The Time Traveler's Wife, Personalized

This is an excerpt from the book, the chapter where Clare, age 6, first meets Henry, age 36. It's from Henry's point of view. One of the major inconveniences of his time-traveling is that he always shows up without any clothes.

Henry: I'm in the Meadow, waiting. I wait slightly outside the clearing, naked, because the clothes Clare keeps for me in a box under a stone are not there; the box isn't there either, so I am thankful that the afternoon is fine, early September, perhaps, in some unidentified year. I hunker down in the tall grass....

I hear a screen door slam and I peer above the grass. A child is running, pell mell, and as it comes down the path through the waving grass my heart twists and Clare bursts into the clearing.

She is very young. She is oblivious; she is alone. She is still wearing her school uniform, a hunter green jumper with a white blouse and knee socks with penny loafers...

[Clare spots him. Lots of conversation, during which he keeps a careful distance and doesn't tell her who he is.]

...But what I really need isn't money, it's clothing."

Clare looks at me doubtfully.

"Does your dad have any clothes he doesn't need? Even a pair of pants would be great."

"I don't know..."

"That's okay, you don't need to get them right now. But if you bring some next time I come, it would be very nice."

[They talk a little more, and then he disappears.]

-- The Time Traveler's Wife, Audrey Niffenegger


So how would this play out in our own personal life? Probably something like this:

Darren: I'm at the Creek, waiting. I wait behind some bushes, naked, and wondering why Sara is so enamored of this place; the sand is gritty, the bugs are fierce, and wrapped around the prickly bush a tendril of poison ivy seems to be reaching out for me. I am thankful that the afternoon is fine, feels like July to my New England blood so it must be early September here, in some unidentified year. I hunker down on that blasted sand....

I hear footsteps and I peer above the bushes. A child is running, pell mell, and as it comes down the cowpath my heart twists and Sara bursts onto the creekbank.

She is very young. She looks like Addie, except for her tousled hair with the cowlick in front, and she isn't wearing glasses. I try to remember when she got glasses, to try to guess her age; it doesn't seem fair that in addition to having to remember to write blog posts for her birthday and that she likes mustard and pickles but never ketchup on her hamburgers, I have to remember when she got glasses. Nine, she was nine the year she got glasses. She seems to be about six now.

She is oblivious; she isn't alone. Trailing behind her are two lanky boys, young teens, wearing cutoff jeans and no shirts. They have a handful of bottle rockets, which they light off at regular intervals and shoot into the creek. Sara pauses near my bush, and her brothers walk father down the bank, looking for snakes to shoot.

I can tell where Addie got her fashion sense: Sara is wearing a grubby shirt, cut-off jean shorts, and is barefoot. Both her knees are skinned; I'm sure she's shown me one of those scars later in life.

[Sara spots him. Lots of conversation, during which he keeps a careful distance and doesn't tell her who he is.]

"...But what I really need isn't money, it's clothing."

Sara looks at me doubtfully.

"Does your dad have any clothes he doesn't need? Even a pair of pants would be great."

Sara looks blank. Right. Her dad died three years ago and her mother hasn't remarried yet. "Um, or maybe your grandfather or your uncle?"

"Matt and Neil have clothes," she says. I'm still surprised by the broad accent. The Sara I know has a slight Southern lilt, not this drawl that gives "Matt" two syllables.

"I don't think your brothers are big enough." They also haven't used up their arsenal of bottle rockets.

"Oh. Wait a sec. I'll be right back." She scampers away before I can say anything about keeping secrets. I wait. [Insert poetic references to the splash and babble of the flowing creek, how it's beautiful like Sara's eyes, etc.]

After some time, I hear footsteps again. Sara reappears; I wonder briefly if she ever brushed her hair that morning. She's brought me some clothes of her uncle's: blue work shirt, denim jeans. The only difficulty with the clothes is that her uncle is still in them.

"Where'd you say he was, Sam?" Will asks. Sam, a nickname bestowed on her by her grandfather. My interest in the situation is heightened when I realize that he's carrying a shotgun. I remember long, languid conversations with Sara in years to come, when she tells me stories of her childhood years, such as how Uncle Will can shoot down a chicken hawk in flight with one bullet.

"Somewhere over here. Um..." Sara turns the wrong way, and I'm suddenly glad for her innate sense of bad direction. They walk several feet down the path, leaving me behind. I consider. Sara and I meet when she's twenty years old. Fourteen years from now.

That really isn't too long to wait.

[Wisely, he disappears.]

-- SJ