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When Stacy woke on Sunday morning, she didn’t bother getting dressed or even brushing her teeth. She simply grabbed her pack of cigarettes and made her way down her narrow staircase to the back garden door.
It was a morning routine to smoke in the back garden. It was quiet there, quiet and peaceful and she could let her imagination run wild.
Her walled in garden reminded her of Mary Lennox and her secret hide away, with Dickon’s wild animals and the magic that healed the children’s lonely hearts and Colin’s weak legs and back.
Her garden had become overgrown the past year since she’d moved into her little townhouse, but it was her sanctuary.
When Stacy opened her back door this particular Sunday morning, she found her sanctuary already occupied by a young man.
He wore a long brown coat, his leather boots and dark trousers scuffed and well worn. His face was down turned, staring into nothing, and in his hand he grasped a small black bag.
“Excuse me? You can’t be here, this is private property,” she called out, half hiding behind her door. When the strange man didn’t even look up, she called out again. “My private property! Shoo!”
He looked up at that. He looked to be of Asian descent, but Stacy thought nothing of it as his eyes caught her attention.
He had sad eyes. Old eyes, eyes that reflected a soul that seemed too heavy laden.
“Oh,” he said, blinking his big, sad eyes and licking his lips. Also big, and puffy and round, and…Stacy lifted her gaze back to his eyes. “I don’t entirely know how I ended up in your garden. I do…. Apologize. Yes, apologize is the correct word, isn’t it?” He smiled without any emotion, just a lifting of the corners of his mouth and squinting of his eyes.
“Are you on drugs?”
“Oh, no, those are illegal.” He waved his empty hand in a dismissive gesture. “But then, so is being in a person’s back garden without their permission, isn’t it?”
Stacy blinked a few times. Normally she would have escorted any trespassers out with a quick foot to rear-end goodbye, and she wondered briefly why she hadn’t already, but something about the whole situation made her want to be spontaneous.
She stepped out from behind her door, letting it close behind her, and pulled out her cigarettes to light one up. If she was going to be spontaneous she would need a good cigarette, and probably a pot of coffee.
While she lit up, the man began to shuffle about her garden, mumbling to himself and inspecting the nine feet tall brick walls that surrounded her little haven of vegetation.
“Are you looking for something?”
“Ah, yeah. I seem to have misplaced my…..flower stand.” He hesitated on the last word. “At least, I think it’s a flower stand. Do you have flower stands around here? It might be a segue or a buggy, but you don’t have buggies anymore do you?” He paused in his search and turned towards her. “What is the date?”
Stacy exhaled her lungful of smoke. “The twenty-second.”
“Of?”
“September?” She frowned, confused.
“Of…?” The man began to walk towards her, his fingers fiddling with the small black bag he still clutched tightly in his left hand.
“Two-thousand thirteen? Who are you?” The man quirked his mouth to the side and ignored her inquiry.
“It’s a Sunday, isn’t it? I’ve always disliked Sundays, try to avoid them, most of us do, such boring, dull, average days.”
Stacy took another puff of her cigarette before stamping it out on the door step. “I’ve always quite enjoyed Sundays, as much as any Saturday or holiday, at least. Quiet days, good for sleeping in. You want coffee?” Stacy didn’t know what it was that made her ask, made her feel like inviting the strange, still nameless, man into her house for coffee.
“I’m Stacy, by the way.”
“I’ve always liked the name Stacy, first time I’ve met a girl named that.” He smiled, folded his hands behind his back and followed her into the house.
After coffee had been had -- with terrifying amounts of sugar and cream -- the strange man, whose name Stacy still did not know, decided it was a beautiful day for a stroll. He didn’t even give Stacy time to change into normal clothes, instead complimenting her on her choice of sleep wear.
“I’ve always enjoyed marshwiggles!” he’d exclaimed happily. “Such pessimistic beings, but really, they make great companions. They make surviving anything seem like a miracle; really stops one from taking things for granted, they do. Though I wouldn’t suggest vacationing with one, they can bring ones mood down quite severely.” He’d winked and patted her on the bottom before walking out her front door, calling for her to hurry.
“So you lost your flower stand?” Stacy asked while shuffling on beside him, mildly self-conscious about her state of dress. Frog print jammy bottoms and a camisole with googly-eyed house slippers wasn’t exactly a normal thing to wear out and about on a Sunday morning.
“Well, it might be a flower stand. Last time I thought it would have been a blacksmith’s shop, and it turned out to be a cellar! That was a very confusing day, really. Not as confusing as the day all the fish on Gorimunacia began to talk, but we figured that one out eventually.” Stacy struggled to keep up as the man began to add a half skip to his step, almost as if he was too eager or excited.
“I really have no idea what you’re talking about. But I haven’t seen a flower stand around here in... Ever. I don’t think I’ve ever seen one. What is your name, anyway?”
“Oh!” He stopped and smacked himself on the forehead. “Of course, basic human decency! You may call me Leader, or The Leader. Wonderful to meet you, Stacy!” He leaned forward and kissed her soundly on the lips. “That’s right, isn’t it? Or is it spitting in one’s palm?”
Stacy was too stunned at first to respond, but when he started gathering spit in his mouth with a snorting sound she quickly stopped him. “Ah, no. No spitting please, that will do, really, thank you.” She coughed and shuffled in place, licking her lips distractedly. The man looked much too worried about greeting her properly.
“Do I really have to call you Leader? You look more like a feng shui to me… Or… Can I call you chopsticks? I’m going to call you Chopstick.” Chopstick opened his mouth to respond, but she cut him off. “No, I insist, its tradition to name strange men who pop up in your garden on Sunday mornings, so really, there’s no escaping it. Sorry, Chopstick.” He snapped his mouth shut and nodded with acceptance.
“Well then, Stacy-who-is-a-lady, shall we continue?” He tucked the small black bag into his coat pocket and fastened it closed before reaching for her hand and entwining their fingers.
They spent a good part of the morning walking the streets of her hometown, and Stacy would sometimes point out places of interest, though too often. He seemed much more interested in the street lights, telephone boxes, and the one adult video store they’d passed three blocks back. He’d exited quite quickly after entering, a deep blush on his face, but an oddly fatherly look in his expressive eyes.
Around lunch time they stopped in what was once the small city’s town square - back when horse drawn buggies had been the mode of transport and town criers had still been the main source of news- for sandwiches.
It was while sitting by the town square’s fountain feature that Stacy noticed a little shop she’d been sure she had never seen before.
“That’s odd…”
“What’s odd? Anything odd is always worth checking out, and possibly eating, depending on if it is edible. And if it turns out not to be… we might need an apothecary.”
Stacy blinked at Chopstick, by now used to his strange ramblings, for the most part. “We don’t have apothecaries anymore. We have pharmacies, or doctor’s offices. We also don’t have a clockmaker’s shop. Or we didn’t last time I was down here, which was only yesterday.”
“That certainly is odd.” Chopstick tossed the last bit of his sandwich into his mouth and stood, brushing his hands together to rid them of crumbs. “Because that is a clockmaker’s shop. It is also my flower stand, which isn’t a flower stand, only I thought it might have been which it isn’t; but it is mine regardless.”
“Alright Chopstick, this I have got to see.” Stacy started off in the direction of the shop, Chopstick following not far behind.
When they reached the shop, Chopstick pulled out his black bag and pulled a rather normal looking key from inside and unlocked the shop door.
The door swung inward easily, but inside the shop was too dark too see much. “After you, Lady Stacy-who-is-a-lady.”
“You know, Stacy is a girl’s name,” she offered as she stepped inside the shop.
“No it isn’t. Neither is Ashleigh, or Alice or Sasha. I knew a Boy named Armageddon once, now that is a girl’s name if ever I heard one.” Chopstick stepped inside the shop and let the door close behind him.
Stacy was looking around the room in awe. It wasn’t a clockmaker's shop. She couldn’t even think of what the room could be used for. Chopstick remained quiet near the door, his key still in hand, and a calm, proud sort of smile on his face. Like a father showing his child an amazing thing for the first time.
The room was large and brightly lit. Lights on a console flashed and moved in indescribable patterns, and cogs and wheels turned and pushed pistons about in the center pillar of the room. There were windows along all six walls, each one looking out onto a different landscape.
The one closest to her looked out onto a desert; the next, a pinkish jungle with trees taller than any she’d ever seen, and the next window looked out into what could only be described as the vast expanse of outer space, as no night view would show so many stars and planets.
“Some flower stand….” she said in awe.
“Do you like it?”
“I’m not sure… It feels…” She gestured helplessly.
“Big.”
“Yes big. Old…. Alive.”
“Oh! Well, it is alive, she is? At least I think she’s a she, never thought of her as a he, but he might be… Can’t really ask, you know. Doesn’t work that way.” Chopstick moved towards the center pillar and console and began flicking switches and hitting buttons. A strange humming sound, almost like the gears of a clock, and yet almost like a mother’s song came from the clockwork pillar. “This is my TARDIS, or well the cockpit, or well…one of the cockpits, she has a few.”
“Tar-dis?” Stacy repeated in wonder, watching out one of the windows as a yellow cow-like creature munched on reddish grass in a field full of creatures much the same. The sky was yellow. “And the windows?”
“They look out onto some of my favorite places. That one-” he pointed to a window that looked more like an aquarium “- looks at the blossoming city of Goreahadicia on Gorimunacia. The fish learned to speak a couple millennia back, and they’ve only just developed non-fin like limbs. Very interesting. I’ve been watching them for a long time, though I suppose I could cheat and just check in on them in a couple of millennia…. But it’s less exciting that way.”
“A couple of millennia? I’m sorry…what?” Stacy was completely confused by now. First, a man in her garden, then a missing flower stand that was really a clockmaker’s shop that wasn’t actually a clockmaker's shop but a thing called a TARDIS.
“I’m sorry, I guess I should start at the beginning. Or, well, not the beginning, that would take too long, but perhaps with the basics.” Chopstick sat down on a flat cushion near the center pillar and gestured for Stacy to sit on another one nearby. After she sat he smiled.
“Hi, I’m the Leader, this is my TARDIS -- it stands for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space -- it’s my spaceship-slash-time machine. I am a time lord, I travel through space and time, don’t ask how old I am, at least not yet. My TARDIS malfunctioned early this morning and I fell out the front door into your garden. And no, you don’t have to call me Leader. You, my Stacy-who-is-a-lady…” He smiled and his eyes told a thousand secrets.
“You get to call me Jinki.”