates she added—in her time.“You’ve gotten around a bit.”
“Most of it only recently,” she said.“Here’s the thing.”She leaned forward, both elbows resting on the table.For just a minute she paused, testing her gut and her time senses, then she continued, “Time travel is physically taxing.They shouldn’t have been sending me out that often.I heard one of the techs asking about it, but he was told I wasn’t staying long.”
“But it’s not the time on the location that’s the problem?”
