When we got to Edward's house, I must say, he is filthy rich. And no wonder he lives alone in the middle of some forested area.
His house looks more like a mansion for some celebrity like Jimi Hendrix than for a mere average guy. Then again, whatever alien research he dabbled in must have caught the attention and interests of the American government and hence they must have given him huge sums of money to make use of his information and technologies, so why am I surprised?
Anyway, his huge house was two stories high and surrounded by a metal fence with intricate objects sculpted on its bars, ranging from flowers to animals like birds. The front of his house was a beautiful marble fountain in the middle of a grass patch, an angel statue in the middle spurting out water from its sides into the basin surrounding it. The house was painted white all over and both stories had square windows dotting them, the upper floor having three windows while the bottom floor had two. Heck, there was even a huge porch leading to the door of his house with wooden chairs and tables on it. There were also a few open cages containing different varieties of birds, chirping loudly. I must say, I was impressed by his house, even surprised.
"Well, son, how does my house look?" Edward petted my shoulder and smiled proudly.
"Well...it looks really expensive and luxurious...how could you afford this?"
"Actually, the government pays for all my needs like my rent...and for good reason...tell you later why," he said as he unlocked the metal gate leading to the front of his house and we walked towards it. I wondered what awaited me when we went into his house...and what secret did he have exactly.
And wondering how his secret would impact me.
When we were inside, I was even more surprised. Far from the interior of the house being luxurious and rich-looking, as I would have expected, with the exception of a huge aquarium fitted into one of the walls of the living room, the interior of the house was...really quite normal. The living room only had a small television on a table, a large black sofa in front of a small table, a wooden shelf beside the sofa and a few lamps, nothing much, really. The kitchen had nothing luxurious it them either actually, just having the usual appliances and other stuff anyone would associate with a normal kitchen. "Hey..um...Edward," I said as I got out of the kitchen and went into the living room.
"Mm? What is it, Michael?"
"Why is the interior of your house so plain?"
"I don't like living fancy, to be honest. I could ask the government for more fancy stuff actually, but I like normality. It makes me feel more at ease in that way," he said as he settled himself onto his sofa near to the shelf,petting on the cushion to tell me to sit beside him. I could sense he didn't want so much luxury to be showered upon him as he wanted to be humble, though not really hinting at it.
I sat down beside him and asked, "So...what's this secret you wanted to tell me about?"
He sighed and opened one of the drawers of the shelf beside the sofa, taking out a small picture, showing it to me. "I think you might wanna see this first."
The photo was coloured, and in it I could see a young man in it i immediately identified as Edward, wearing a black suit and tie and sitting on a red velvet sofa next to a young and petite woman in a bridal gown. This woman had long, flowing blonde hair and held the hand of the young Edward in the photo, both smiling widely. I guess the woman must be his wife. "Um...why did you show me your wedding photo?" I asked as I handed it back to him.
"Well, glad you asked," he said and took a deep breath while looking at the photo, as if feeling sentimental. "You see, my wife in that photo was the love of my life. She was my compass and source of encouragement. Her name was Melissa White."
He sniffed slightly and took out a piece of tissue from his pocket, blowing into it before continuing. I guess he must have lost his wife in some way. "When I was young, I was obsessed with the universe we humans lived in. I literally pored over a myriad of books on astronomy and space science, awed by the wonderful universe God created. But that got me wondering about something after a while." He paused, and smiled slightly. "What if..we are not alone in this universe? What if, somewhere..there are others like us? At first, I tried researching on planets in our universe that had the conditions for life to flourish. Of course there were some planets that could, but it was doubtful to me whether life truly existed there or not, and whether there were other beings like us humans that had physical and mental capabilities like us, perhaps even superior. I gave up eventually during my college years, and came to a conclusion: there can perhaps be only life outside our universe. And indeed, I was proved right."
"One day, something happened to me that would change my life forever." He looked down and clasped his hands together as he spoke. "One night in 1952, when I was still in university,I was walking about outside my hostel when a sudden blue light flashed from the trees behind my dormitory. Curious, I ran to the place the blue light had come from. Strangely, I only found a brown-haired woman walking around confused in a white coat. I guess she might have been a scientist."
"Anyway, I approached her and asked where she was from, after introducing myself to her. Surprisingly, she backed away from me as if she was scared. It took me a while to reassure her that I didn't want to harm her, and then she told me that she was from another universe and had stumbled upon our Earth by accident." He chuckled and then said, "It was true: what I had concluded was right, that there was life in other universes. I then pleaded with her to tell me how it was possible for her to travel to our universe, and she gave in after some time,but charged me to keep my encounter for the time being and that she would answer my question on her universe tomorrow night, picking me up on the same spot where we were. Then, a blue portal appeared out of nowhere near us that glowed brightly, and before she walked into the portal and disappeared, she told me her name was Margaret Bonnibel."
He then excused himself to the kitchen to get a cup of water before coming back. After gulping his water down, he continued, "Now where was I? Oh yes...it took me a while to get my bearings after what had just happened, and quickly I looked around to see if anyone was with me. Thank God, no one was, and then I rushed back to my dormitory, excited for tomorrow night and pleased that what I had thought was true all along."
"My only closest friend in the Humanities stream and future wife in university, Melissa White, was the only one I told about my discovery and encounter, and she believed me, as she, like me, was interested in astronomy and the possibility of other universes, and on this we became best friends. You see, I was a very reclusive guy and really didn't interact with others well. She wanted to go with me to that other universe and I allowed her, but when it got to the point when Bonnibel was going to pick us up, she wasn't exactly eager on me bringing her along, and she berated me for breaking my promise, but eventually she reluctantly allowed me to bring Melissa along."
"When we stepped into the blue portal that Bonnibel had went through on our first encounter...oh boy, what I saw on that universe was...odd. But first,she showed us what had produced the portal and I was shocked, and some day maybe I will show you how that portal looked like and how it works. Anyway,back then both Melissa and I were shocked by all the new technology there...I could never describe to you what complex technologies I saw there. But not everything was perfect. Rampant poverty was in the area and it came to me that on that universe, the people were...more advanced than us in technology but much the same as us in modernity and standards of living, with there being high, middle and lower socio-economic groups. In fact the complex technology wasn't really available to everyone, and that was kind of a concern for me. The government run there was somewhat a democracy but also autocratic, though maybe I would say corrupt in some aspects."
"Of course, I never really pointed those details out to Bonnibel while she was showing me and Melissa around. At the end of our tour, she gave both of us a blueprint of how the portal looked like, instructions on how to build it and the materials needed to build the portal...and it was a really heavy load to carry. After going back to our Earth, we felt the need to spread this around and for our fellow humans to know that there is life on other universes and that we could prove it. You may not know this, but I was a great builder, architect and technician as I was taught by my parents on building stuff. So Melissa and I, during the term breaks, would work on building the portal and sure enough we had it erected in our backyard...yeah..." He sighed and put his hands on his face, before putting the down. "Now, I wished I hadn't done that. But I will explain why later. Anyway, of course people were skeptical of our claims at first and we took a while to convince them that our portal to travel to other universes works. And when it came to us demonstrating that it did...well it worked! We allowed them to see for themselves what we had said was true, and eventually our success spread very fast around the country to the point that the government,some other scientists and I agreed to collaborate on exploring the multiverse through a series of confidential meetings."
"But as always, my studies came first, and so I had to balance between meeting government officials and scientists and focusing on graduating from university, which I did, though not without difficulty. When Melissa and I both graduated, I proposed to her after some dates and we agreed to get married. And over the next few years...everything could never had been better for me." He smiled and looked up at the lights on the ceiling. "We had a son, we were funded by the government very generously to help in our research, given a really great house by the government, the one you are in now, and still had the same passion for exploring the multiverse...heck I have seen weird universes, from people who can control the elements to people who have superhuman abilities and powers. Everything was just...perfect, and I thought this would define the rest of my life." He sighed deeply and looked at his glass of water on the table. "Then, as the saying goes, all good things must come to an end. And it came to an end due to one tragedy I'll never forgive myself for."
My heart went out to Edward and put a hand on his shoulder. He then started to sob and continued, "One day... me, Melissa and a group of scientists were in a research facility in Kansas working on travelling to a certain universe through one of the portals I had built...okay first just to tell you, I got a really huge amount of materials both by Bonnibel, whom I visited frequently for help and advice,along with the government, to create and build the multiverse portals. And on that day, everything was going perfectly until a malfunction cropped up in the system..and caused the portal to turn into a black hole. Don't ask me why, I'm still trying to comprehend why it happened myself. Anyway ,everything spiraled out of control at that point and...I lost not only all of the scientists I had worked with and spent good times together as friends for many years, but I also lost my wife..." Almost immediately, he broke down and cried, tears running down his eyes freely like waterfalls and his eyes red as blood. I really wished i could comfort him, but I knew that once some one is dead, he or she is dead, unless God resurrects the person.
It took a good while for him to calm down and he apologized for his outburst. "Its okay, Edward," I said. "Take your time." I smiled reassuringly.
"Thanks," he responded and smiled back. He sighed and continued. "Anyway, after that the government charged me after several meetings to keep silent about the incident and sent their condolences to me concerning the death of my wife, assuring me they would continue to fund me and pay for the , they told me that I was to stop my research on the multiverse and stop the building of my portals,deeming the research too dangerous to continue. I was so depressed that I would have stopped working on my research of the multiverse anyway, and went into isolation. Now, I'm just living in luxury and alone and with really nothing much to do,I work as a car repair man. I have stopped travelling to universes and have since not kept in touch with Bonnibel. Wonder how's she doing now. My son has also drifted away from me and despises me, refusing to visit me." He stopped and wiped his eyes with his hands. He then smiled at me sadly and said, "So yes, that's my story. Really complex and sad. You can see now why my discovery and research on the multiverse is both an achievement and failure. I wish now I had been interested in something else, so that none of this might have happened." He looked down and sighed.
"But Edward...it's your passion. And I'm inspired by you!" Edward turned and looked at me with surprise. "Why do you say that, son?"
"You know...after my family was broken and separated I might have actually killed myself because I felt I had failed to protect the family I had as a teenage boy that protected and cared for me though I am from another universe! But now, after listening to your story, I finally now have a new mission: to help you regain your passion in exploring the unknown and finding my family! I know you may not want it, but I wanna see the multiverse and how it looks like, and perhaps even find my original family! God has put me in your life to help not only myself but you, Edward!" I looked at him earnestly and smiled.
Upon this, tears brimmed from his eyes and he hugged me tightly, saying, "Thank you..thank you so much for understanding me. I thought I no longer had a reason to live...but you..you have given me hope!" He then let go of me and looked at me with eyes that showed determination. "When the time is right, I'll show you how the multiverse is like! I still have one research facility that hasn't been dismantled yet,because my wife and I used to work there in private. I did not destroy that one because I wanted to keep it as a symbol of my grief for her. Now, it has become a symbol of hope that my passion in exploring the multiverse is not dead yet."
And the next day, a new chapter of my life had begun.