Short Story: Time Travel, Baby Sisters and Hobbits

At school they make us write about what it means to be Australian and stuff. That’s cos I’m an Australian. So is my mum. My Dad is what we call a Pom. He isn’t from Pomland but a place called England. England is so far away that they are backwards in time, which makes it complicated when Dad is trying to phone them cos he has to pick a time that works in the past as well as now.

I’ve never been there but Dad has decided that we are all going to go this Summer cos he wants us to meet our pom family properly, cos talking through the video on the computer doesn’t count.

I’m not sure about it cos Mum says it never stops raining and the trains never come. Sitting at stations and getting wet sounds rubbish. I’d rather go to the beach but Dad has promised that I can use his enormous umbrella that pops open when you press the button. It is a really cool umbrella. If Batman had an umbrella it would be like this one cos it’s black and has the turbo charged open button.

Course going back in time will be cool too. I’ll know what’s going to happen but I won’t tell no one cos that might change history and stuff like in the movies. Messing up the space time continumum is bad and you can end up not existing cos you change things and are never born and stuff.

Mum seems worried about the trip. I asked if she was worried about me changing the space time continumum, cos she didn’t need to worry cos I knew about stuff like that and would be careful but she told me to stop being silly. This is what she always says when she is only half listening and thinking about something else. I can tell cos her eyes don’t look at me.

I heard her shouting at Dad and she is worried about 24 hours on an aeroplane with 3 kids. I don’t know why she is worried cos Dad told me all about aeroplanes and they sound cool. He says you can watch movies and play games and other cool stuff without leaving your seat, it is all in the ‘puter on your seat. It will be like we each have our own IPad, I won’t need to fight with my sister Charlie to use Dad’s.

Dad has told her not to worry, that Mabel will be fine. Mabel is my baby sister. She isn’t big like me and Charlie so she can’t play games or watch movies. All Mabel does all day is blow spit bubbles, fart really loudly and do smelly things in her nappy that my mum has to clean up. She can do that on the aeroplane too, no worries. Sometimes she cries too but normally that is cos she wants you to plug a dummy in her mouth. Babies are easy.

It will be a waste really cos she won’t be able to ‘preciate the time travel or her own ‘puter with games and movies. Sometimes she stares for ages at cuddly toys going round and round over her head and she even laughs. I was worried that she was stupid but mum got cross with me for saying that and told me that I was just like Mabel once too.

I don’t remember being that little but I’ve seen photos so it must be true. I asked Mum if I farted as much as Mabel does but she just said “Oh Georgie” with a big sigh, which means that I’ve just said something wrong. She does this a lot.

My best friend Tom isn’t coming with us cos his parents are taking him to the red centre. The red centre is in the middle of Australia and is really cool cos it looks like Mars so Tom is going to explore and look for new life. He’s going to be a famous scientist one day, he told me so.

Tom thinks my time travel trip is cool but he thinks it’s weird we’re going backwards. If he was time travelling he’d go to the future. I asked Dad if we could go to the future instead but he just laughed and said we’d go to New Zealand another time.

I thought this was really weird cos I learned about New Zealand at school and they never said it’s in the future. All they told us is that it has lots of volcanoes and sheep and hobbits. That is a rubbish future. Really in the future there should be future people dressed in silver with lots of cool stuff we don’t have yet.

I don’t think Dad was being properly truthful about New Zealand being in the future. I think he was adult lying. Adult lying isn’t like Kid lying cos you get in trouble for kid lying but adult lying is ok. It is OK cos with adult lying the other adults know the adult is lying and they laugh cos it is like a big lie that is actually a joke. A bit like stories which aren’t true but aren’t lying either cos they are just a story. So maybe Dad is telling me a story about New Zealand being in the future.

One day I’ll get Dad to take me to the future, the proper future not some story future that is full of short people with hairy feet.