Part II: A Past That Is Also a Future — THE EPISODE OF THE MONROE STREET PARKING GARAGE - The Time Traveler's Wife

Monday, January 7, 2006 (Henry is 43)

Henry: It’s cold. It’s very, very cold and I am lying on the ground in snow. Where am I? I try to sit up. My feet are numb, I can’t feel my feet. I’m in an open space with no buildings or trees. How long have I been here? It’s night. I hear traffic. I get to my hands and knees. I look up. I’m in Grant Park. The Art Institute stands dark and closed across hundreds of feet of blank snow. The beautiful buildings of Michigan Avenue are silent. Cars stream along Lake Shore Drive, headlights cutting through night. Over the lake is a faint line of light; dawn is coming. I have to get out of here. I have to get warm.

I stand up. My feet are white and stiff. I can’t feel them or move them, but I begin to walk, I stagger forward through the snow, sometimes falling, getting back up and walking, it goes on and on, finally I am crawling. I crawl across a street. I crawl down concrete stairs backwards, clinging to the handrail. Salt gets into the raw places on my hands and knees. I crawl to a pay phone.

Seven rings. Eight. Nine. ‘“Lo,” says my self.

“Help me,” I say. “I’m in the Monroe Street Parking Garage. It’s unbelievably fucking cold down here. I’m near the guard station. Come and get me.”

“Okay. Stay there. We’ll leave right now.”

I try to hang up the phone but miss. My teeth are chattering uncontrollably. I crawl to the guard station and hammer on the door. No one is there. Inside I see video monitors, a space heater, a jacket, a desk, a chair. I try the knob. It’s locked. I have nothing to open it with. The window is wire reinforced. I am shivering hard. There are no cars down here.

“Help me!” I yell. No one comes. I curl into a ball in front of the door, bring my knees to my chin, wrap my hands around my feet. No one comes, and then, at last, at last, I am gone.