Bernard wakes. In his parallel world he forces himself to never try to date Ann Champion and see what her life would become.
He rubbed his eyes and sat up. Only an hour and 15 minutes had gone by since he had fallen into the trance. He had the strained look of someone who had been told a secret he had not wanted to hear. When he spoke his voice was strained.
“I found out what I wanted to know, Dr. Candella. The old saying is true. ‘Beware what you search for; you may find it’.”
He laughed but his laughter was hollow.
”It was not what I thought it would be.”
More than ever I desperately wished to know what Bernard had experienced in the Wish Machine.
“Please record your experience for me, Bernard. I will keep your story in the strictest confidence.”
I turned on the recorder.
“When I went to sleep beside the machine I woke up to find myself young again. It was the day I first saw Annie. She was on stage. She was playing with her band and singing, but this time she was singing Bill Bailey.”
He made a small movement of wonderment with his hands.
“It was every bit as real as you are, doctor.”
After a minute he picked up the thread of his story.
“Annie was singing ‘Running Wild’ the first time I saw her.”
The effect of what Mr. Dellarambo had experienced was so telling and powerful he had difficulty speaking of it. Another moment of silent introspection and he continued.
“Other than that small difference everything else was exactly the same as it was the first time. It was the same band and the same lovely Annie. I was just as smitten as I was the first time I saw her on stage.”
That small change of the song his wife had sung in Bernard’s alternate past caught my attention. It was one more piece of evidence for my theory; there are an infinite number of alternate worlds. Even a world next door, while seeming to be the same, will have small differences. For Mrs. Champion to sing the second time, “Bill Bailey,” instead of Running Wild was proof positive.
Bernard repeated himself. He couldn’t help it.
“Doctor, it was so real. I was there again, doctor. I had just put down my glass of scotch and water. The moisture from the glass was still damp on my fingers.”
Bernard whispered his telling of that moment like a benediction.
“My God, doctor, what an amazing experience it was to find myself there again. More than that, when I bothered to think about it I remembered everything about this world and my life now. Not only that, I remembered all the years of this life; what I did and who I am.”
He shook away cobwebs.
“Before the day had passed for me, this world began to be the dream. That other world in your machine was the reality. It was a weird experience, doctor.”
“I remembered coming into your office and entering the Wish Machine. Yet I was repeating an experience that had happened 30 years ago. I actually pinched myself to be sure I was not hallucinating.”
“I had a scotch and water on the table in front of me. The band was playing and Annie was singing. I sat in a stupor watching Annie and trying to sort out the impossible paradox of two sets of memories. The first time I walked up to the bandstand and introduced myself. This time I had to fight like hell with my feelings not to go up to the bandstand and talk to her. It was the hardest thing I have ever done.”
Next episode: Bernard discovers what Hollywood and the high life did to Annie. He is ready to cry.
Gene Paleno is an author and illustrator living in Witter Springs.
