Baby Hitler

I've got a great idea for a short story. You know that facetious theoretical hypothetical question about being a time traveler, and whether or not you'd go back in time and kill Hitler as a baby?

Well, imagine there's someone, a University student, and he uses that question all the time, it's his go-to for when he meets new people, because he's the kind of numpty that thinks that sort of thing is deep, and this becomes a defining feature of him in a way, so he plays up to it, maybe people even start calling him "baby killer" or "the baby Hitler guy", some thing like that.

Now, years later he's grown up, he's met someone, and perhaps rather unexpectedly he's found himself fathering a child, a little adorable baby of his own, a cute apple-cheeked son.

So here he is, helping to nurture and raise this child, but slowly that question from his past comes back into his mind...

Sure, it's just a baby, but it does seem to scowl at him in a strangely threatening way, and it kicks at its mum - just as it did from the inside - and claws at her skin with surprisingly sharp nails. It seems to be possessed of - even though it can't possibly mean to - a single-minded determination to ruin the peace and calm of their lives in a way that, to him, seems unlike any other normal baby could.

As it grows older he begins to notice it subtly bullying other children, not understanding simple things like sharing, or that playtime shouldn't involve a wallop to the other kid's face, but, it's barely a toddler, surely these things are accidental? Surely...?

So, this guy starts wondering to himself again; "Maybe my baby is Hitler? Well, not the Hitler, but a Hitler equivalent and that, if left to continue down its path, it will inevitably become a genocidal monster?" He reassures himself that this isn't a question of bad parenting, he's positive of that, he doesn't treat his son badly or anything, he and his partner shower their love upon this child, they dote on it, they coo at it, they adore it, but still it seems that this child could  very well grow up to be the embodiment of pure evil.

Now, back in his Uni days he was always so certain, so sure of himself, of his answer to that question which he revelled in posing to every and anybody who happened to be down at the Varsity pub that evening. How he'd paint the scene; describe this adorable little cherub to them and then - he'd even mime this part out - place an imaginary revolver in their hand and point it towards that baby's head and ask:

"So, would you shoot baby Hitler?"

They'd say no. They'd say that maybe they'd try and encourage a better environment for the child. He'd argue back about the certainty of fate in this instance, that no matter what you tried to do this baby would become the Hitler of history, and that the only way to possibly prevent that would be to shoot this infant in the skull. Splatter its curious brains across the crib.

It was around now that people would either call him a sicko or ask him what he'd do, and he'd lean back confidently, announce how he'd definitely shoot baby Hitler, and take a swig from his bottle of cheap lager, satisfied with himself.

But, as far as he could tell, here, in the present, he was staring into the wet eyes of his own psychopathic offspring and he had now become the other person in his discussion, the one reasoning that things aren't so definite, that destiny and fate are nonsense, that nobody is born bad, that you can't know the future and that time-travel doesn't exist, so how could you ever know for sure, and even if you did know for sure why would murder be the answer? How could that possibly be the just thing to do?

So he didn't do it.

He didn't kill his son, even though that question kept returning to him over the years, as his boy moved from crawling to toddling to walking to running, passed exams, joined teams and clubs, got involved, developed a personality, became a person, became a man, and then...

Yeah, his son started a fascist group that brought about the deaths of millions upon millions of people, tens of millions actually. In fact, he was roundly regarded as being worse than Hitler. After him Hitler wasn't even the go to name for genocidal monsters anymore, no, it was his name they used, and when idiots in University towns posed the 'would you kill baby Hitler' question to friends and strangers they didn't say Hitler anymore, they said... well, yeah, you guessed it... him.

So, that's the idea for the story, pretty stupid really, and I'm not sure what the moral is... Is it; if you suspect your child might grow up to be evil then you should kill them? Or is it, more simply; kill all children, y'know just in case? I'm not sure, and I don't know if I could rationalise writing a story that seemed to justify either of those conclusions.

Hopefully it's more positive than that and does suggest that there is no absolute certainty with regards to the ultimate destination of our lives, but I think that's over-thinking it, anyway, not sure if I'll bother writing it, might do, one day, though it's not my top priority, besides I've got a new baby to look after...

Earlybird

The problem with being psychic is you get nostalgic for things that haven't happened yet.
    I was watching a squirrel move erratically around the base of a tree, I couldn't tell if it was looking for food or had already found some but forgotten where it had buried it, and I began thinking about Lea.
    We wouldn't meet for another four years, which was a shame, because I already have so much love for her, I'm impatient with it, it's like buying someone a present you know they're going to adore, but you've found it months before their birthday and you just can't wait to give it to them, to see them smile.
    My colleague, Amy, roused me from my daydreaming, handed me a wad of papers, told me that they needed to be signed off by the close of business. I drew the blinds so that the squirrel, and the future memories, wouldn't distract me.
    I've never been able to shake the thought though, the horrible sense of waiting that comes from its inevitability. January 17th, that's when I'll meet her, I don't need to make a note of the date, ever since I first knew the future it's been etched into my thoughts.
    But I've always been impatient, I could never wait for anything as a kid, I would bawl and scream for my lunch as soon as I'd finished my breakfast, and then dinner straight after that, it was as if the world were too slow for me. I think that's what caused me to become psychic, this impatience, this desire to have tomorrow today, and over time my reach got hungrier, stretching our beyond tomorrow's tomorrow until I saw all my tomorrows, and now I'm no longer thirsty for that knowledge, instead I crave the experiences of what I know is due me.
    That's why I chose to find her, I remembered a conversation we are going to have about the past, about what she was doing now, where she was studying, and I decided to take a week off of work and hang around in the city where she would be, where her present life is, before the chain of events that would lead us to meeting, and I walked the city's streets, I went to the bars she may have mentioned in off-handed remarks in reminisces that she's now initially experiencing.
    Irregardless of chronology we shared a moment, perhaps spurred on by my own search, so when my eyes finally found hers there will filled with a strange kind of optimism, and she felt it too. She didn't know how much like destiny it felt, though she said it seemed so predetermined that very evening, as if there were something magical about it all, it fuelled the romance of that night.
    We drank, we laughed, she was the first to make contact, to run fingertips across my bare forearm and we fell silent, our eyes looking up from the touch to one another, to lips in need of moisture, a sure sign, and we walked along the late night street away from the bar, into the square, dizzy hands, draped playfully around lamp-posts in a parody of theatricality, emphasizing the moment, the muchness of it all, and we kissed.
    I had beaten time and fate, I had taken my future and kicked my feet eager against the sides, spurring it on.
    But it was not to last, the next day she was full of regret, shame and sadness, she had a boyfriend, they'd been together for two years, I'd forgotten about him, and she was a mess of tears for what she'd done. I sneaked out, gave her my number, told her to call me.
    She said that she felt something, something special for me, and she didn't want to sound crazy, but it was like she knew she would meet me one day, but, knuckles paw hastily, pre-emptively against a damp eye, it wasn't supposed to be yesterday. She sighed, jokingly cursed about having a boyfriend, but didn't take kindly to my suggestion that if she felt that way about me then maybe she should end things with him, that maybe she should just follow her heart, and she smiled sweetly but seriously and told me life isn't like that. It should be, I spat back, a little too petulant.
    We kissed goodbye, I told her that if she ever needed to she could call me, no matter how much time had passed, no matter where she imagined I might be. Her smile was sad. I caught the train home.

Four years later on January 17th I was waiting for her, but she wasn't there. I had written the date down in my diary as well, as it was becoming harder to keep it in my head, the future was harder to see in general, I know I'd changed things, but I wasn't prepared for this lack of foreknowledge, this foggy lack of clarity, because as hard as I try all I can see now in my future is nothingness.

The Coincidence Machine

I didn't know what it was at first.  It was shrouded in bubble wrap, which had rendered it spherical, but once the wrappings were removed it was a small rectangular casket with a leather shoulder strap.  There were various knobs and dials and a brass handled lever.  There was a yellowed roll of paper in amongst the wrapping, and on it was written these words: 'Henry, don't play with this, it's most precarious.  Uncle Stanislous.'
    Naturally this only piqued my curiosity.  I put the leather strap over my head and across my chest, the casket sat snugly at my stomach, the enticing array of buttons in easy reach of my eager fingers.
    I was ginger at first, choosing carefully which dial to twist, and doing so only gradually, but, as nothing seemed to happen I became more reckless, more ready to turn things as far as they would go, until at last in utter frustration I threw my hands to my sides and exclaimed; "How does this contraption work?!"
    At this point I stumbled backwards over an old dusty sheet, pulling the covering off of one of my father's bookshelves, revealing an assortment of aged tomes.  One in particular caught my eye, less dusty than the others, it was a small book, no more than 100 pages at most and didn't bare any inscription on the spine.  I stood up and slipped it from the shelf.
    It turned out to be a notebook, written by this Uncle Stanislous, and explaining the workings of the box at my belly.  It was, what he called, a coincidence machine.  I skimmed listlessly through the pages, the book falling on the final page of scribbled inkings, words stressed with harsh under-lining, emphasizing their importance: 'Perhaps it is best to leave things to chance.'
    This did not interest me, I flipped back to the beginning, to the operation of the machine.  It transpired that the various dials controlled levels of coincidence, from a little bit of happenstance through kismet and ultimately to destiny.  You could carefully adjust each dial to endeavour to incur the occurence of all manner of fates, from financial to romantic, though the book was rather unsure of the correct ratios to encourage each.  The lever was, quite simply, the on and off switch.
    To be sure I moved the lever back into the off position.  Just in case.
    I figured the best place to test the coincidence machine would be somewhere out in the open, somewhere public and prone to randomness.

I received a few suspicious looks as I strolled around the supermarket with this odd brown box hanging from my neck, carefully twiddling its knobs, but waiting until just the right moment to finally turn it on.  Finally I reached a good cross-roads, a small roundabout of baked goods where the breads and cakes were kept.  I stood back, surveyed the scene, and pushed the lever forward.
    There was a lady examining egg boxes, opening each one and checking the contents carefully, inspecting each half dozen, looking for the perfect purchase.  Nearby a father and his toddler were inspecting birthday cakes, trying to find the right one, the boy was unhappy with the selection of novelty caterpillars, football shapes and boy bands.
    "Well, what do you want on your cake, son?"
    "A picture of me fighting a hundred robot sharks!"
    His father chuckled, "I think that's rather wishful thinking..."
    "There it is!" his boy beamed, pointing at a cake down in the corner.
    "What?" his father stepped forward, assuming that his son had spotted another satisfactory confection and forgotten all about his surreal suggestion.  But there, sure enough, was a rectangle of sponge, smothered in icing and bearing a rather life-like image of the boy dressed as a space warrior blasting at a seemingly endless army of mechanised great whites with his double-barrelled laser rifle.  His father, with a look of some confusion and trepdiation in his eyes, snatched up the cake and hurried off.
    I quickly pulled the lever back.  I took out my camera, snapped a picture of the dials, and wrote - in a notebook I had purchased earlier - 'Tuesday 11am: Cake coincidence.'

I went to the park, it was a nice day but quiet, perhaps it was too late for all the joggers and too early for all the lunchers.  I sat on a bench and adjusted each dial ever so slightly, wanting to see what effects a small change would have before I tried anything too wild.  I looked around and pushed the lever.
    “Michael?” came an excited female voice, I turned, as it had called my name.
    Stood in the path, dressed in jogging clothes, removing the headphones of her mp3 player from her ears, was Elizabeth.  She had been a huge crush of mine throughout University, we were on the same course together, and she looked even more beautiful now than she had done so then.  She brushed a slip of her long dark hair back from her eyes where it had fallen from the neat pony-tail it was otherwise cinched into, and walked towards me.  I stood and received a big hug and a rather unexpected kiss on the cheek.
    “Hey!” I beamed, “It’s been a long time.”
    “It’s been five years exactly,” she nodded, doing the rather simple math in her head.  It was indeed almost exactly five years since the end of term of the last year of University.  “How have you been?”
    “Good, yeah, great, I’ve moved to London, how about you?”
    “Yeah, London as well, been here for a few months.”
    “Whereabouts are you?”
    “Stoke Newington.”
    “Oh, me too, I have a flat on Church Street.”
    “Me too!  Spooky.” She exclaimed.
    “I know,” I agreed, but I knew that this was not what she thought it was.
    “What number?”
    Tentatively I said; “Thirty eight.”
    “No!  I’m at thirty-seven, what a –“
    I cut her short, almost loath to hear the word, and feeling like the cruel invisible orchestrator of some twisted symphony.  “Are you still seeing…?”
    I only wished to imply his name, she’d been with Johnny for the final two years of Uni, they’d begun their relationship on the very day I had finally psyched myself up enough to try and ask Elizabeth out.  When I got to Scholars – our regular pub – there was Elizabeth and Johnny, fingers entwined, slumped happily on the sofa chairs at the back.  They didn’t see me, but I saw them and immediately turned around, went home and drank an entire bottle of Glen’s vodka.
    “Johnny?  No, we broke up about a month after Uni, in fact I haven’t seen him in – OH MY GOD!” she broke into another massive smile, but she was looking just over my shoulder.
    I turned, there was Johnny, he was riding a bicycle towards us, but came almost immediately to a halt when he saw Elizabeth’s grinning face and out-stretched arms.
    “This is SO wild!” she howled with glee.
    “Elizabeth?” Johnny smiled wistfully, “I don’t believe it.” He turned and looked me up and down, scrunching his eyes into a squint of remembrance, “And… Martin, good to see you too, buddy.”
    “Michael,” I corrected, shaking his hand.
    “No, it’s Johnny.” He corrected, squeezing a little more tightly as he did so.
    “So, how have you been?” his correction directed at Elizabeth, I was no longer part of his attention, I could have stripped naked, painted myself blue and farted the complete works of Shostakovich and he wouldn’t have noticed.
    “Great, yeah, me and Michael –“ (She emphasized my name for Johnny’s benefit, but I doubt it mattered.) “-were just catching up, we’re neighbours, can you believe that?”
    “That’s great,” Johnny said with a spectacular lack of conviction.
    “How about you? I thought you’d moved to Chicago?”
    Suddenly Johnny seemed to take on a different shade of confusion, he looked around like a concerned squirrel and surveyed the scene, the cold London skyline, the weary trees, the dew dusted grass.
    “I have,” he whimpered.
    “What brings you back?”
    “I’m back?”
    “Yes,” suddenly Elizabeth lost her radiance, “We’re in Clissold Park, Stoke Newington.”
    “What?! I… What? You’re messing with me, right?”
    “No, I, well, look, that’s the Castle, that’s the pond, er, how can I prove this?” Elizabeth got out her mobile phone, illuminated the screen and showed him the little location indicator beneath the clock that read ‘London’.
    “This is impossible… I was on my way to a business meeting… the most important…” his eyes darted from left to right, baubles of sweat were visibly sprouting out of his brow, his hands were shaking on the handlebars, his voice was beginning to quiver.
    I timidly glanced down at the coincidence machine and, very slowly so as not to arouse suspicion, edged the lever back to the off position.
    But, unlike fairy tales when the spell is broken, things did not revert back to normal, and Johnny stood there unable to articulate his bafflement. He was overcome with shock, Elizabeth, being the wonderful person she is, wrapped an arm around him and said she’d make him a cup of tea at hers and then they could figure out what had happened and how to get him home. I made some terribly flimsy excuses and, with waves of guilt crashing over me, took a prolonged and circuitous route back to the flat so as not to bump into my new neighbour.

When I was home I took a photograph of the settings and wrote; ‘Tuesday 1pm: Old friends.’
Now I was beginning to realise the terrible power of the coincidence machine. Whilst it had clearly brightened that child’s birthday, relieved – and, I think, worried – that beleaguered father, almost allowed me to make up for a missed romantic opportunity, it had, on the other hand perhaps destroyed a man’s career, cost him a flight home and, worst of all, potentially reunited a couple I was more than grateful to have seen the end of.
    I began to suspect that there was no real way to control the coincidence machine once it was operational, that you couldn’t will a coincidence into action, and, at first, the coincidence machine had a secret agenda of its own that, ultimately, fed off of the thoughts and feelings of those drawn into its sphere and brought about whatever little acts of fate they perhaps wished for or dreaded, unintentionally or otherwise.  Turning the coincidence machine on was a leap of faith, a plunge into the unknown, it was dangerous and could not be trusted.
    I felt that the power of this device was too much for anyone to be responsible for, that the consequences of operating it were too random and hazardous for further experimentation, no amount of analysis of those various dials would ever be enough to understand the machinations of fate, and that potentially tragedy could befall me before I completed my task.
    Worse, I worried that the coincidence machine had not only been effecting me, but it had impacted others, that, suddenly, spontaneously, around the world there had been a mass outbreak of coincidences resulting in all manner of awful and awkward situations. Though another, more romantic, voice in my head had posited that perhaps it could have possibly resulted in the discovery of important clues in unsolvable cases, of parents being reunited with long lost children, of lovers seperated by trivial notions who both longed to speak but had never had the courage miraculously found themselves face to face and immediately fell into one another’s embrace.
    What was it? I wondered. If there are two sides to coincidence, the magical and tragical, then does one outweigh the other? For all the strained conversations that a bad coincidence could elicit, perhaps the good that this device was capable of tipped the balance.
     I had convinced myself, it was worth the risk, I turned the coincidence machine back on, besides, what’s the worst that could happen, it’s not the end of the world.