Chapter Thirteen

Staring at me was Grace Kim, my great-grandmother. She looked elegant and ethereal in a white lace gown that looked to meet the era exactly. Her curly hair was pinned up in a bun and she wore very little make-up. She looked so much like Gram it shook me to my soul.

Her smile was just like Gram's, and I smiled back. I mentally took a snapshot at that moment, hoping to capture a woman I had never met. This was so strange it was beyond any and all weirdness that traveling through the books had ever brought me before.

Meeting Nancy in the kitchen didn't compare to this. This was bizarro-land.

"Hello, child. I'm Grace. It's nice to meet you," she said with a smile. I noticed her lipstick had attached itself to her teeth just like my Gram's used to do. "You're a Kim. There's no doubt about that. You have that Kim look to you."

Her accent was as strong as Gram's, and it made me smile to hear it.

I tried to speak, but found that my damn voice wouldn't work.

"I know, child. It's a bit shocking to stare at your relative that should be…dead by the looks of your clothes. You're no doubt from the future. No way would any woman before me wear something so ugly."

I found my voice as I began to laugh. I was wearing a cream lace dress and my black tights and boots. I was not dressed ugly, but I guess if you came from the 1930s, you'd think this was hideous. Compared to her, I was the ugly duckling in the family.

I ran a hand over my dress then to my hair, hoping it was tame in my bun.

"You are beautiful, so don't fret. What's your name?"

"Jennie," I choked. "Jennie Kim. I'm the granddaughter of your daughter, Mavis Kim-Long."

Grace's eyes widened at my words.

"I have a daughter! What year is she born?"

"She's born in 1939, and she is a wonderful woman."

I didn't go into too much detail, but I explained how she met my grandfather and how they had my father. I told her how in love my grandfather was with the sea and how much he loved Gram that he decided to drop his own last name and take on hers.

"Well, Jennie, the Kim name is very important. I see that your father had it as well?"

I nodded. My father was a Kim, even though his father's name was Long. Kims must have been important because there was no talk of that ever happening anymore. When a man and woman married, traditionally, the woman takes his name. But for my grandfather, it wasn't that way. He loved Gram, and that was all that mattered.

I was proud to have the name. I always was. And I suppose my dad was too. He must have liked it better than Long as he went by Thomas Kim, instead. I never questioned why he took Gram's last name; it was just something that never came up.

"If your grandfather was a Long, the family I'm thinking of, they came from a family of…well, misfits would be the right word for it. Maybe your father and grandfather were all right with giving up the name to spare them some embarrassment."

I shrugged.

I didn't know much of my grandfather's family, except that we never saw them. Dad never mentioned them before.

"Misfits, huh?"

She nodded. "The kind that do bad things and go to jail for it, for a long time."

I was catching on, now. They were bad people. Now I understood why my dad would not want to be associated with them. Dad had a good job—one where his name would be important. He worked at the law firm in the next town. If he was from a bad family, I could see why a name was important to earn people's trust.

I could hear sounds of talking and music coming from inside the house, and I realized that they were having a party. I also realized that we were standing outside Lisa's home. It looked different to me at first because it was nighttime. The stars were beautiful as they shone down on the big house.

"They're hosting a little party in our honor," Grace explained. "You and me, we're going to go for a walk."

She took my arm in hers and we walked away from the noise and people.

"You're quite lucky you arrived when you did, otherwise you'd shock a whole lot of people. They all think we're visiting from America, which I suppose we are, but they're clueless we traveled through time, not by boat."

She laughed at her little joke and I smiled.

"I grabbed the wrong book. That's why I'm here. I have so many questions," I explained.

"I'm sure you do, and I will answer them all. But first, sit."

She ushered me to take a seat at a little white set of chairs that sat in a garden.

"You're probably confused. I know I was my first couple of times."

"That's an understatement. Most first times are awful, but at least we get a little warning. This one wasn't explained to me at all."

She frowned.

"You mean my daughter doesn't explain any of this to you? Not one bit?"

I shook my head, not wanting to tell her that her daughter died at the age of seventy-seven.

"She must not have the gift then. That makes me a bit melancholy, Jennie. I'm sorry you're thrown into this life. But let me tell you, it's an important task and a huge responsibility that you've been granted."

Great! I need more responsibility on top of owning the library and promising to set aside my career. Let alone the college courses I've been taking at night via computer.

"The Kim women have always had gifts of old magic. Not the kind you think of, Jennie, but the kind that protect history. We are part of a secret society of travelers that maintain and protect the histories, which make the world what it is today. History can go back millions of years, and it is our duty to travel through the stories of old and capture every single moment.

"You see, Jennie, we travel through books and capture moments that have yet to be told. We are not storytellers, but story-preservers. Many stories have been told of important times in history, and it is our job to travel back into time and live. We meet the people, and in those moments, it's all recorded."

I let her words roll around in my mind, just picturing the important moments in history. There were so many moments that happened it was overwhelming to believe that they were part of some of that. The fact that these women were able to see some of it was simply amazing.

"Which moments do you record, and why us?"

"Well," she paused, thinking, "the stories of influential men and women of history are most important. But we don't get to choose who or when. The books are handed down from family to family and we enter them at different times. You see, I'm here in this time and I'm capturing the history of a Mr. Jackson Manoban. He is a very important man in our nation's history."

Jackson Manoban was Lisa's father. I wasn't sure why he was important. I had never learned about him in our history text books.

I started bouncing my feet up and down, nervously, and biting my fingernails at the facts that swirled around me. I was scared and excited to be a part of something this huge. I had magic and was part of an elite group of story-preservers. This was way more than I thought it would be.

I had to confess to Grace. I had to tell her about meeting Lisa.

"Are you all right, dear?"

"Yeah," I said as I forced myself to calm down. "It's a lot to take in. I have entered a time myself. Entering yours was, like I said, an accident. My time that I entered was 1897. I met Mr. Manoban's daughter, Lisa."

"Oh, what a delightful girl she is. Tell me, does she grow up beautiful?"

I wanted to tell her she was the hottest I've probably ever met, but realized that wasn't very proper. So I just said yes.

"You asked how we are able to travel, and I can't really explain the formula. That's up to the men who have written it, mostly scientists who have been assigned to our society to help us travel. It's all very boring stuff really," she said with a wave of her hand. "Harold Lockhart, he's been assigned to us Kims for many years as his family was before him. He has the gift to travel back and forth to assist our ancestors."

I realized then that she was speaking of the group of women from the photograph: Tessa, Alice, and Laura. And I was right about Harold. He was, in fact, the one who helped them. While I liked being right, I wasn't going to be able to relish in it. I had questions, and I didn't know how much time I had left with her.

"Lockhart is a true talent. Like us, he is dedicated to preserving the histories and stories. He and I walked through the Salem Witch Trials together. Truly awful that was."

I shivered at the thought of being stuck there. I'd no doubt be captured as a witch and hanged on my first day all because of my choice of clothes. I didn't think they'd appreciate my many pairs of yoga pants.

"I know this is a bit much, Jennie, but it's our duty to do this. Historians and researchers rely on us to learn. If we do not travel through the books and record what we learned, then think of what would be lost."

It's was a huge duty to do this and it wasn't lost on me, but I wasn't sure I wanted it. I could barely handle meeting Lisa, let alone meeting more people. The magic and everything was amazing, but I didn't know how far I wanted to be involved in this.

"I get that it's huge. I really do, but Gram left me her library. I was a college student, and I gave that up to take care of it. I can't do this forever, and I can't afford it either."

"Jennie, you don't have to do this forever. And as long as you keep the library up and running, your money should keep coming. You'll never go broke." She laughed like the thought of a Kim being poor was funny. Thinking about it now, I wasn't ever sure how Gram was able to raise me and the library too when I was a kid. I remember thinking that life as an adult meant endless money because Gram never ran out.

We never needed for food, clothes, or anything. Even when some of my friends' dads struggled to make ends meet, we never did.

If I needed new clothes, we got them. The time that I got my first car, it just appeared on my birthday. I never wondered how she did it, but now I knew the answers. "We take care of one another, Jennie. All over the East Coast, the ones who are better off take care of the ones who aren't. And it seems like my daughter was the latter?"

I nodded and comprehended that she had referred to her own daughter in the past tense, like she knew she was no longer around. She understood that her daughter was dead, and I was all that was left.

"This isn't something you have to do for the rest of your life. You can stop and teach your own child when she's of age."

The thought of having a child made me almost violently ill. I never thought I'd be the type of woman who was a mom. Losing my mother made me an awful and selfish person.

"Who is your protector?"

"My what, now?"

She giggled again. "You know the one who pulls you from the book after you travel. The person who is assigned to you to keep you safe."

The look on my face must have been a huge indication that I was totally clueless and had no protector because she stood fast, knocking over her chair. She looked terrified for me, and it scared the living hell out of me. I stood too, like that would somehow make this easier to explain.

"You don't have a protector?"

"Umm…no. I don't. What the hell is that?"

Her hands started shaking and she looked around us, terrifying me even more.

"Is a zombie going to jump out at us or something? What the hell are you doing?"

"Oh Jennie, you could be stuck here. I'm so sorry this was never explained properly to you. You should have read the guide before you ever traveled."

Stuck here!

What freaking guide was she even talking about? I couldn't be stuck here. I had a life to get back to. I hated this time period.

No air conditioning. No ice-cubes. No cars. No cell phones. And to make matter's worse, Lisa was only a kid still. She wasn't an adult who I could end up falling in love with.

If she was, maybe I could swallow this news a little better. I'd stay with the book boyfriend and never leave. How awful would that be? But being as though she was probably twelve, I couldn't handle that.

"No! This can't happen. I have to get home. You have to help me," I begged her. My eyes filled with tears and I grabbed her hands. "What is the guide and where can I find it?"

She shrugged her shoulders and shook her head. How could I think that she'd know where it was in my time period? She could at least give me a hint of what it looked like, right?

Help me out here, lady!

"The set of books we all travel through have an instructional manual with them; it's a traveler's guide. When you travel, you must read that first. After you've traveled through your book, there are instructions on how to keep going or how to explain these steps to your children. Your protector, or guide, should be back in your year waiting for your safe return. She or he will have the guide book just in case things go wrong."

Great! Just great! Not only do I not have a guide, I don't have anyone back home watching over me to make sure I come back in one piece.

How on earth did I do this before and not stay stuck?

"Wait one minute!" I exclaimed. "I have traveled before. How could I have done that without a protector?"

Grace shook her head at me again with a bewildered look on her face. I wanted to slap her for getting my family into this mess. How dare she be this stupid book-magic wielder that only travels through time? Why couldn't she be a witch who conjures shit up? My family heritage was seriously lame, and I wanted to strangle my own great-grandmother.

"I traveled twice before this and each time I came out of it fine. That can't be coincidence, Grace. Throw me a bone here, lady. You have to know something," I pleaded.

"You had someone back there, in your time, watching over you, and you just didn't know it," said a voice behind me.

I swung around to see a handsome man with a black hair and the lamest mustache I'd ever seen. Somehow, though, it fit his face and made him look dashing.

Harold Lockhart.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean what I say," he said.

Smart ass.

I sat back down and racked my brain. The first time I traveled, I woke up to Rose shaking me. But she wasn't there the second time. Actually, no one was.

No! That's a lie. Someone was there, she was just upstairs.

"Can your protector change?"

"Sure. They just have to care for you," Harold replied. "They don't have to literally pull you out. All it takes is the force of a thought or concern."

The thought or concern for me.

"Tarryn," I mumbled aloud. "The first time it was my best friend, Rose. But the second time it was my roommate, Tarryn. She was upstairs."

"Well," Lockhart started, "she may have come to check on you and you didn't know it. I think you know your answer. Is this Tarryn with you now?"

What was he stupid? Did he see her?

Oh…he meant with my body in my time. That answered one question; I'm not sucked into the book and I don't disappear. I must be sitting there with my eyes wide open like Tarryn explained the other day. She must think I'm losing my mind. But all my other questions were still unanswered or confusing me still.

I nodded to Lockhart, hoping that Tarryn was indeed with me.

"I hope she checks on you because we're leaving soon."

Well, shit.

"When?"

Lockhart shrugged and said, "I'm not sure the time exactly. I just know it's soon. Our protector is keeping track of time. We knew that we were only permitted two days here and those two days expire soon."

"Jennie, it's important that you read the guide and follow the rules exactly," Grace said before I recognized the pull from my time tugging at my body.

"I'm leaving," I told them with a thankful smile.

Grace looped her arm in Lockhart's, and they waved at me as I was sucked back into my own time.