The error in the time machine

It was the dead of night and thunder could be heard outside my laboratory when it was ready. My time machine. The first one to be made.

 Now it only remained to be tested. 

 According to the calculations it could successfully transport people to the past  and then bring them back exactly where and when they had left but not transport them to the future. At most it could take people 500 years back.

However, there was one drawback: you could only go back a number of years which was a multiple of 10.

Making a time machine had been my childhood dream! I was really happy that day and was a hundred percent sure the machine would work and was not at all scared to test it. Fifty years ago nobody would have considered making it possible by the current year, 2074.

The machine was cube-shaped, had dimensions of seven feet, was fully black except a silver door and the buttons inside the machine. The buttons (about 13 on each wall) were dark blue, about 50 in total. My machine could read people’s minds and land them wherever they wanted and if there was no space to land there, then on the nearest location to where they wanted to land.

  I got into my machine, pressed the “Go” button and then pressed the button “-50”, which would take me 50 years back in time! 

I felt a sensation of the machine shaking side to side, slowly at first and then so violently that I fell out of my chair.

Then it suddenly stopped shaking in about 10 seconds and the door unlocked, so that I was able to open it.

Yes my machine had worked! I was now on the footpath of a  marketplace. I really loved the awe-struck face of a little girl who had been looking at the footpath and my machine had appeared suddenly. In my excitement I was not able to notice much. There was confusion near my device and people were running away from it.

 Overjoyed, I went back to the machine and pressed the return button as I wanted to tell everyone about it! 

However, I was horrified when I pressed the return button as nothing happened. I waited and opened the door and I was in the marketplace again!

 I tried to go back several times but without success. 

I was so disappointed and shocked that my head felt like bursting. I sat down in my machine and cried loudly for a few minutes. 

I only stopped crying when I heard the sound of somebody trying to break my machine. People were obviously scared by a silver room appearing in the middle of a footpath out of thin air.

 I rushed to open the door of my machine. I did not want myself to be hurt.

Oh! I cannot describe the look on the faces of all the twenty or so people who had gathered around my machine. Their faces portrayed utter astonishment and disbelief, their eyes wide and most of their mouths gaping.  But most were running away from it. I could see signs of chaos and confusion everywhere. I tried to explain that I had come from the future but most people just stammered things like "wh.. wha.." or "gh.. gh.. ghosst". Some were even shouting for help.

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I left the crowd  hurriedly but word about this incident spread although few believed in it except the ones who really saw it (as I had expected).

I  convinced myself that if I could actually get to the past, I could certainly come back to the present and was determined to do it. 

And by the way, I was in America.

Having no money, I started driving a taxi to make a living. Driving was hard. I was not used to it as a robot had done it for me from the last 20 years. 

But while I was driving, I realised I had no place where I could stay. I decided I would live in my car.

 I decided to rebuild my machine and make it better so that it could even take me to the future ( I said my machine could only take you to the past. Remember?)

For this I would need access to a laboratory and for that I would have to prove that I was really a scientist.

On my first day in the past, I even made a friend- Rosie. She was from Ghana. She had curly hair till her shoulders, wore a shirt with torn jeans and was very pretty, about 30 years of age. She also drove a taxi. She was the one who had initiated the conversation. "Hi, nice to meet you" she said when I was sitting on a bench in the evening looking disappointed. "I am Rosie. I too was sad like you when my husband died but one should always be brave." and she told me about her passengers and their negligence of her, their weird ways and how she managed to live alone. It did not take long for me to realize she was quite talkative.

It was now my second day in the past and I had taken a break from driving to eat. The sun was sinking and clouds were trying to shade it just like my spirit was sinking and thoughts were shadowing it. I slowly sat on a bench to eat a sandwich I had purchased from yesterday's wages and started pondering  how I could prove myself as a scientist. 

I had no school or college certificate and so the only option seemed to raise enough money and then do school again until a new idea dawned. I would create my own website, write all I had used to make my time machine and some scientists would read my work and want to start working with me to make a time-machine. I would finally get a laboratory! This was faster than having to do school and college again and most scientists would not want to look at a certificate after reading my work.

I made my website at a cybercafe and put my content. In a few days I got a mail from someone from Oxford wanting to meet me.

 I met that person and showed him the website again. His name was Mark. "Quite interesting work."he remarked while browsing through it again. "Yes" was my nervous reply.  I still remember my reaction when he said I could work with him. I could not believe it for a second and then I hugged him. He was quite taken by surprise. 

It has been five years since I started working on the time machine with Mark.

And I never think of  telling him or anyone else that I am from the future for fear that they might  think I am mad. I got a small room on rent too. And I am still in touch with Rosie, though I obviously don't meet her very often.

Once when I had been here for only two years I was in low spirits and a  small girl came and sat next to me in the garden. The girl’s name was Mary. I started talking to her. And she said I could always sit next to her. Mary lived next to me. I sat with her on many evenings from then on in the garden. I always felt better. We watched the sun going down and we talked about almost everything. Some days were cool, and then we even played with a ball she always brought. On very hot days I would sometimes bring for her, her favourite vanilla ice-cream.

Some days I used to feel dejected, that it was worthless to try to go back. 

Slowly I started feeling that although it was not wrong to try  going back I should even enjoy the process. I had neglected my health, not enjoyed a single movie and never really lived life in the present all these years. 

Slowly but surely, I made friends and started liking this place although I still sometimes miss home. Most work people do here is done by robots from where I come but here life is a lot better in some ways, for example- people interact more, there are more people and it is a greener place.

I am now married to Stane, a gold merchant. I have learnt: we should let go of our frustrations and accept the life God has given us.