Time slips and tax thiev.., p.1
Time Slips & Tax Thieves, page 1
part #4 of Time Travelling Taxman Series
Time Slips & Tax Thieves
Time Travelling Taxman, Book Four
By Rachel Ford
Chapter One
Alfred Favero sighed. He was a senior analyst with the Internal Revenue Service, a man of learning; an accomplished professional, one of the top in his field. And yet, here he was, grunting in the dirt like a common animal, beads of perspiration dripping down his face as he wielded a tiny yellow mallet against, of all things, a tent stake.
That he seemed to be losing the fight only made matters that much worse. They’d pitched their tent in a gravel-covered patch of their campsite. “That,” Nancy told him, “will have better drainage.” He didn’t doubt it. The rest of their site was a veritable swamp, oozing with mud from yesterday’s rainfall.
Still, driving a tent stake into gravel was darned near impossible as far as he was concerned. How Nance had managed to get the other three stakes in baffled him.
Alfred and Nancy Abbot worked together. He was one of the tax analysts, and she was the information systems team lead. But more to the point, she was his girlfriend and the love of Alfred’s life. Which is how she managed to talk him into getting into awful predicaments like this one. A few months earlier, it had been a comic book convention that nearly left them both dead. For the next two weeks, it would be camping.
He’d already done a risk analysis, and the odds were not great. Aside from predators – bears, wolves, even the odd mountain lion – there were the less obvious dangers – insects, and all the diseases they brought with them. Then there was the increased risk of skin cancer that came with prolonged exposure to the sun, and the heightened danger of other forms of cancer that came from using the various repellents he’d packed.
That, he supposed, was some manner of cosmic jest played out on poor fools like him: the only way to keep safe from Lyme disease, from anaplasmosis and the various spotted fevers, from all the pathogenic, viral, and protozoan infections that insects could transmit, and from that great nemesis of human kind, skin cancer, was to douse yourself in more chemicals than a pesticide factory floor. And that, of course, increased your risk to other cancers. If God had a sense of humor, it was decidedly dark.
Nancy, though, had just laughed off his chart, reminding him that people went camping all the time and managed to survive. “You’ll be fine, babe.”
“You’ll be sorry when we both die of cancer,” he’d warned her grimly. Not that it had made any difference. Here he was, after all, fighting with a tent stake: an apex predator at the height of human advancement, wrestling with rock fragments and a little strip of metal.
This is going to be a long two weeks.
“How’s that going?” Nancy called from the vehicle.
“It’s going.”
“If it’s not cooperating, maybe try-”
“Nancy,” he said, frowning up at her, “I think I can get a stake in the ground.”
He wasn’t, of course. But he certainly wasn’t going to admit as much to his girlfriend, either. He was going to get that stake in, or, dammit, he was going to die trying.
Fortunately, it didn’t come to anything so drastic. A few muttered curses – “Fudge muffins” and “you son-of-a-biscuit” – later, the stake slipped into place. Not entirely into place; Nancy’s stakes were flush with the ground, but his peaked a good inch or so above it. But close enough. It’ll hold, he decided.
Now, sucking in a lung full of moisture-heavy air and swiping perspiration from his brow, he stood. “Alright, what next?”
“You want to grab the cooler?”
“Sure.”
“Put it there, under that patch of trees.”
He followed the direction she indicated with his gaze, then nodded. This was more suited to his camping skillset. See heavy thing. Lift heavy thing. Move heavy thing. Be done.
He’d never been one for camping. He’d gone now and again with his family, but his dad and brother always enjoyed it more than he and his mom had. If not for Nance, he would have happily spent the rest of his days with camping relegated to a distant memory.
But though she’d been able to talk him into it, it had been a long time since he’d last tried camping. His memory of what to do was spotty at best, so he relied on her for direction.
And, for better or worse, Nance was nothing if not the gal with the plan. She’d made spreadsheets of what they needed to bring before they left. She’d printed off a checklist to confirm they had everything, and assigned each of them tasks. She’d even made spreadsheets of their meal options, laying out how much food they had, and what any given option meant for the remaining choices. “So, on the breakfast tab, you see the eggs? If we just have eggs for breakfast – fried, boiled, eggs in a nest – that means we have fewer egg options later on. But if we mix in pancakes now and then, we stretch our options – because you only need one egg per recipe of pancakes. Of course, pancakes does cut into our milk and oil…”
That was a mess he was going to let her solve. He’d be more than happy to do his share of the cooking, but she was the one who had brought math and spreadsheets into it. She’d be the one to sort them out.
In the meantime, though, he’d focus on unloading their gear. After the cooler came the air mattress and duffel bag of their clothes. “I’ll get those,” she said. “You grab the cook stove and propane.”
Here, Alfred’s jaw dropped. Sugar cookies. Though he managed to keep the cursing internal, he couldn’t keep apprehension out of his voice. “So, uh, theoretically, Nance, how bad would it be if I forgot the propane?” It had been on his list, and she’d reminded him a few times. He vaguely remembered something about not being able to cook without the propane, but he was hoping she’d been exaggerating.
Nancy poked her head out of the tent. “What?”
“Suppose I, say, forgot the propane…how badly would that impact our trip?”
Rolling her eyes, Nancy said, “There’s no ‘suppose’ about it, Mr. Favero: you did forget the propane. I saw it was missing during my last check.”
“Oh.” She seemed a lot less concerned than he was. Maybe it wasn’t a problem after all. “So…not a big deal then?”
“Sure, if you like eating raw food.”
Now, Alfred was confused. Her blue eyes were twinkling, but the revelation struck him as rather dire. “Well, what are we going to do?”
“I grabbed it before we left. It, and your clothes.” She shook her head at him. “You forgot those too.”
“Oh. Did I?”
“Yup.”
He felt a little silly at that. “I don’t know how. I checked your list twice. Are you sure it was on there?” At this, she pulled a face, and he nodded. “Of course you are. You data nerd.”
She ducked back into the tent, and he was just congratulating himself on routing her with his wit when a large white projectile shot out in his direction. He started a moment before something soft collided with him. “Heads up,” she called. “Pillow incoming.”
Sputtering, he grabbed it. “Hey, stop that. That’s my pillow.”
“Yup.” She was grinning. “It is. Good thing you didn’t drop it in the mud.”
“Good thing for you,” he declared, tossing it back to her.
“Oh no,” she said, feigning a fumble. “There it goes.”
Despite the buzz of mosquitos around his ears, the drip of sweat on his person, and the general anxiety of the dangers all around them, he laughed. “Alright, where should I put the grill thing?”
“On the picnic table.”
“Okay.”
“And then get the tub of cookware.”
“Alright.”
“Once I’m done here, I’ll get us some coffee going.”
Alfred rolled his eyes. “Great. Camp coffee. I might as well just chomp a mouthful of grounds now.”
“I said I’d get it going, darling,” Nancy smirked back. “Not you.”
Alfred stretched out his legs and sighed. This time, it was a contented sigh. He wasn’t sure how Nance had managed it, but she’d made a good cup of coffee. He would have preferred the addition of a nice caramel syrup, but for regular coffee with regular milk, this was very good.
She’d taken out the citronella torches too, and most of the mosquitos had fled the area. He sympathized, every time the wind changed and he got a lung full of fumes. But, on the other hand, he wasn’t keen on being a walking foreign food buffet, either.
“You hungry?” she asked.
“Starved.”
This, apparently, was a good answer, because Nancy smiled broadly. “Good. What should we make?”
Here we go. “I don’t know.”
“Let me consult my spreadsheet.”
“Or we could wing it…”
She shook her head disapprovingly at him. “Our rations are carefully planned, babe. You know that.”
“Don’t I ever,” he groaned.
“My point is, if we just wing it, we may end up running out of food before the two weeks are up.”
“There’s a store not ten miles down the road.”
“Yeah, but no civilization, remember? We’re roughing it.”
“With an airbed and a camp stove and spreadsheets?”
She grinned at him. “Well, not too rough. Still, we can’t just run to the store. That’s cheating.”
“Cheating?”
“You heard me,” she nodded, sifting through a stack of papers.
“It’s not a test, babe.”
“It is. Think of it l
“With an SUV packed full of supplies.”
“With an SUV packed full of supplies,” she laughed. “That’s the only way to face the zombie apocalypse, isn’t it?”
He considered for a moment, then shook his head. “I’m voting ‘no.’ The zombies win. Let’s just give up, fail the test, and have fun.”
She dismissed this, though, with a wave of her hand. “But seriously, what do you think? Personally, I could go for grilled pizza.”
“The favorite food of all apocalypse heroes. We are so roughing it.”
“And, anyway, we can cross the cheese off the list: one less perishable to keep track of.”
Alfred groaned. “Fine. Pizza it is then.”
“Great. You want to get started on the dough?”
“Wait, you mean…we have to make the dough?”
“Of course. We’re roughing it, remember?” He frowned at her, and she laughed. “Don’t worry. It’s a mix. All you got to do is add water.”
“Oh. Okay, I guess I’ll live through that.”
“See? The zombies won’t stand a chance.”
Chapter Two
Alfred slept soundly that night. Once camp was set up, Nancy had dragged them to one of the longer hiking trails. He’d applied so much bug spray and sunscreen he nearly asphyxiated himself at one point. Still, though the hike was arduous and the chemical cocktail lethal, it had been a good workout. They’d finished the day up with a swim. The promise of a shower afterward had been sufficient to keep the thoughts of how many people must have urinated in that public lake from his mind, and the taxman positively enjoyed himself.
Then they had showered and got a campfire started. He’d read aloud and Nance prepared dinner. He felt a little bad about leaving the cooking to her, but the fact was, he didn’t dare intervene. She’d been planning every meal with such gusto for so long, and she seized on the opportunity at the slightest provocation, that it seemed wrong to get in the way.
This time, she’d bypassed the propane cook stove and went straight to the campfire. The food was smokier and a little more charred than he would have preferred, but she beamed with delight the whole time. “I love cooking on a real fire.”
He didn’t understand, but, then, he didn’t really understand the appeal of camping either. Nature was all well and good when observed from a distance, but to deliberately inject oneself into its midst, into the swarms of bugs and dirt and general unpleasantness? It didn’t make sense.
Then again, it didn’t matter much either. Nancy’s eyes sparkled, as if every mundane aspect of life was somehow rendered magical by the added inconvenience and unsanitariness. And that was the appeal to him.
So, as the temperature fell to a comfortable coolness, he wrapped an arm around her, and they slept. How many hours ticked by, he wasn’t sure. Now and then, he’d stir as she moved and the air mattress wobbled underneath them both. Now and then, vague, faraway sounds would reach his thoughts: the wailing of wind, or the splashing of water. He dreamed of being at sea, on a pirate ship in one of the video games Nance played. In his mind, sea shanties carried on a brisk sea breeze, and the ship underfoot rose and fell on rolling waves.
But it was the splash of something cold and wet on his face that drew him from this happy reverie. He started upright. “What the-?”
Nancy stirred at his side. “Alfred?”
He rubbed at the cold liquid on his face, trailing down his forehead and cheek. “What is that?” he wondered, of no one in particular.
“Sweetheart?” she said beside him, her voice still heavy with sleep. “What’s going on?”
“I don’t know.” He reached for the flashlight Nance had given him. “There’s something wet.”
“Hmm,” she said, her tone a little wearier than before. “Really?”
He stretched his hand blindly in the direction of the light. For a moment, it moved unobstructed through empty air. He leaned over the edge of their bed, dipping closer to the tent bottom. He was vaguely aware of noise outside their tent, steady and loud, like the drip of a faucet.
Then, his hand touched something cold and wet, and he yelped out loud. This time, Nancy woke too. The bed wobbled and shook as she sat upright, and a moment later a beam of bluish light cut through the darkness. She’d turned on her flashlight, and the light darted around their tent. “Babe, what’s going on?”
The illumination was sufficient for him to see the dim outline of his own flashlight, and he grabbed it and shined it on the cold liquid. It was clear, and glimmered in the light. “There’s…water in our tent,” he declared in a minute, mystified by the revelation.
Nancy’s flashlight pointed toward the tent now, its light tracing lines up and down the corner seams. “Dammit,” she said. “It’s the rain. The tent’s leaking.”
“Rain?” That, at least, he could deal with. Fear receded, and Alfred’s reason returned. The noise made sense. It wasn’t a faucet outside; it was a downpour. And, apparently, tents leaked. That was an aspect of camping he’d never had the dubious pleasure of dealing with before.
“I wish I’d re-applied silicone spray,” she was saying, meanwhile. “But the weather said the rain had passed.”
“Well, the clouds didn’t get the memo,” he declared, wrinkling his nose at the sight of the puddles across the bottom of their tent. “What a mess.”
She nodded glumly. “Well, there’s nothing we can do about it now. We’ll just have to wait until morning, and sort it out then.”
This, of course, was easier said than done. No sooner than had they switched their flashlights off, did another icy droplet of rain splatter onto Alfred’s face. He knew exactly what it was, but he still started at the temperature. “Oh, that’s cold.”
After the third droplet hit him, following a much shorter interval than before, he sat up again. “Nance, I’m getting rained on. I can’t sleep like this.”
“Can you shift a little? So you’re out of the rain?”
“Shift?” The question seemed preposterous to him. “There’s rain coming into our tent. Like, actual water, Nancy.”
“I know, babe…but I don’t know what to do about it. I mean, I waterproofed the thing once before we left. Obviously, that wasn’t enough. But it’s too late to fix it now. We’re just going to have to wait out the storm, and then dry everything tomorrow.”
“What if it’s raining tomorrow too?”
She sighed. “Well, that’d suck.”
Another droplet splattered down on him, and he shivered. “And in the meantime, I’m going to be soaked.”
The interior of the tent was suddenly filled with a bluish light, and he blinked. She was holding her flashlight again. “You want to wait it out in the car?”
He considered. The idea of sleeping in a vehicle didn’t appeal much, but, then, it appealed more than being rained on. “Okay,” he said at length.
“Alright. We’ll have to make a dash for it. It’s raining cats and dogs out there.”
He nodded, ignoring the urge to consider the origins of that phrase. Perhaps there was some cryptic linguistic history there. But as it stood, it was downright mortifying. “Anyway,” he said aloud, “I agree. I don’t want to get soaked.”
“We should grab anything we think we’ll need in the car. So, flashlights for sure.”
Alfred nodded, grabbing his own. “And keys.”
“And keys,” she agreed. “And cell phones.”
“Right. Anything else?”
They considered, then she shook her head. “I think that’s everything.”
“We shouldn’t need any bug spray, right?”
“I hope not,” she laughed. “Oh, grab a jacket. It’ll at least help keep you dry.”
“Okay. You ready then?”
Nodding, she pushed onto her feet. For a moment, they stood there, half hunched over to avoid contact with the sodden tent overhead. Then, she reached for the zipper. “Ready?”
“Ready.”
With a quick arcing motion, she unzipped the tent flap. He darted out, his jacket propped over his head like a makeshift umbrella. She followed a moment later, pausing long enough to zip it back up.
