The Man From the Future

We were walking up the cracked staircase with the smell of sulfur in the air. When we reached the top we saw a mysterious man in a trench coat beckoning us towards him. We reluctantly walked towards him, careful to not make any sudden movements. Who knows? This guy could be a psycho. We finally reached him and I got a good look at his face. It was full of scars and it looked like he had been beaten up recently for he had a black eye. Now I know that I should not be talking to strangers, but I had a weird feeling the minute I saw him.

“Hello?” I say.

He does not respond. He only gives me a letter and runs off into the distance.

“Careful, that might be something dangerous,” my best friend Jack says.

“Ok, then you hold it,” I say.

We do not have any time to waste if we want to find that man, I think to myself.

I start running the way he went, but I trip on a huge crack in the freshly laid asphalt.

“Come on, let’s go!” I yell at Jack as I pick myself up.

We start running again. As we are passing the bakery that smells like fresh bread, we suddenly see the man! We break off the path and run towards him. Jack almost tackles him to stop him, but I grab the man before anyone gets hurt.

“Who are you!” I scream.

“I am you, Ron,” he responds.

I stop. Nobody knows my real name other than my mother and my father who have been dead for seven years.

“He is not Ron, you have got the wrong guy,” Jack says. “His name is Jon.”

I never told Jack that my real name is Ron. There is a law in my country that states no one can have the same name as the leader (more like a dictator). The leader’s name is currently Ron Johnson.

“That is what he wants you to think,” says Ron from the future.

“My real name is Ron,” I tell Jack. “My parents were part of an organization that was trying to overthrow the government so they decided to give me a name that would make the government hate them. But when my dad died my mom told me I have to go by Jon now.”

I think the reason she had me do that was so that I was protected. With my father gone I did not have a lot of protection anymore.

“Yes. You know what,” Ron from the future says. “That is why I came here to talk with you.”

“Hold on, hold on,” Jack says.

“Ron, we are a part of that organization in the future. This letter I gave you was addressed to your dad seven years ago, the day before he died,” says Ron from the future.

“Why would you have to come to me?” I ask.

“I can’t read it,” says Ron. “It is in some sort of different language or a code.”

The only code that my parents ever taught me was the code of the organization and I doubt a letter from the government would be in that code.

“Okay fine,” I say as I open the letter. I started to read out loud “Hello citizen of Sonstar, we unfortunately have to give you some information that might not settle very well with you. If you do not stop this business with the organization of deviants, you and your family will be hunted down and we will not stop until you have nothing. Or you can take this check and get out of this country. Your choice. Sincerely, Ron Johnson.”

“Why do you need help with this?” Jack asks.

“Because I believe that our father is not dead, Ron,” Ron answers. “And I know how to find him.”

“That letter said that if they take the check. They would not be killed. Why would they be threatened to be killed if all they did was join an organization? I think our father was a bad man.”

“Why would you think that?” I questioned.

“Because he is in jail,” he responds.

As we are running to the jailhouse a thought crosses my mind.

“What if he doesn’t recognize me?” I ask.

“Oh, he will,” Ron responds.

We finally make it to the jailhouse. We go in and talk to the person at the front desk and she lets us in.

We walk to my father’s cell and for the first time in seven years, I see him.

“What are you doing here Jon?” he asks.

“I came here to see you,” I respond.

“Why are you here?” Jack asks my father.

“You mind your own business, you…” He stops as the guards start to approach us.

“Get out of here boys, he is getting very aggravated,” the guards say.

We run out of the jailhouse and we make a beeline for the Capitol Building.

“Where are we going?” I ask.

“To get some answers,” responds Ron.

We finally make it to the building and as we run past the secretary we say, “Sorry, we need to see Leader Johnson.”

We rush into the elevator and press the button for the top floor. We run into the office of Ron Johnson and he turns his chair around and points at the chairs as if to say, “Take a seat.”

We sit down and ask, “Why is my father in jail?”

“What is your father’s name?” he asks back.

“Jared Jobbs,” I respond.

“Oh ok, he was a very bad man, Ron, we had to protect you,” he responds.

“Thank you,” I say.

We slowly go back to my house and think over what happened.

“Well, I better get going back to the future,” Ron says.

“Okay, thank you so much for everything,” I say.

“No problem,” he says as he disappears into the future.

Eventually, Jack and I go back to normal. Every once in a while though I think about the day I saw myself from the future and learned that my father was a criminal.