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Zach passed her a bowl and we all ate happily with plates resting on our bellies.

I finished eating, passed my bowl back to the tray, took a deep breath, and jumped into a big important thing. “So, Magnus, I have something to discuss with you and... I — one day Zach and I were Googling the history of you, and we learned something about Lizbeth that I want to talk to you about.”

“Lizbeth, what is...? You have a sad look tae ye, Kaitlyn.”

“We learned that she doesn’t make it through the birth, this December, I mean, in December of 1703, she dies.”

“Och.”

“I know.”

“Can we go back and do somethin’ tae save her?”

“I don’t know, but I want to try.”

Zach said, “Okay, wait, I don’t want to sound callous, but we’re talking about someone, your sister, Magnus, I get that she’s important to you⁠—”

“She has raised me from a verra young age.”

“I understand that, but she’s been passed away now for three hundred years. She will die. Don’t you have to get used to the fact?”

I said, “But when I go back there, to Scotland, she is alive. And she is amazing. I can’t imagine Scotland without her.”

Zach said, “I get that, but what about changing time? If you change the course of history, what will you change in the course of our present?”

Magnus asked, “What do you mean by this, Chef Zach?”

He leaned forward in his chair. “Like if you go back in time and killed someone, like a King, you would change written history. Maybe his death starts a war. Maybe something important that we need wouldn’t be invented. Maybe the children of the king are important. Maybe you come back here and this present-day world has been altered because the son of the king wasn’t born. As a time traveler everything you do might have consequences...”

Magnus said, “Kaitlyn has killed a king.”

“That was in the future, we don’t need to worry on that one much. Though what’s happening there now should concern you.”

“It does, verra much. So ye are sayin’ we only need tae worry on our effect on the past? We left machines from the future in the past. We left a black man in a Scottish castle. I have already changed the story in 1703, and this world hasna changed.” He looked around at us. “Has it?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

Zach sank back in his chair. “But I guess if you think about it we wouldn’t know. If the present was different from three days ago, we would be living in a different present with a different history. We would have no idea.” He groaned. “I just totally freaked myself out. Hold that thought, I’m going to go check on Ben.”

He jogged up the stairs and was gone for a moment and then jogged down to the kitchen. He called, “Sorry about that, got a little nervous.”

Emma said, “I have the baby monitor right here.”

Zach shook his head. “Sometimes you have to put your hand on his sleeping back to accept he’s okay.”

He opened the cabinet over the refrigerator. “I have a bit of a pot brownie. Anyone else wants a bite?”

“No thanks,” I said. To Magnus I explained, “That’s one of those cookies, like we ate that night, remember?”

“The one that made ye giggle like the ocean fish? Aye, I canna eat it. I need tae be ready in case there is a storm.” Our eyes all shifted to the television screen. It didn’t help, it was a commercial for Xanax.

I resumed our conversation. “And Zach, we have these paintings — they’ve been here for well over a year, but having them didn’t change Picasso’s worth or value or anything, right? I mean, if we killed a king that might have a ripple effect, but small things, in the scheme of it, might not be that big a deal.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right. Don’t mess with big established important events and don’t interfere in your own personal history. Like the time rules on Doctor Who⁠—”

Magnus asked, “He is a physician?”

I said, “Doctor Who is a television show about a time traveler.”