The Undoing of Ms. Germaine (Part 5)
After countless failed time loops, she glimpses the life she fought for—but the cost proves unbearable.
If you’re new here, I sometimes post fiction I’m working on. Welcome!
This story is about a woman in handcuffs who claims she traveled through time to undo the one mistake that haunts her.
It’s been a while since the last installment, so you can catch up on the previous portions here:
The patient shook her head and stared at the blank door, her only means of escape. “When did anything ever go right?”
The doctor flipped his pages back up and began writing again.
“Endless experiments,” she said, “going over and over the same days until everything blended together. Too many times to count, we got close and failed. The rock kept falling downhill every time—”
She paused and sighed, “—until it didn’t.”
The doctor’s eyes shot to hers. “Wait, are you saying the child lived?”
The patient’s chin began to quiver. Her face fell to the table between her elbows, hands clasped together above her head as if in prayer.
“I can’t,” she said. “I can’t go there yet.”
They sat in silence for several moments as her shoulders shook with sobs. The doctor reviewed his notes on one side while nervously spinning his cigarette pack with the other hand. After a long while, the woman sniffed, surreptitiously wiped her eyes, and looked back up. She sat as straight as she could in her chair with her arms still chained.
“Are you ready now?” The doctor tapped his pen on the yellow paper. She only shook her head. He tapped the notepad and said, “Then perhaps you can clarify something for me.”
“Shoot.” Her voice was raspy.
“You told me your first few trips lasted eighteen months. Then you mentioned going back again and again. I’m paraphrasing, ‘too many times to count, in six-month intervals, like Sisyphus,’” he paused, making air quotes with his left hand. “Even if ‘too many times to count’ reaches two dozen, wouldn’t that put you well into your seventies? You don’t look that old.”
The patient smirked. “Congratulations, Doc. You caught me using averages. It’s hard enough to keep things straight when you return to the same time and events repeatedly. I’m trying to condense the story for your benefit.”
“Walk me through it, then.”
The patient rolled her eyes and pursed her lips as the air conditioning rattled through the vents.
Ultimately, I had several major trips, maybe ten or eleven. But in between—once I realized that my actions stuck, that all my plans were already in play, and I just had to insert myself into those relationships—that’s when I figured out that I could cycle faster.
So, I did.
My AI agent needed more data to help me figure out what to do next. I picked out what we thought were key moments that changed the timeline, and I went back to those moments to experiment.
Sometimes it was a day. Sometimes it took a couple of weeks before I realized that that decision hadn’t changed anything. But if I knew, for instance, exactly what to say to my friend to get her to talk about the abortion, then I could avoid wasting hours and days and weeks of conversation to get to that outcome.
Each time I had those conversations, I could skip all the meaningless stuff, go straight to what made the difference.
The doctor cleared his throat as he rolled his head to one side. “It sounds like you learned how to manipulate these people,” he said.
“I can see why you would think that way. You’ve never had to deal with something like this. But remember, I was trying to save a life.”
Besides, all of these people were willing to help. If I could get it smoother and faster, I had to. Like you say, I was running out of time—getting older. The way I calculate it. I left just before I turned fifty-one, and I’ve spent approximately nine-and-a-half years in the past. Not many adoption agencies are willing to place a newborn with a woman in her sixties.
Lucky for me, I have good genes.
And on paper, I’m forty-seven with my AI documents. Maybe I look a little haggard for that. But for a sixty-year-old, I look pretty good, even with all the time travel.
“That’s remarkably plausible,” he said. “How many of these mini...trips would you say you took?”
“That’s the too many to count part. I’d have to check my AI agent or go back to my house with my records to tell you exactly. Dozens? Probably a fair guess.”
“And none of them were successful,” the doctor said, his tone flat and heavy as a millstone.
The patient’s chin dimpled as she shook her head.
“Why don’t I sum up all those micro-trips for you, Doc?”
He nodded as he took the first drag on a new cigarette.
We got the papers signed. And that became the new checkpoint for things that were settled in time.
Once those papers were signed and filed, they were locked in. I could jump back to the day after that happened, or anywhere up until...never mind.
Anywhere in between then and now. That part would be done.
Then I just had to pull the right levers, have the right conversations, and make sure Melissa went through with the adoption. Sometimes, she backed out early.
Most times.
She was allowed to do that.
But the longer the pregnancy went on, the more complicated it got. At week twenty-five, the doctors told her there were complications. With that news, I couldn’t stop her. She chose abortion every time.
It didn’t matter how much I pleaded; how much I promised. I was willing to give this child the best life possible. She didn’t want to bring a baby into the world who was handicapped or disabled.
If there was a tiny probability the child would have a life that she saw as less than normal—Melissa wouldn’t have it. That period had the most trips.
The doctor nodded as he flipped another page. He opened his mouth, a question poised.
Finally, I found a breakthrough! I convinced her to have the baby.
But then the complications got worse.
The doctor closed his mouth and looked at her.
Somewhere around week thirty-two, Gloria took a turn. She didn’t make it.
I didn’t grieve. I didn’t cry. I immediately went back to the signing date and pushed harder for the tests to happen early, so that we could do something!
After another round of trying to convince Melissa, I paid for the tests. I paid for the intervention. Time after time, I shelled out money and favors and my own heart to save this baby and get her born.
“I can only imagine how much that pained you,” said the doctor, barely holding her gaze.
The patient held up her hand to stop him. It was clear she held back further tears.
“Apologies,” the doctor said.
It felt like an eternity.
It felt like Hell!
I pushed that stone up the hill and every time it rolled back, until—
“So, she was born,” the doctor said, his voice rising with his brows.
The patient nodded and sat in silence again for several minutes, staring beyond him. “Yes,” she whispered.
The doctor squirmed in his seat, waiting for her to continue.
One time.
This last time.
The interventions worked. The doctors thought Gloria could survive and Melissa had an emergency C-section six weeks early. I had to bribe her to go through with it. I promised to pay for her postgraduate studies. But she did it.
Melissa was fine after surgery, but Gloria ended up in NICU. And for a little while, I held that baby—if only with my eyes.
She lay inside a glass incubator. Tubes, wires, and tape covered her like she was one of Dr. Frankenstein’s experiments.
But she was perfect. Perfect and beautiful, and I could never hold her.
They wouldn’t let me.
Again, the doctor’s scratching pen was the only sound in the room until he coughed.
“If she lived,” he said, “then why are you here?”
This is part 5 of 7.
Read the rest here.
This fiction is inspired by several women who have told me of their regret after an abortion. I dedicate it to their silent struggle in a world that ignores their stories.
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In addition to speculative fiction with spiritual themes, Brandon Wilborn also writes articles about Faith, Fatherhood, and Classic Values on the Imago Dad Substack. Learn more about his speculative fiction at BrandonWilborn.com or his children’s fiction at DogKnights.com