They chased them down, following the bright green bikes corner after corner, street after street. Elle wasn't much of a runner, and nor was Marty. They rounded a corner and looked for their guides, but they were gone.
Elle looked around. They seemed to be in a neighborhood. Maybe her dad and George lived here and had already put away their bikes? The thought diminished immediately when she saw one of the bikes parked next to a tree. Elle looked around: there was no sign of the boys. That is, until a leaf fell.
Elle gently touched Marty's arm and gestured upwards. George was wrapped around a tree branch, binoculars pressed to his face.
"What's he looking at?" Elle whispered to Marty.
"Dunno..." Marty followed George's gaze and saw a young girl undressing in front of her open bedroom window. A sudden realization struck him. "He's a Peeping Tom!"
"What?" Elle giggled. As George inched up the branch to get a better he must have lost his grip because he rolled over and was left gripping the tree with only one hand. His hand slipped and he landed in the road, disoriented, just as a car was pulling up.
"Dad, look out!" Marty shrieked. He ran out into the road and pushed his father out of the way before absorbing the blow that landed on him instead. He landed on his back a few feet away, his head hitting the concrete with a dull thud.
Elle held a hand to her mouth, shocked. The sound of the car door slamming jolted her out of her trance and she ran to her now unconcious friend. "Marty? Marty? Come on, Marty, wake up..." she slapped his face a bit, but his head just rolled around uselessly. "Come on, Marty!"
The driver of the car came around and looked at her. "Who are you?"
Elle was speechless. "I- I'm- er-"
"Never mind that now. Stella!" he yelled. "Another one of these damn kids jumped in front of my car!" He bent down next to Elle. "Hey, miss, you help me heave him on into the house, hear?"
"Yes sir," Elle nodded. She stuffed her hands under Marty's arms and he grabbed his ankles. The man led her to a pretty blue house just across the street. He banged on the door with his foot.
"Stella! Open the door!"
"I'm coming, dear!" Stella called. A few seconds later a thin, smiling woman opened the door. "Yes?"
"Another one of those kids jumped in front of my car. I'm going to put him in Lorraine's room for the day, you know, so he can rest." The man started moving inside.
"Oh, not again, Sam!" Stella moaned. "I keep telling you and telling you to watch where you're going-"
"I was watching where I was going, but the boy just appeared out of nowhere, he just fell outta the sky!" They were moving up the stairs now. "Come on, girl, this way," he added to Elle before entering a room. It was a girl's room, no doubt about that: a pretty floral design covered the walls, and a large dresser stood against one wall with a lovely round mirror. Bottles of nail polish and face powder littered the top. A small bookshelf sat in the corner.
"Come on, now, let's get him into bed." They dumped Marty onto the bed, which was neatly made. Elle sank into the window seat, shaking. Marty was just hit by a car. They were in a stranger's house. They had just met their teenaged fathers. In 1955. "There we go, he should be fine."
"Thank you," she said.
"Don't mention it," he said gruffly. He was about to leave but he turned around again. "By the way, what's your name?"
Elle opened her mouth to say it was Elle, but she quickly remembered that she was in a different time period, that she did not belong. "Um... Anne."
"Anne?" Sam asked, fishing for a last name.
"Just Anne."
"Is this here fella your brother or what?"
"Er... brother. He's my brother."
Sam held up his hands. "Alright. Don't hesitate to ask me or Stella for anything, okay?"
"Okay. Thanks again."
He shut the door. Elle sat there, the only sound breaking the silence being Marty's soft breathing. She looked at him and felt a rush of warmth. He looked so innocent, so helpless, like a... like a...
Like a lost puppy.
"Oh, Jesus Christ," Elle murmured, burying her head in her hands. What was happening? This was her best friend, this was the guy she'd known since, what, second grade? She wasn't supposed to like him. She was supposed to just be his best friend, be the person who was there when he was down, when he was stressed out, when he just needed a laugh. That was who she was supposed to be. Sure, Marty was cute, and sure, he was cool and all, but he was like her brother. After all, who would date their own brother? And even if she did like him, it wasn't like she could date him. He was dating Jennifer, and he wouldn't break up with her over something as trivial as Elle... She put her hand in her pocket and fingered the page from the phone book.
Doc! She thought suddenly, unfolding the page in her lap. She still had to find him, she couldn't just sit here and do nothing... but Marty was still out, she couldn't just leave him...
Well, whatever, she thought. Henry and Stella seemed like nice people. They could take care of him for a while.
Right now, she had business to attend to. And she was going to get that business done.
Or not, she thought as she tried on another dress in the boutique. She had to pass through downtown again to get to Doc's old address after a kind businessman gave her directions. As she walked past the shops and diners the boy's scathing remark went through her head again. "Hey, chick, are you wearing your father's pants or what?" Funny, because her father was there when he said that...
So her girly instincts kicked in and she found a decent shop and tried on nearly every dress in the place. And the one next door. And the one next to that one. Hey, it wasn't every day a girl got to buy original vintage pieces for their original price. Although she loved every dress she tried on she found three that she just couldn't bear to part with, and she bought them for a total of $2.10. Not bad. By the time she finished night was falling, so she hurried back to Sam and Stella's house with her purchases tucked away under her arm in a box.
"Ah, Anne! You're back!" Stella exclaimed when she opened the door. "Just in time for dinner too! Do tell us you're staying."
"Um, yeah. If you want me to, of course."
"Of course we want you to. Dinner'll be out in a moment, just wait at the table." She bustled over into the kitchen.
Elle set her box down on the counter and found a place at the table. She waited quietly for a few minutes, still trying to absorb just exactly what was happening. Sam sat on the ground, fiddling with a television set.
"Oh, I'd better go and wake up that young man. I bet he's hungry now," Stella said to herself as she started up the stairs. There was a thud. "Lorraine? Are you up there?"
Elle's insides jolted; once Marty was awake, then they could go looking for Doc, for real this time. She glanced at her reflection in a glass cabinet, quickly smoothing her hair down and making sure she looked presentable.
Wait a second. This was Marty Mcfly. He'd seen her when she was disgusting before and never said anything about it, why start caring about her looks now? But her heart still leapt out of her chest when she heard footsteps coming down the stairs.
"...So how long you been in port?" Stella was asking.
"What?"
"You're a sailor, right? That's why you're wearing that life preserver."
"Yeah, Coast Guard," Marty said, finally relenting.
"Sam, this is the young man you hit with your car outside. Thank God he's alright."
He looked up at them. "What were you doin' in the middle of the street, a kid your age?" he demanded.
"Oh, just ignore what he says, he's in one of his moods again," Stella chirped. "Come follow me into the dining room..."
Elle's heart was hammering out of her chest. His eyes landed on her and he grinned.
"Oh, thank God you're alright," she said, standing up and throwing her arms around him. He staggered a bit with the sudden weight, patting her back awkwardly.
"Thanks a lot, Elle."
Elle took notice of a girl standing beside him and almost gasped out loud: she was his mother. No doubt about it. Instead of wrinkles pulling at her face or a muffin top, her skin was clear and young, her waist thinner than Elle could possibly imagine. Her thin mouth was curling up into a sneer at the sight of Elle. Clearly she was jealous. Elle smiled sweetly at her and pulled Marty into the chair next to hers.
Stella went around the table introducing everyone. "This is Milton, this is Sally, this is Toby, and over there in the playpen is little baby Joey! Sam, quit fiddling with that thing and come and eat your dinner!" Stella added to her husband. "Well, I hope you like meatloaf, Marty and Anne..."
"Anne? Who's-?"
"Well, that's your sister, isn't it? Anne Klein?" Stella raised her eyebrows.
Marty looked at Elle. Elle looked at Marty. She shrugged.
"Yeah. That's us," he said, putting an arm around her. "Calvin and Anne Klein."
"Oh, ho, ho! Look at it roll!" Sam hooted triumphantly, wheeling in the TV he had been messing with. "Now we can watch Jackie Gleason while we eat." The rest of the family fixed their attention on the TV, but Lorraine kept her eyes on Marty.
"Our first television set," she said shyly. "Dad just picked it up today. Do you have a television?"
"Well, yeah, you know, we have... two of them."
"Wow!" said one of the little boys. "You must be rich!"
"Oh, honey, he's teasing you, nobody has two television sets," Stella said good-naturedly.
Silence descended on the table once more as everyone returned their attention to the TV. In flickering black-and-white, a man appeared through a doorway, covered head to toe in aluminum foil and cardboard boxes. A metal pot sat on his head in a comical way. Elle nearly choked on her potatoes.
"Hey. Hey, I've seen this one, this is a classic!" she blurted. "This is where Ralph dresses up as a man from space!"
"What do you mean you've seen this?" the boy said. "It's brand-new."
"Yeah, well, er, I saw it on a... rerun," Elle said, remembering where she was.
The boy stared at her. "What's a rerun?"
Elle looked away. "You'll find out..." she mumbled, feeling her face heating up.
Stella propped her head in her hand thoughtfully. "You know, you look so familiar. Do I know your mother?"
Marty took a fearful glance at the teenaged Lorraine beside him. "Yeah, I think maybe you do."
"Well, I want to give your mother a call. I don't want her to worry about you guys."
"You can't," Marty blurted. "That is, uh, nobody's- nobody's home."
"Oh."
"Yet," he added, in case she got the wrong idea.
"Oh," she said again.
"Uh, listen, to you know where Riverside Drive is?" Elle jumped in, rescuing him.
"That's on the other side of town, a block past Maple," Sam said, not looking away from the TV. "East end of town."
"A block past Maple, that's John F. Kennedy Drive," Elle worked out the directions out loud. Sam tore his eyes away from the TV to look at her.
"Who the hell is John F. Kennedy?"
"Um, mother?" Lorraine said, her voice high-pitched and innocent-sounding. "With their parents out of town, don't you think they oughta spend the night? After all, Dad almost killed Marty with the car."
"That's true, guys," Stella said. "I think you should spend the night, I think you're our responsibility."
"Gee, thanks, Mrs. Baines..."
"I mean, I don't know..."
"And Marty can sleep in my room."
Marty suddenly leapt up as though he'd been electrocuted. He grabbed Elle's wrist and pulled her up with him. "Thanks everyone, it was wonderful, you were all great. Uh, we'll see you all later." Marty opened the door. "Much later," he murmured before fleeing into the night with Elle in tow.
"Marty, what happened? You just shot up and left!" Elle exclaimed as they walked through the sweet-smelling streets. It was wet outside; it had rained.
"She was like, Oh, he can sleep in my room-" he mimicked his mother's voice with a high-pitched falsetto- "And then bam! She squeezed my leg. She wants me, Elle, and it's weird."
"Oh, God, are you telling me your own mother was hitting on you?"
"Yes! It's creepy as hell, I know!" He noticed her dress box. "What's in the box?"
"Nothing you need to know about. Come on, I think I see 1640 up there."
A huge wooden mansion dominated the hillside, with a brick pathway leading up to it. Elle ran up to the mailbox and checked the number: 1640, right on the dot. She nodded at Marty, who ran up to the front door. He rapped his knuckles three times on the expensive-looking wood.
"Elle, are you sure about this?"
"Positive. We're at the right address, aren't we?" She was about to knock again but her knuckles fell forward as the door flew open. A visibly younger, less-silver haired Emmet Brown appeared in the doorway, a huge metal contraption strapped to his head. "Doc-"
"Don't say a word," was all he said before pulling them inside.
"Doc-!"
"I don't want to know your name. I don't want to know anything about you." Doc crossed over to a metal cube with a myriad of different-colored switches and buttons.
"Doc, it's us, it's Elle and Marty-"
"Don't tell me anything. Quiet. Quiet!" He stuck a blue, plunger-like thing to Elle's forehead with a soft plop! Elle stared at him.
"Doc, what're you-?" Marty started.
Doc ignored him. "I'm going to read your thoughts. Let's see now." The machine hummed and smoked, with a couple of beeps thrown in. Elle stood there, absolutely bewildered. "You come from a great distance?"
"Yeah! Exactly!" Elle exclaimed. "We-"
"Don't tell me!" Doc shushed her, and Elle fell silent. "Uh, you want me to buy a subscription to the Saturday Evening Post?"
"No!" Elle said, all hopes of recognition fading from her voice. "No, we-"
"Not a word, not a word now!" Doc reminded her impatiently. "Uh..." he clutched the metal hat, now blinking yellow and red. "Donations! You want me to make a donation to Coast Guard Youth Auxiliary!"
"Doc," Elle said, ripping the thing off her head. "We're from the future. We came here in a time machine that you invented." Elle explained all of this as though she were speaking to a child. "We need your help to get us back to the year 1985," she said slowly and clearly.
Doc looked at her with slightly more reverance. He stepped forward and clutched her shoulders. "Do you know what this means?" Elle shook her head, confused. "It means that this damn thing doesn't work at all!" he proclaimed, unbuckling the metal hat. Elle sighed in defeat.
"Doc, you gotta help us," Marty jumped in, following Doc into what looked like the living room. "You are the only one who knows how your time machine works."
"Time machine?" Doc whispered, touching a bandage plastered to his temple. "I haven't invented any time machine."
Marty sighed. "Okay, alright. I'll prove it to you." He reached in his pocket and pulled out his wallet. "Look at my driver's license. Expires 1987. Look at my birthday for crying out loud, I haven't even been born yet." Doc still looked unconvinced. "Still don't believe me? Look at this picture. It's my brother, my sister, Elle, and me. Look at my sister's sweatshirt." Doc took the picture in a huge pair of wooden tweezers. "Class of 1984."
"Pretty mediocre photographic fakery," Doc said coolly, tossing the picture aside. "They cut off your brother's hair."
"Doc, we're telling the truth," Elle said earnestly. "You gotta believe us."
"Then tell me, future kids. Who's the President of the United States in 1985?"
"Ronald Reagan," Marty answered confidently.
"Ronald Reagan? The actor? Ha!" Doc spat. He furtively began to collect rolls and rolls of blueprints into his arms. "Then who's the Vice President? Jerry Lewis?" Doc ran out the door and into the night.
"Wait, Doc!" Marty called as they ran after him, their feet sloshing in the lawn mud.
"I suppose Jane Wyman is the First Lady!" Doc yelled over his shoulder. "And Jack Benny is the secretary of the treasury!"
"Doc, you gotta listen to us!" Elle said, catching him just as he reached the garage door.
"I've had enough practical jokes for one evening, good night future kids!" Doc shrieked before closing the door.
"No, Doc, wait! The bruise- the bruise on your head, I know how it happened. You told us the whole story!" Elle called through the wood.
"Shit, that's right! Doc, you were standing on your toilet, you were hanging a clock-"
"-And you fell and hit your head on the sink-"
"-And that's when you came up with the idea for the flux capacitor-"
"-Which is what makes time travel possible!" they both finished. They stood there for few seconds, panting. The garage door opened once again to reveal Doc, his brown eyes wide with astonishment.
"There was something wrong with the starter," Marty said as they drove up to Lyon Estates in Doc's white Packard. "So we hid it here." They got out and carefully brushed away the tree branches concealing the DeLorean. Doc stared at it.
"After I fell off my toilet," he began, "I drew this." He held up a pice of copy paper with a hasty drawing of the upside-down peace sign. A couple of equations had been scrawled next to it.
"The flux capacitor," Marty murmured. He opened the door and flicked on the real thing. He pointed and grinned in a sort of grim way.
Doc fell on his knees, staring at the thing. For a second Elle thought he might faint. "It works!" he yelled into the night. "I've invented something that works!" he said, grabbing Elle's collar in excitement.
"You bet your ass it works," Elle whispered.
"We've got to find a way to sneak this back to my laboratory." He clutched her tighter. "We've got to get you home!"