Happy Back to the Future Day!
...
A sports almanac. That was what had apparently caused the whole world to fall apart.
It seemed innocuous enough on the surface. After all, how much damage could a damn sports almanac cause anyway?
Too much, apparently.
Marty had gone through hell and high water to get the thing away from Biff. It was clutched tightly in his hands now. It was a bit strange to think about the unbelievable power he now held. With it, he could've used the future information to get filthy rich; not that he would actually do that after what he'd just been through, of course.
Kneeling in the tall grasses behind a billboard, Marty hunched over a small fire in a metal tin. Despite the oncoming storm, it refused to go out and continued to provide a bit of light in the darkness. Marty glanced over his shoulder to check for any sign of a problem. When he was sure there was nothing behind him except the wind, he unceremoniously dumped the almanac into the flames, watching the colorful cover and priceless sports statistics burn away to nothing.
...
The cracking of gunshots was by no means a rare thing to hear in the Hill Valley of 1985. Even on the twenty-seventh floor of Biff's Pleasure Paradise, Lorraine could hear the sounds of shootouts on the streets below on an almost-daily basis. During the nights when they happened, she would pull the covers over her head and desperately try not to think of what was happening to cause them.
However, it was impossible to ignore them one night. The gunshots weren't coming from a distant street corner several stories below her feet. They were too loud for that, and were accompanied by yells and a crash of breaking glass. Somebody was shooting within the Pleasure Paradise itself, and they were probably doing so on the same floor she resided.
A chill ran up her spine as she thought of people shooting with her and her son so close by. Marty had made a mysterious return from a Swiss boarding school that very night, and she suspected that the nearby commotion had something to do with that.
Although she'd certainly missed him, she had once held some comfort in the fact that Marty was far, far away from Hill Valley. She'd wanted to believe Marty was happier there, and that this school was different from the long line of expensive boarding schools he had been expelled from. The chance of that was slim, but that small amount of hope stayed with her. It had remained there until that night, when Marty made an unexpected return.
She still wasn't sure of the circumstances that led to Marty's reappearance in town, but no matter what it was, the end result would be the same. Marty would confess to getting expelled. Then, the yelling from Biff would start, followed by the interrogation, and then followed by insults about how "good-for-nothing" he was. Like a videotape on endless loop, that exact routine had played out many times before. Why did she think this time would be any different?
She had stopped trying to intervene after the first few times. Biff was so much stronger than either her or Marty; she would've had better luck trying to subdue a raging bull. The thought of Biff doing so much as laying a hand on her son because of some futile attempt to fight back on her part was too much to bear. Besides, he was the one who took care of them with his money. Without him, they'd all be homeless and on the streets.
Her shoulders were hunched forward as she sat at the bar table, alone with her worries. She found herself pouring another glass of whiskey into the glass and swallowing it in one gulp. She had drunk more alcohol than on an average night, but it failed to make her worries fade away. All her concerns ran uncontrollably through her mind. It was going to be a bad night, one where she couldn't pretend that everything was okay. Sleep was out of the question altogether.
Another crashing noise made her flinch. It had come from the roof, no doubt. 'This is it,' she thought to herself. She had to go find out what was happening. Maybe she could actually make a difference for once. With her husband and his goons around, Marty's fate hung in the balance.
The trek to find out what was going on was more perilous than intended. Behind a marked door down the hall were flights of stairs leading to the roof. As it was hidden from visitors, it lacked the neon colors and tacky flashiness of the rest of the building. Instead, it was gray and damp, having gone unused for some time.
Lorraine looked up from the bottom of the stairs, realizing what a daunting task she'd taken on. Wrapping her fingers around the cool handrail, she slowly climbed the stairs, hoping not to slip and fall on the concrete. Between the high heels she wore and the alcohol affecting her vision, it was difficult not to. Walking in a straight line would have been a feat, let alone flights of stairs. She wished she was able to move faster, but it wasn't possible. Every step forward was agonizing.
After what felt like hours, she reached the door on the other side and flung it open to reveal the roof of the Paradise. A chilly wind blew curls of hair in her face. She stopped, breathing heavily from the climb, and searched for anything that could have caused the crashing and gunshots. To her confusion, nothing appeared out of the ordinary. Either she had missed whatever had happened or imagined it entirely.
The second possibility was put to rest immediately. Some kind of scuffle had definitely happened on the now quiet roof, she had just missed it. Lorraine realized this when she saw something behind her that she hadn't seen previously. Lying sprawled out on the roof was none other than Biff.
She staggered over to where he was and knelt down in front of him, checking to see if he was waking up. He stirred a bit, but his eyes remained shut. Even in his unconscious state, his face was contorted into a frown and his brows were furrowed together. It wasn't his face that made Lorraine gasp in shock, though. It was the pistol clenched in his hand.
No..." she whimpered, slouching forward in defeat and putting her head in her hands. She was unable to do anything else for a few moments except repeat, "No...no, no...this can't be happening."
Her mind jumped to the worst possible conclusions. Biff had been steaming mad at Marty and could've easily become dangerous. The last she'd seen of her son, he seemed to be running away from something. Who knew what Biff could have done with that gun? Whatever it was, she became determined to find out. Even if waking up Biff wasn't necessarily a good idea, she needed to find out where Marty had gone off to.
"Biff. Biff, come on. Wake up," she said. After she lightly shook his shoulders a few more times, he snapped awake. He scrambled to pick himself up off the ground and quickly rose to his full height. Narrowing his eyes, he took notice of Lorraine.
The hell are you doin' up here?" he questioned accusingly as he rubbed a bruise forming on his forehead. His voice lacked its usual anger, as he was still a bit out of it.
"Looking for my son," she spat back. "What happened here? I knew I heard someone shooting. Dammit, Biff, if he's hurt, I'll...I'll..."
She trailed off mid-sentence. She had no idea what she would do if Marty was hurt or worse.
Shut up," he said. In that moment, he appeared much taller than he actually was. There was no yelling, hitting things, or any of the usual theatrics Lorraine expected from him. His anger was less explosive than usual, but it was no less apparent and no less frightening. He wouldn't even make eye contact, and Lorraine didn't like the way he was turning the gun over and over in his hands. An uneasy feeling settled into the pit of her stomach.
He walked over to the edge of the roof and looked down on the street below, mumbling the whole way. Most of it was incoherent, but Lorraine thought she could pick up the words "almanac" and "bastard kid."
She followed him. "Where's Marty, Biff? What happened to him?" she repeated.
"I said to shut up!" he yelled, finally snapping. She took a step back. Instead of becoming angrier, he put his head in his hands and rested them against the concrete barrier that separated the roof from the streets below.
While she was confused at first by his lack of reaction, something else happened that distracted her. A wave of images and sounds suddenly flooded her brain, quickly jumping from one scene to the next. It was something she could only liken to a near-death experience, where one's life flashed before their eyes. There was one problem: the memories were unfamiliar. She recognized most of the people in them, but the events and circumstances they were put into were new. They were twisted versions of people she knew-not necessarily worse, just different.
Images of her children at various ages showed up often, as well as old friends of hers that had moved out of town years ago. Biff was there too, waxing cars of all things, which was something he wouldn't be caught dead doing. What surprised her the most was that her late first husband showed up as well. At one point, she could see an image of George with a version of Marty who was well into his teens. She wondered how that was possible, and her heart ached at what could have been.
The memories of the past stirred up a flurry of emotions within her. The life showed in the memories was happier than the reality. Snapshots of a quieter, brighter Hill Valley, one where people walked the streets without fear of being shot, flashed before her.
She had to wonder where all the memories came from. Were they some kind of hallucination brought on by too much alcohol? Had she gone insane? She wasn't sure what was going on, but had became too dazed to panic.
While her life had fallen apart over the last thirty years, memories of a better time became a refuge. She could remember happier times to distract herself from reality. Now, she was in danger of losing even that. Her old memories were becoming fuzzy, contrasting with the sharp clarity of the new ones. While the new images were happier, they didn't carry the same comforting familiarity. It felt as if they were someone else's memories altogether.
Once the tide of memories had slowed, Lorraine glanced around. Biff had moved a few feet away from her. He stood at the ledge, head still in his hands and muttering curses under his breath. The thought of Biff experiencing the same thing she had crossed her mind.
Before she was able to ask, she noticed that the chaos within her mind had reflected into the town. It seemed that all of Hill Valley was changing before her eyes. Even thorough the darkness of nighttime and clouds of smog, she could see the whole town coming apart and rewriting itself into something different. The grimy streets that were usually crowded with black masses of cars and motorcycles became empty in an instant. The layout of the buildings themselves changed, and for a moment she swore the Paradise itself was becoming translucent. She tried to look everywhere at once, taking in the new surroundings.
"From twenty-seven floors above, she had a bird's-eye view of the entire town. On an ordinary day, seeing the mess of gaudy neon lights and huge skyscrapers that it had become would've saddened her. Now, as she looked down on it, she found herself unable to tear her eyes away.
The town became similar to the version Lorraine remembered from her teenage years, before Biff had made it the center of his empire. The small shops in the town square directly below her were a bit old-looking, but they were certainly more welcoming than the shady adult stores that had once been in their place. A mall had replaced a nuclear waste site, and housing developments sprung up over landfills.
Lorraine still didn't have a clue about what was going on, but somehow it didn't matter. As she looked down on the town and the rapidly fading Paradise, she reveled in how beautiful it seemed. There was nothing else she could do but laugh. It was only a small giggle at first, but quickly grew louder. She laughed harder than she had in years. Cold tears streamed freely down her cheeks and made her makeup run, but they were happy tears.
Deep down, she knew the whole experience was most likely a dream or hallucination of some sort. However, she was going to enjoy the escape from reality while she could. Maybe she would wake up the next morning to find herself lying on a roof with a hangover and the realization that the town and memories had been fake. If it was a fantasy, it was a damn good one, though. In that instant, it didn't matter. Seeing a better world, even for a moment, was enough.
She drank up every detail of the town and relived every happy memory she could think of. The memories suddenly didn't seem fake anymore. She could almost believe that she really did live through them all, and that the memories of her current reality were the fake ones. For the first time in God-knows-how-long, euphoria coursed through her veins.
It didn't take long for a thought to wipe the smile off her face. As spots danced across her vision and she started to lose conciseness altogether, one last thought broke through the confusion of decades of new memories appearing all at once.
I never did find out what happened to poor Marty.'
Then, the world went black.
...
When Lorraine woke again, there seemed to be an unexplainable melancholy feeling hanging over her.
There was no reason for it to exist, no reason for her to have woken up in a cold sweat. It was late at night, and everyone in the house had gone to bed. The house was quiet and peaceful for once, and the only light came from the glowing red numbers of the alarm clock on the nightstand. Even George was asleep, snoring softly on the other side of the bed.
There was something nagging at her, telling her she'd forgotten something. She could not for the life of her figure out what it was. It was like she'd woken up from a nightmare and couldn't remember it. No matter how hard she searched her mind for the answer, nothing came up. The exact details had faded into a haze, leaving only a vague emotion behind.
Whatever it was, it wasn't important, she decided. She'd probably forget waking up in the middle of the night in the morning. She laid back down and wrapped the covers around herself. Her head had barely hit the pillow when she fell asleep
...
Meanwhile, on a stormy night thirty years in the past, Marty was able to breathe easy again with the knowledge that 1985-A would be no more.
As the newspaper headlines and words printed on a matchbook taken from the Paradise changed to fit the timeline caused by the burning of the almanac, there was nothing else he could feel except relief. If he had to stare at the headlines "George McFly Murdered" or "Emmett Brown Committed" one more time, he'd be sick.
It was a good thing he wouldn't have to anymore. 1985-A had been erased from existence, leaving no trace behind. The timeline truly had been repaired.
As he listened to thunderclaps in the distance and felt the first drops of rain on his arms, he stared into the fire. The last remnants of the almanac that had caused so much trouble had turned to mere ashes, never to return.