Running from the Future

“Don’t tell me you’re going to lecture me now,” I muttered. Suddenly, a memory from the day I was frozen hit me. I looked over at Gerard, then to Mikey, then finally landed on Ray. “Wait a damn minute,” I said, turning to face them. “I thought you guys said not to except to see you here when I was unthawed, if I was unthawed. What the hell are you doing here if you said you wouldn’t be?”

“We couldn’t leave Frank,” Mikey answered. “You might have been a dumbass to go through with it, but you’re still out best friend, we couldn’t just leave.”

“Believe us Frank, everyday for the fucking past 30 years we’ve been making sure that you came back. Ray even started doing research to help Evander get you out.”

“Big fucking help it did!” I shouted, causing everyone to jump. I turned to Evander, who shrunk back slightly. “You fucking swore up and down you knew how to get me back within a fucking year, and what happens? I miss 30 years of my life, I miss my daughters’ lives. I’m stuck looking like I never aged past 29, when I have to go around telling everyone I’m fucking that in reality, I’m 58 years old. You know just, fuck this.” I stood up and stormed past everyone toward the door everyone entered earlier. It beeped and let me out. Since I had no idea where I was going, I just chose to turn right. Somehow it worked in my favor, however, because as soon as I turned, I was outside.

“Frank!” I heard Gerard’s voice shout.

“Fuck off!” I shouted at him, picking up my speed into a sprint.

“I might be aged more than you but I’m still in shape!” he called. I picked up my speed more to where I was full out running without looking back. They wanted to stick up for the fucking scientist who made me miss so much of my life, fuck them.



I watched as Frank ran from the lab, and my age finally did catch up to me. Panting with a stitch in my side, I doubled over as I heard someone running toward me.

“He’s gone,” I told them, looking up. Mikey looked in the opposite way of where Frank had ran while Lily placed her hand on my back.

“We have to find him,” Cherry muttered to her sister. “He doesn’t know anything about the world anymore.”

“He’s resilient,” Ray spoke up. “We should call around though, let people know what’s going on.” I nodded, standing up and walking back into the lab. Using the Teletub, I spoke a name, and it started dialing right away. I decided on calling one of our old and close friends. He had a diner not to far from here that Frank could possibly pass, and even go in to.

“Hey Bob,” I said when he answered.

“Hey Gee, anything new with Frankie?” Bob asked. We informed him of what happened with Frank the day after, and automatically Bob dropped everything in Chicago and moved to New Jersey to be closer. He helped anyway he could, and that even meant taking some of his funds from his diner to pay for stuff that was needed for research.

“He’s awake, and he ran before we can tell him about the place,” I muttered, scrubbing my face with my hands. “He was heading in your direction, think you can have your staff keep an eye out for him? We might have to call the police and tell them what’s going on.” I heard a whimper and glanced over toward Evander. “Dude, they don’t throw you in jail for experiments like that anymore, so get a grip.” I turned back to Bob, rolling my eyes. “Think you can do that?”

“Absolutely, how long ago did he leave?”

“About five minutes ago, so it’ll take a while for him to get there if he does.”

“Right, I’ll keep an eye out and call you as soon as I see him.”

“Thank Bobert,” I said, shutting the screen off.

“We should go looking for him too,” Cherry said.

“It won’t do much good,” Lily replied to her sister. “If he spots us, he’ll run again for sure.”

“That’s not the Frank we knew,” Mikey whispered. “Something must have happened during the thaw out.”

“We just have to figure out what, and how we can fix it.” Ray agreed, walking to the computer. He looked over the scans of Frank’s brain activity during the process, but frowned the longer it went on.

“This is going to take some time,” he muttered. He looked up at Evander, “and an extra set of eyes. You guys go try to find him, we need to get him back here to fix whatever went wrong.” I nodded, as did Mikey.

“I have to get home to Gary,” Lily said, hugging the men she knew as her uncles. “Call me as soon as something changes.”

“I got work to do, but same, call me.” Cherry told me. I nodded and hugged her as well.

“Be safe you two,” I told them. They both nodded and left the lab, deep in conversation about their father.

“Let’s go Mikes,” I said to Mikey.

“Should we drive or walk?” Mikey asked at the car.

“Drive, we’ll catch up with him faster,” I answered him. Mikey nodded and got into the car. That is the one thing that hasn’t changed drastically over the years. Cars don’t levitate, but they don’t take gas anymore. Everything is electronic now, so even the cars you just plug in and charge like an older cell phone.

It was a long time that we drove around, and the power was almost exhausted from the car, so we decided to stop at Bob’s Diner to hang around there.



“Lee, get table four,” the manager of Bob’s Diner demanded. I sighed and looked over at the man sitting alone. He had on vintage clothing that looked as if it was from around the time I was born, if not older.

“What can I get for you?” I asked him.

“Anything you have that can get me back to 2011,” he muttered, not looking up.

“That’s pretty much every food item we have on the menu,” I replied, tucking a strand of the black wig that was part of my work uniform behind my ear.

“I mean physically take me back, none of that mind trip shit.”

“I’ll give you a few more minutes,” I sighed. He just shrugged, but when I went to walk away, he stopped me.

“Please help me, I have no fucking clue what I’m doing,” he begged. I looked back toward the manager, but saw him talking with the owner.

“Bob?” the man asked, looking at the blonde haired man.

“Frank? Thank fuck!” Bob exclaimed, rushing up to him. “Shit, you haven’t aged a day!”

“No shit Sherlock, I figured that out already.” Frank replied. I watched them confused as the doors opened.

“What the hell is this?” Frank asked, looking at the two men who just walked into the diner.

“Frank, you need to come back with us,” the short of the two men who just walked in said. “We think something went wrong and we need to try to fix it.”

“I’m not being another science experiment!” Frank shouted suddenly. His hand was still on my arm, and I felt him squeezing it with fright.

“Frankie, you need help,” Bob said to him gently. “Look, I wasn’t there when you went in, so you know you can trust me.”

“I can’t trust anyone,” he muttered, his grip tightening even more.

“Frank, let Agliera go,” Bob said firmly. “Let my employee go Frankie.”

“No,” Frank said suddenly, bringing me closer to him. “Get away,” he shouted.

“Frank, think this through,” the taller of the two men at the door snapped. “You take her, that’s kidnapping. That never changed.”

“Just, get away!” Frank shouted, grabbing my hand with his other one. He all but dragged me out the door, and into a waiting car. He slammed on the go pedal, and sped off down the street.

“Stop this car!” I shouted at him.

“Shut the fuck up for a minute!” he shouted back. “Dammit,” he smacked the wheel of the car, so many times I’m surprised he didn’t accidentally jerk the car or anything.

“Where are we going?”

“I have no damn clue,” he admitted a second later. “Look, I have no idea what’s going on, I’m not normally like this.”

“What happened, talk to me,” I said gently, hoping to calm him down before he killed either one of us.

“You wouldn’t believe me…” he muttered. “Look, tell me how to get to your house and I’ll take you home. I can’t go back with them.” The car stopped so suddenly, Frank started panicking.

“What’s going on?”

“Anti-theft,” I replied, confused on how he didn’t know that. “The driver has a button on his or her wrist or around their neck. Their car gets stolen, they press the button and the car stops until they enter a code.”

“So the car is useless,” Frank pointed out. He slammed open the door and stormed out of the car, wringing his hair and looking around.

“Do you need any kind of help? I asked, walking up to him carefully.

“I can’t let you help me, I fucking kidnapped you remember?” Frank muttered, leaning against the side of a building.

“If I didn’t want to be taken, you wouldn’t have gotten me to go,” I pointed out to him, feeling a rush of adrenaline filling my bloodstream. “I needed this excitement.”

“You’re one crazy chick,” he smiled. He then held out his hand to me, which I thought was an odd thing to do. “Frank Iero,” he said, confusing me even more.

I still stared at his hand, then back to his face, not sure what to do. Frank Iero, was he introducing himself to me?

“Frank Iero? Is that your name?” I asked finally.

“Erm, yeah,” he muttered. “Don’t tell me you’ve shaken hands with someone before.”

“Shake hands? Why would I do that?”

“It’s what…never mind,” Frank muttered, letting his hand fall. “I’m not up with the times yet.”

“You look to be about my age, so you should have a good handle on things now, not unless you were transported through time somehow.”

“Nope, frozen,” he said.

“Frozen? Wait, you’re that guy that Bob kept talking about! The friend that was frozen for thirty years!”

“Shh,” he snapped, looking around.

“So, your friends think something went wrong while you were thawing out right?” I asked, looking down the street.

“I guess,” he replied, starting to walk down the sidewalk. I quickly caught up with him and listened to his story. He was really fifty eight with two twin girls he had no idea he even had. Apparently his wife died a few years ago and his friends were pushing him too far with all the information of much things have changed.

“I’m sorry,” I said when he finished.

“For what?” Frank asked.

“That you had to go through all of that. I know Bob though, I know how much he worried about you while you were frozen. He won’t let anyone do anything to you.”

“I know,” Frank sighed. “I just, I get so defensive now, I don’t feel like I can trust anybody.”

“Then why are you keeping me around?” I asked, my eyebrow raised. He opened his mouth, but closed it again after a minute of thinking.

“I really have no idea,” he muttered finally.

“You can still trust people, you’re just scared of what would happen if you allow the scientist to try to fix you, and the only way you can think of to prevent it is by running from it all.”

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but are you a damn robot who’s programmed to know just what to say?”

“In a manner,” I smiled slightly. “I’m a servant, have been my entire life.”

“A waitress?” Frank asked.

“That’s putting it mildly, and in an old fashioned form. No, when someone is born now, they’re automatically put into living classifications. You’re either an entertainer, a leader, an educator or a servant.”

“That was the way it was back in 2011.”

“Back then, you had a chance to get out of it, right now, you don’t. If you’re an entertainer, you stay an entertainer, if you’re a servant, you stay a servant your entire life.”

“It’s not what you want to be though is it?” Frank observed.

“Nothing gets past you,” I smiled. “But no, I don’t want to be a servant for the rest of my life, but that’s the path that was chosen for me, and it’s impossible to break away from it.”

“Only if you let it be impossible,” Frank whispered. We both stopped walking and stood off to the side against a building.

“Hey!” Someone shouted. We both looked up and saw that it was the two guys from before.

“Shit,” Frank muttered, looking around.

“Follow me,” I said, grabbing his hand.

“Agliera, Frank!” Bob’s voice shouted as we started to run. I didn’t turn back, and neither did Frank.

“Why are you helping?” Frank asked as we ran.

“I told you, I need the excitement,” I laughed as we ran down an alley way. I knew these streets like the back of my hand, so we were able to lose them in no time at all.

“Come on, my apartment is this way,” I said, walking down the alley we stopped in to catch our breaths.

“Thank you,” Frank said.

“It’s nothing,” I replied with a smile. I noticed Frank’s eyes staring at my hair, and after touching my head I knew why. A thick strand of hair had fallen out of my wig. I decided to take it off, letting my natural long brown hair flow free.

“Damn, nice wig,” he commented with a smile.

“Job uniform,” I muttered. “I hate the damn thing.” He laughed as we started walking again, being careful to keep to the alley ways.

“Here we are,” I said, walking up to my apartment. I ran my hand over the lock pad, and it beeped as it unlocked the door for it to open. Frank walked into the place, and his mouth fell to the floor. My living room was decorated with things from the late 1980s.

“I’m impressed,” he stated, looking around my apartment. I smiled and looked around.

“I’m going to go change into something more comfortable, have a seat if you like.” I told him, indicating the couch pressed against the wall. I quickly changed into a pair of vintage jeans and a t-shirt with a band logo on it. An old pair of Chuck Taylor’s finished the ensemble.

“So that’s why you’re not too surprised by my clothing,” Frank said as I walked out into the living room. “You’re a vintage junkie,” he smiled.

“That I am,” I sighed. “It amazes me how free you were back then.”

“It amazes me how I’m talking about the only time I can remember like I was around to see it end,” Frank replied, staring at his hands.

“You should really let your friends help you.” I said, sitting on the couch beside him.

“I can’t,” he muttered.

“Why not?”

“I’m a burden to them, and I don’t want them to feel obligated to have to help me every step of the way.”