100 Yellow Doors

june 17th, 1963, 3:32 p.m.

It was a very good thing, Iman thought, that she had asked Beck to drive instead. After all, she could not possibly drive and be in this strange, foreign meadow at the same time.

A moment ago, she and Beck had been at a red light, the radio turned low to static, Beck's hand brushing her thigh. She was thinking, thinking, thinking. About what Hana said and why Julien wasn't picking up his phone and how there was a gruesome squirrel corpse in her glove compartment. By all means, she shouldn't have been so surprised when her stomach began to float within her.

"Beck," she'd said, urgent. "Beck, I'm about to—"

She never finished the sentence.

She could picture him now. Beck, hands gripping the steering wheel as he guided the car onto the shoulder and frantically looked around for her. He had never seen her disappear, after all. There was no preparing for something like that.

I can't worry about Beck right now, Iman told herself. She was lying on the ground, small, yellow needles of grass poking at her arms and the back of her neck. Sun—bright, hot, dazzling—blazoned her face. I have to figure out where the hell I am.

She squinted and lifted a hand to her brow, sitting up. The meadow seemed ceaseless, a yellow-green sea only interrupted by a shack in the far distance and—was that—a person?

Panic seized in her throat. She didn't know where or when she was; the cultural aspects of this time, this place, wherever and whenever this was, was lost on her. She was a woman of color in no man's land, and she was entirely helpless.

This part of time traveling got very old, very fast.

Iman stayed low, as if the grass would hide her. Sweat stuck her curls to her face, the scent of earth and ragweed in her nostrils. She watched the figure, waiting, hesitating—only it didn't move. It was utterly still, slumped over, its head hanging. Almost as if it was...dead.

Iman waged a small war with herself then, but her altruism won over her caution. She got to her feet, wading through the grass, the wind tearing at her hair, her clothes. She grew closer, closer, closer still. She saw the black curls—shorter, but recognizable nonetheless. The tawny skin, gentle jawline. Those slender, long, pianist fingers, littered with burns.

The name felt as though it was choked out of her. "Julien!"

It was Julien, chained to a wooden post in the middle of the field, defenseless in the broad scope of the blazing afternoon sun.

He looked up at her, and though his eyes blazed a fervent crimson, she had never seen so much hope in them before. "Oh, Immy, thank God," he said, his voice shattered, mere pieces of what it normally was. He picked up his head, though it looked like it hurt him. Rattling his chains, he asked, "Think you could help me with these? They're silver, so I can't—"

Iman nodded, waving him to silence. "Shh, don't talk. I've got you."

Iman knelt, fumbling with the chains, trying to ignore the scent of Julien's sizzling flesh as she worked him free. She unknotted them until they were loose enough for Julien to wriggle away; he did so, though it was painfully slow. Iman helped him up, silent, tossing his arm over her shoulder and dragging him towards the shack at the edge of the meadow.

She didn't ask him how he'd gotten there, how long he'd been there, who'd done that to him. She did nothing but hold him up until they reached the shack, where she shouldered the rotting door open and pulled Julien into the safety of the shadows.

She glanced around, checking if the meadow was clear, and pulled the doors shut again.

They were alone. The shack was empty, a dilapidated structure of holed, ancient wood, plentiful dust, and old haystacks. Only a sliver of the sun shot through from the roof, a small area which Julien avoided.