Summer of Yesterday (9 page)

Except totally not a genie.

Jake's arms are crossed, his legs apart, like a genie, but that's it. “Well, look who we have here.”

ten

I
was just going,” I say, getting up to leave, but Jake blocks my path.

“I don't think so. First you appear out of nowhere, then you escape the clinic and my boss made us all look for you, and now you show up here after the park is closed. I'd say it's time I made a call.” He lifts his walkie-talkie to his mouth, but I grab his arm and pull him down.

“No, please. Listen, it's not what you think. Jake, right?” My eyes beg him to listen.

He glances at me sideways, unsure. “You've been hanging around my brother, haven't you? No wonder I couldn't find him anywhere after work yesterday.” He scoffs and shakes his head.

“I know it looks like I'm trespassing, but there's a perfectly good explanation for it.”

“Which is?”

“Which . . . I can't explain to you right now.”

He lifts his walkie-talkie again, but I block him.

“I will. I'll explain soon, just please let me go. Don't call your manager.” I look at him, and it's amazing how much he looks like Jason, but with darker hair, a mustache, and brown eyes. And an attitude a little more . . .

He presses the button on his walkie-talkie anyway. “This is Jake at RC. I have an unregistered guest wandering the facility.”
Evil.

“No!” I grab the walkie-talkie from his hand and hold it over the slide. He lunges forward to get it. “I'll drop it! I swear, I will.”

“I could get in trouble if I lose that.”

A voice crackles through the speaker. “Copy, Jake. Security will be right there. Name your location.”

I pretend to fling the radio down the waterslide. “Don't tell them. I told you I had a good reason.”

“I don't care what that reason is.”

Great, now what?
“Well, do you care that your girlfriend was hanging out with another guy yesterday while you were working?”

At this, he stops. His whole expression changes. “What do you mean? Oscar? He's just a friend.”

“Are you sure?” I'm so using him. Of course he knows he's just a friend, but I hope I've given him enough to think about so he'll leave me alone. “I don't know, she really seemed to like him. I'm just sayin'.”

“Give me the radio.”

“Don't report me.”

“I already did. They're on their way.” Our eyes lock. I want to punch him for being such a jerk. “I had to, I'm sorry. I can't lose this job.”

My eyes shoot mental fireballs at him. “Thanks a lot.” I crouch down and hurl the walkie-talkie down the slide, hearing it make its way around the first bend. The water is turned off, but the slides are still wet enough for it to go winding its way around.

“No!” He jumps in after it, and I take advantage of the time it'll take him to catch it before it hits the lagoon and climb back up to run off.

Quickly, I hustle down the stairs and over to the gate I came through, but it's been locked tight with a chain. Ack! I climb the fence, curling my legs over the top edge, and jump down, losing a flip-flop on the other side. I reach under the fence to grab it, even though it's slowing me down. But I won't get far without shoes on boiling hot pavement.

Reach . . . and . . . got it!

Run. Run, Haley. . . .

I race down the service road, but halfway down I see a truck coming up the road. I duck behind some bushes next to a building behind the pool rock formation I saw when I first got here. There's another gate open, and a lady standing right there, cleaning the sidewalk with a powerful spray hose. I stop to catch my breath for a second.

Her back faces me, and the hose is really loud, so I whisk right past her without her even noticing me. I'm in the bathroom and locker area. It's still inside the water park, where there's a network of sidewalks leading back to Pioneer Hall, but almost to the outside. No one notices me. Not one person.

Except my mom. Of course.

“Oh my gosh, you scared me.” She turns around and holds her chest while leaning over. “Haley, right?”

What is she doing here? I'm pretty sure the front gate must be closed at this time. How did she get in? And how do I tell my past-mom I don't have time to talk to her?

I scan around, making sure Jake is not after me. “Yeah, Haley.”

“I guess I wandered in here by accident. Oops! Where is the exit again?” She laughs nervously. My mom, trespassing too? I see how my straight-laced dad thought she was a little too adventurous. She could get in trouble! Where's my grandma if not watching her? “Hey, can I ask you something?” she says, leaning into me.

“Yeah, sure.”

“I saw that you were having lunch with that guy from the towel shack. What's his name?”

Uh-oh. Don't tell me she likes him too. That would be too much. “Jason?”

“Right, Jason.” She looks around, gathering her courage, then back at me. We walk to the front gate, which I see now was left ajar with a garbage can on wheels propping it open. “I guess that's why you were in here too, waiting for him to get off work, huh?”

Yes, let her think that. “Oh, sure, right.”

“Well, do you know the guy that he and his brother sometimes spend time with? Medium height, brown hair, not his brother, but the other one?”

Aha. And so it begins.

I look at her fresh face, her beautiful mouth, her hair half picked up on the sides and held with two barrettes. I'm looking at the beginnings of me. Of Haley Petersen. I smile at her. “Yeah, Oscar. Oscar Petersen.”

“Oscar Petersen,” she says, trying the name out in her vocal repertoire. She pokes her head out the gate and opens it for us. “Come on, nobody's looking. Yeah, that one. He stays in my loop every year. He's so cute.” It's almost as if she's forgotten that I'm standing right here with her.

“He is. He's perfect for you,” I say, and she looks back at me and smiles giddily.

“You think? But he never even notices me. He's always with
that girl
.” She says
that girl
like Marsha is a bug that should be crushed.

“Oh, he will,” I say, looking at the way those words seem to make her whole being come alive. A moment ago she wasn't sure of herself, and now I've made a goddess out of a geek. “He'll get over her, don't worry.”

She stares at me in disbelief. “Wow. Thanks, Haley. You're a good friend. I know I've only known you a couple of days, but I don't know what it is. . . . It's like I've known you forever.”

I guess, in some way, we have known each other forever. And always will.
I love you, Mommy.
“Me too. Some people just click like that, huh?” I smile.

“
Click
, yeah.” She likes that word.

As much as I want to stand here talking to my mom, I have to move along. Jake could come running with security guards any moment now. A couple of cast members walk by the front entrance and glance our way, though they're gabbing too much to realize we shouldn't be here.

“We have to get out of here,” I mumble, hurrying toward the exit. “Catch you around later?”

“Sure. Where will you be?”

“I don't know. Pioneer Hall maybe?”

“Well, I'm going back to Magic Kingdom with my family in a bit to see the fireworks. They're over at the marina about to get the launch. I was here hoping . . .” She smiles sheepishly. “To find Oscar. I know I shouldn't be.” She laughs to herself. “But he's really cute. I just wanted to find him, thought he'd be with those guys who work here. You know what I mean?”

I nod. I totally know what she means, but, uh, we have to get out of here. “Yup. Anyway . . .” I try to hurry her along, but she doesn't seem to care that we could get into trouble. Typical Mom.

“Wow, I'm hopeless, aren't I? Maybe I'll see you tomorrow, Haley.” She smiles.

“Okay, bye . . . Jenni.” There, I said it. Jenni Campbell. Soon to be Petersen. Then back to Campbell.
Sigh.

As I scuttle off my way and watch her walk in her direction, something inside me twists. I know she will meet the boy of her dreams. She'll fall in love with him. They'll get married and have me. But for some reason—reasons that don't make sense—things won't work out between them.

So maybe . . .

I shouldn't try so hard to get home yet. Maybe I should take advantage of this rare opportunity and tweak things however I have to. So that it won't happen. So that my parents won't have to go through that sadness, and neither will I.
Then
I'll come back here and try forcing an episode again.

There's one reason to postpone my leaving.

Way up ahead, as Jenni-Mom turns left down the marina path, I see Jason behind her to my right. He's arriving in his cart, parking, and walking into the Settlement Trading Post. Make that two reasons.

eleven

I
t doesn't look like Jake is coming after me. He might've listened to my plea and told the security guards that it was nothing. Or he might be swimming in the lagoon searching for his walkie-talkie.

The Settlement Trading Post is a grocery and souvenir shop. I look around for Jason but don't see him anymore. Inside, I find another T-shirt to wear, a solid green one with Chip and Dale over the pocket. I like it better than his mom's shirt. Checking out what other girls are wearing, I also get a pair of long blue shorts with an elastic waistband that looks like something Anma would wear, but I'm not sure I can bring myself to put them on.

As I'm pulling out the fifty Jason gave me, I notice something—my phone is missing. Great. On top of
everything else
, I lose my phone. Where did I leave it? Suddenly, the horror hits me that I left it at the top of the Whoop 'n' Holler slide. It must've slid out of my pocket when Jake caught me. I can't even go back to get it. Ugh! I'm not worried about them turning it on. There's no iPhone charger in 1982, but my pics . . . I took pics!

“You okay?” the cashier asks. Her feathered hair looks like it might crack if I tap on it, from all the shellac hair spray.

“Yeah, I just lost my phone,” I tell her. Stupidly, I realize.

“Your phone number, you mean? To the trailer?”

“Nothing, don't worry about it.” I hand her the fifty, and she gives me back a ten and a five, while some coins come rolling out of her machine into a little tray. I actually have change?

“Ooh, these are pretty trendy,” she says, folding up the pair of shorts. “Perfect for replacing your broken ones.” She smiles a sweet, grandma smile.

I'm too annoyed about my phone and hunger to be bothered by her comment right now. “How much for the Snickers?”

“Fifty cents, plus tax,” she says. “Do I ring one up?”

Bargain! “Two, please.” I would never, in a million years, have a Snickers bar at home. Coach would kill me. But I don't see anything healthier, and at least this has protein in the peanuts. “Thank you.” I take my Disney World bag, rip open a candy bar, and head out the wooden doors.

I follow the bathroom sign around a soft-serve ice-cream stand that I don't remember being there in the future and change my clothes inside a stall. I can't do the shorts. I just can't. I leave my shipwreck shorts on but put on my Chip and Dale shirt. I put his mom's back in the tote bag and head outside.

I stroll down to the marina, veering off under the pines, still reeling from the Jenni-Mom sighting. The night is alive with the sounds of crickets and kids laughing.

“Man, I'm too late.” I hear a voice next to me. When I turn, I see Jason standing there, looking fresh and showered and in a Journey concert shirt. Hey, isn't that the “Don't Stop Believin' ” band? I'm totally impressed with my vintage music knowledge and, okay,
Glee
watching! He's holding a brown paper bag in his hands. “I thought you might be hungry. Brought you something to eat.”

“Oh my God!” He looks so HOT! And I am very,
very
happy to see that food! I throw my arms around him in complete relief. Jason does not try to pry me off. In fact, he just laughs, and I feel his hand lightly wrap around my waist.
Nice!
“What'd you get me?”

“Some barbecue chicken and a sloppy joe. If you don't like either, I can get you something else at the tavern.”

“No,” I say, opening the bag and ripping into a chicken drumstick. “This is perfect.”

He smiles. “A girl with a hearty appetite. I like it. Want to go sit?”

I nod, knowing I look like a troglodyte, not even able to answer with my mouth full of chicken, and, boy, do I know how to charm a man on a first date.
Is
this a date? We walk together to the edge of the water, me glancing around for any sign of Jake and the Mickey Police.

“Have you seen your dad?” Jason asks. I notice he's wearing longer shorts now, like basketball shorts. “Are these more to your liking?” he says when he sees me eyeing them.

“Yes, those shorts are great, and no, I haven't seen my dad.” Not since yesterday afternoon. But I have seen my mom!

He presses his lips together and nods. I wonder if he really wants me to reunite with my imaginary family or if he secretly hopes I won't find them. “Hey, I thought maybe we could go do something fun after you're done eating. Want to?”

“Like what?” I gnaw at the drumstick.

“I'm not going to tell you. That would ruin the surprise.” He flashes a gorgeous smile at me. If he keeps up with the hotness, I'll be forced to kiss him later.

“I didn't know there would be a surprise, but yeah. Can I finish my food first?”

“Sure, you just . . .” He hesitates, as if wanting to touch my mouth, but not quite. “You got some sauce. Right . . . there.” He points to a spot at the corner of my lips. I know he's noticing the sauce, but I can't take my eyes off his fresh, clean-cut beachiness closing in on me.

He retreats a bit. “What? Is something wrong?”

“Nothing, you looked like someone I knew for a moment,” I lie.

He smirks. “Wait, let me guess. Christopher Atkins? Girls always tell me I look like I could be his twin.”

“I . . .” have no clue who Christopher Atkins is. It's times like these that I want to whip out my phone and Google Christopher Atkins on the spot. But I can't keep acting so clueless, so I just say, “Yeah, you sort of do.”

“I knew it. It's the nose. Maybe I should quit my towel-shack job and be an actor. It's great that you know who Christopher Atkins is. That says a lot about you.” His eyes do that thing where they disappear into a squinty smile.

“Of course I know! I'm not a moron!”
Crap, I'm such a moron
. “Don't change your look, though. You wouldn't have that Calvin Klein model, all-American thing happening, which I think suits you.”

“A what model? What is that?”

“Oh, Calvin Klein? A designer brand. Never mind.”

“See, I don't know much about clothes.”

“Ahh, so you
admit
to not understanding the fashionable properties of my shipwreck shorts!” I point a finger at him. “Ha! Which are called Daisy Dukes, by the way.”

“Ooh, Daisy Duke. Man, she can jump in my General Lee anytime,” he murmurs, and I have no idea what any of that means. Then he adds, “Hey, have you ever heard of Duran Duran? They're this band from the UK. They played a song last month on that TV show
Dancin' On Air
? But I haven't heard it since, and I'm trying to remember what it's called.”

Duran Duran? Aren't they those guys with the song where the girl hiccup-laughs at the beginning? I played it on Rock Band 2. I start humming it quietly.

“Yes! That one!” Jason's eyes fly open and he joins in. He actually sings pretty good! But he doesn't know the words any better than I do, because he mumbles half of them, and the other half don't make any sense. “Seen in the subway, up is a wire . . .”

“Doo-doo-doo-do-do, doo-do-do, doo-do-do, doo-doop-doo-doooooo!” We sing together, finally sharing some pop culture thing that we both understand. “I'm hungry like the wooollllf . . .” We finish off, laughing like two idiots.

“ ‘Hungry Like the Wolf.' That's it!” he cries, sitting back, ­staring at me in awe. “I can't believe you knew that. Nobody I've asked has known what the hell I'm talking about.”

“Well, yeah, I like that song,” I say, as if everybody knows it. Doesn't everyone? Maybe they're not super famous yet. Either way, I love the way his whole face changed just now after singing and laughing so hard. His eyes and smile loosen up. Even his nose, which is strong and makes me think of running my fingertip down the length of it.

He nods. “Yeah, me too. They have a video on MTV that's sexy. That one's called ‘Girls on Film.' I hope they make it big here. Have you seen that one?”

“I think so,” I say, trying to remember if I ever saw it on
I Love the 80's
.

“You would remember it. It was a bunch of girls mud wrestling.”

“Oh, right!” I fake-remember.

“You've seen it!” He's amazed again by me. I feel so fake. “That one is supposedly censored unless you have ONTV. You have ONTV?”

“On what?”

“Cable television. You pay for it. Not like ABC or NBC. Wow, I thought everyone had heard of cable by now.”

“Well, I do. I mean, of course I know about cable. I just never heard of ONTV.” I feel the urge to tell him how between my two parents' houses, I must have at least seven hundred satellite ­channels, more than he would even know what to do with. Jason would love hearing about it, especially since he's so into previewing things before they come out. It saddens me that I can't share that with him.

“What are you thinking about right now?” he asks quietly.

“I'm just . . .” It's going to be really hard having any kind of friendship with him if I don't come clean. Not that I'm going to. I can't. “Have you ever watched
Doctor Who
?”

His eyes get big all of a sudden. “On PBS? Yeah. You watch
Doctor Who
?” More and more, he seems impressed with things I know, as if girls don't watch sci-fi or know anything about technology or music.

“Who doesn't know what a TARDIS is?” I ask, impressing him into stunned silence. “But, I guess I'm curious to know, since you like technology, the future, and, well, EPCOT—”

“EPCOT Center,” he corrects.

“Sorry, EPCOT Center. Do you think that's possible? You know, for people to travel between times like that, the way the Doctor does on the show?”

He shrugs and looks out at the lake. He obviously doesn't realize how his answer will map out the course of how much I might venture to tell him. “I think it's cool to think about it, to imagine that it might happen. But I never heard of any documented cases, so it's hard to believe.” He looks at me again, judging how well I might receive his answer. “Why? Do you believe it could happen?”

I look away and start drawing a circle in the sand. Had someone asked me this two days ago, I would've said no, point blank. I've never believed much in ghosts, the supernatural, or anything that hasn't been proven, but look at everything that's happened to me! So much has changed in only two days. I'm sitting here in another time and dimension. Do I really need a scientist to validate that for me? How much more proof do I need than actual experience?

“I'm not sure,” I say honestly. “I'm only now starting to think that humans don't know the tiniest fraction of what there is to learn about science. We
think
we know it all, but that's because of our egos. Things are always happening to change everything we believed just minutes before. Life is challenging that way.”

I get that now, which is why Mom is always telling me not to make excuses, live my life, and never apologize, and Dad is always stressing family, family, family. Because you may never see them again.

As Jason watches the water, it seems something has changed in him. He's gone back into his serious shell. “That's smart, and yeah, you're right about that.”

I touch his arm. “Hey, you okay?”

He's absorbed in his thoughts a minute more, and I feel bad for whatever I said. But then he pops up and shakes the sand off his butt, offering me a hand. “Totally fine. Ready to have a blast?”

Oh my God—a blast.
I can't help but smile. I place my hand in his. It feels firm and cool. It feels really nice.

“Let's go.” He leads me toward the golf carts lined up against shrubs. I couldn't be more confused about my feelings right now. Am I getting too distracted? I mean, I should be trying to find my way back to the future! The thing is, I've noticed I've been smiling. Smiling A LOT since I met Jason. That wasn't happening much before I slipped back in time. So what does it matter what year I'm in, as long as I'm finally enjoying my summer?

I have to stop obsessing over all this. First of all, there's nothing I CAN do. And second of all, if my mom and dad are both right, we should all live like there's no tomorrow. So maybe that's what I should try.

Live
, as we jump into the cart and drive into the warm evening of the campground.

Live
, as we sing, “Doo-doo-doo-do-do, doo-do-do, doo-do-do, doo-doop-doo-doo,” driving through the wilderness roads, laughing and yelling like dorks when Jason turns off the headlights at one point.

Live
, and forget, if only temporarily, that I have another life. It's the only way I will ever enjoy this moment. Because it's perfect. And if I really am dreaming, then guess what? I don't ever want to wake up.