The Visit - chapt 1

THE VISIT

         "I downloaded it this afternoon," I explained, "and it just wouldn't work somehow. As a matter of fact, nothing works now."

         "What's the program?" asked Fred, as he peered over my shoulder. He was not only my best friend but a genius when it came to computers.

         I had called Fred and Susan, my female best friend, over that evening to help figure out the problem. Not only could I not get the downloaded program to work, but everything else seemed to have gone haywire, also.

         "It's that new 'Beyond Virtual' that was advertized this morning in my email. I can't even uninstall the thing either. Wish I hadn't have been so curious."

         "Look," exclaimed Susan. "There's a hot link over in the corner that you can barely see. I think it's the address to some Website. Move the mouse over there."

         She pointed to the top, right corner. Sure enough, the arrow turned to a pointed finger. The word "Visit" appeared by the corner. Impulsively, I clicked the mouse button.

         The computer showed a photo of a child's bedroom.

         Then I saw people moving around.

         "Wow." Fred was staring into the screen even more intensely. "It's like they have a cam recorder hooked up to their website."

         A mother was tucking a child into a little bed.

         "Now why would they want that on a website?"

         Susan was flabbergasted. "Pretty bad security if you ask me. Not to mention lack of privacy."

         We watched as the mother plugged in a night light and turned off the lamp on the bedside table.

         After a few more loving tucks to the blue blanket around the child, the mother walked out of view.

         As she disappeared, the picture on the monitor blurred badly for a moment or two, and there was a slight buzz in my head, or maybe that was the computer - it was hard to tell.

         I was beginning to feel pretty weird. I turned away from the monitor to look at Fred and nearly fainted at what I saw. My stomach turned over inside me, and my heart sped up in an adrenalin rush.

         "We're there," I gasped.

         "Yeah, I see that," said Fred. Both he and Susan were staring into the monitor intently.

         "No. I mean we are really there. Look behind you."

         Susan and Fred gasped when they turned around. We were no longer in my quaint, little room at my home. We were in that child's bedroom shown on the screen.

         "Oh, no," Susan whispered. "How did this happen? We shouldn't be here. We'll get in trouble. Someone will think we broke in."

         "How did we get here?" asked Fred.

         "More like - how do we go back home?" I whispered back. I knew we were in trouble.

         Susan turned back to the monitor for some clues. Lucky for us, the child in bed was already asleep. We were now looking at his monitor into my room.

         "Do something you guys. Hurry," I said, "before the mom comes back."

         Too late. I could hear footsteps coming up toward the room.

         A short-haired, wiry woman entered the room and stopped in shock.

         "What are you doing here?" she backed up towards the door.

         I took a step toward her to try to explain. Bad move I thought, as I saw the terrified look on her face.

         "Wait," I said, "Don't be scared. I don't quite know how we got here either. But we're not thieves."

         That seemed to relax her a bit, but there was still confusion on her face.

         "What do you want?" she demanded, her fear turning into anger.

         I then tried to explain what happened, but it was really hard to explain something that I had a hard time believing myself.

         She didn't look like she bought anything I said at all, and she did look mighty perturbed that we had invaded her privacy.

         "You kids just get out of here. I don't know what you're up to, but I could call the police."

         I didn't need further invitation to leave and quickly herded the others out of the house. Outside on the sidewalk, I stared back at the modest bungalow we had just left.

         "See what you've done, Barry?" Susan turned to me accusatively. "Now, how are we going to get back to that computer. How are we going to get back home?"

         "Easy. Let's find out where we are and call our parents. Someone will come and get us. Why do we need to go back through the computer?" I felt pretty smug. Here I was, a computer dummy, out-thinking a couple of computer wizards.

         "Look," said Fred, "There's a convenience store down at the end of this block, and it's still open. Let's go ask someone there."

         We took off for the store at a high clip.

         "You are in Denver." The cashier looked at us strangely.

         "Like, Denver, Colorado?" I ventured.

         "Yep. Like Denver, Colorado." He was being sarcastic now. Must think we are out of our skulls, I thought.

         Fred let out a low whistle. He was staring at the clock on the wall.

         "What's wrong?" Susan asked.

         "Look at the clock," he said.

         I saw it said 9:00, and so did my watch.

         "So what? What's wrong with the clock?" I retorted. Fred could be exasperating at times, expecting the rest of us to keep up with his computer-brain. Right now he was ignoring me.

         "What's today?" I asked the cashier.

         "Look, kids. Either you buy something and move along, or I'll have to kick you out. I don't need you hanging around here and I don't have time to answer stupid questions."

         "Fine. We're going," I protested, shocked at the way things were turning out.

         I could see we had overstayed our welcome.

         Grabbing Susan's arm and yanking Fred away from the newspaper he was now staring at, I headed for the door.

         Once outside, we sat on a nearby bus stop bench.

         "So, what's wrong with the clock?" I asked Fred once more.

         "It's the time zone," he said. "We came from Seattle, which is one hour behind Denver. It is 9:00 in Seattle and should be 10:00 here, but it's not."

         "What about the date?" asked Susan.

         "The newspaper in there said it's Friday, August 02, 2004. Same date - no problem. We've just shifted back an hour in time."

         I was beginning to see the problem. But I just had to try out something.

         Spotting a payphone nearby, I trotted over and dialed my own number using the phone card my mom was so generous in buying for me a couple days earlier. Mom answered, and I asked for myself.

         She called my name and when I heard my voice say 'hello', I hung up. Shocked, like I had seen a ghost, I was speechless at first and wondered if I was in a dreamstate of some kind.

         "What's wrong?" asked Susan.

         "I almost talked to myself."

         "So, what's new?" chuckled Fred.

         "Not funny." I was definitely awake. "Nobody's going to be coming to get us. We've got to get back to that computer to go home."

         "You gotta be kidding." Susan looked at me horrified. "We won't be able to get near the place. That mother is going to be watching for us."

         "Right. And the police will arrest us for breaking and entering," said Fred.

         I headed back for the house. Even though I didn't have a plan, I figured I might think of something when I got there.

         Standing under a large oak tree in the small park across the street from the house, we watched the house - none of us coming up with any suggestions of how to gain access to the kid's computer.

         "We could be here all night," said Susan. "I think we're forever lost in time." She moaned and sunk to the ground.

         Fred ran his fingers through his tossled hair. He seemed scared. "Don't say that. We've gotta think of something."

         "You got the brains," I ventured, "Why don't you think of a plan?"

         Both Fred and Susan were smarter than I when it came to computers, but I was beginning to see they were not as adventurous as I was.

         After two hours went by, the lights went out in the house, and all was quiet and dark. I looked up at the large tree that half covered the child's bedroom window. Must be some way to get in by climbing up the tree. I'd seen it done in movies. I started across the street, but Fred caught me by the arm and yanked me back.

         "Wait. Look at that tree," he hissed.

         At first I couldn't see anything except for the tree, but then I saw a shadowy figure crouched in the shadows on the ground.

         "What's he doing?" I whispered.

         We watched as the figure climbed the tree to the child's window. He opened it and slithered inside.

         "Shouldn't we call the police or something?" said Susan.

         "No wait. Let's see what he's doing. Didn't look all that tall. Maybe just another kid." I scooted across the street and started to climb the tree.

         "Barry," hissed Fred beneath me on the ground. "Get back down here. You'll get us in trouble."

         I didn't pay any attention to him. We were already in trouble as far as I could see. Fred may be smart, but I was more daring.

         Leaning precariously towards the window, I peeked into the window. A figure was bending over the child, who was in bed sleeping. Was this a kidnapping? Should I shout out and scare the intruder away? My heart was pounding with heavy drum beats so loudly I was sure the others could hear it. Slowly, I slid along the branch to get closer to the window. It was half-open, and I could easily crawl into the room. Now, if I could just get in without the intruder hearing me, I could maybe hit him on the head with something and warn the child.

         I slipped halfway onto the ledge and wiggled my head carefully through the window.

         Just then my hand bumped some hard, cold object inside the room and sent it crashing to the floor. The figure by the bed spun around and headed right for me.

         I tried to retreat, but my head hit the bottom of the sash above my head, and, as I saw nothing but stars for the moment, I could feel two hands grabbing my shirt by the shoulders.

         "Who are you?"

         My head cleared, and I saw a boy's face staring at me as he held tight onto my shirt. I did a double take as I saw he was not much older than me.

         "Who are you?" he asked again.

         "I-I-I'm Barry," I whispered, afraid that I had aroused the entire household. What was I to do? Where were Fred and Susan when I needed them?
Another face appeared beside my captor.

         "Bring him in. He's the one," said the new face.

TO BE CONTINUED "THE VISIT - chapt 2"