Chapter 1: History

“Finally, five o’clock.”

Usually, George worked until well past midnight, always fixing computers, and oddly enough, watches. It had always been a great hobby of his to fix things. Well, not always, because he used to think breaking things was more fun, until when he was fifteen, he threw his best friend’s bicycle in the pond – just for fun. The fun quickly passed when he got severely beaten up by said friend’s dad. That’s when he started fixing things. After looking for a job for years, he gave up and decided to be weird – to start his own company. George’s Fixation, it was called, simply because he couldn’t think of a better name. Still, it was a pretty good name, since he was absolutely glued to his work – fixing computers.

Frank, the clerk and only employee George had hired for his tiny but relatively lucrative company, came in, just as his boss was about to head home.
“Uh, George, there’s someone to see you.”
“Oh no… I’m having dinner with the wife at seven thirty… is it important?”
“Well, the guy looks excited, says something about ‘most interesting’ blah blah, I don’t know… shall I show him in?”
“Hmm… just give him some coffee while I call my wife… I hope it won’t take long, but I’m afraid I know who’s on the other side of my office door.”
“We’re out of coffee, chief.”
“Then give him tea and tell him it’s coffee. He’ll probably find it most interesting.”

George guessed it rightly. His wife, Lori, was a total history buff. Not just enthusiastic – she was a history professor at the local University.
“Why must she always get into the history of things…” George sighed.
It was this ‘getting into history’ that fired a chain of events that made George’s life miserable. At least, in his opinion. George had to go figure out what his family roots were. And George conceded.
In his right mind he would never agree upon something like that – the only history he was interested in was the lifetime of a clockwork. But he wasn’t in his right mind – he was in love, totally in love with Lori. He had agreed to everything she said, always. And why not? He was 29 now, and when he got to know Lori a couple of years ago, he’d never expected to ever find true love; but he did. And that’s when things went downhill with his creative, adventurous, talented mind. He was now under a curse – the curse of family life. And of agreeing to everything your beautiful, brown-haired, green-eyed, red lipstick-toting wife would say. Especially in that red dress she looked incredibly stunning, and he still wondered why she fell for a guy with no real attractive sides. Well, except the inside maybe.

“Mister Henderson!”
George woke up into reality very suddenly. The dream image of his perfect wife and himself in Hawaii – complete with hula skirts – that his mind got him into, was now replaced with a balding, rather uninteresting man with a tie. And a stain on his shirt. Oh, how George hated that. He was chaotic in everything (especially his desk, where his only tidy thing was the executive thingy with five iron balls on strings), except in clothing.
The boring man coughed. “George? Are you daydreaming again?”
“Oh, yes, sorry. Grab a seat, André.”
Just then he realised that he forgot to call his wife. Lori would be flaming mad, and now he was stuck here with a stupid professor connected to the University of Saskatchnecticut or something, in stead of with his darling snookums. At least it couldn’t get any worse.
“Thank you. George, I was browsing through some archives at a library in Portugal, when…”
“Ah, so that’s where you were all that time.”
“Yes… I was abroad for my work, and decided to see if I’d find anything interesting there.”
“I almost missed you,” George added under his breath.
Ignoring this last remark, Professor André Lacroix, historian – as his business card read – went on: “I found something most interesting.”
This was bad. Lacroix used his catchphrase quite a lot, but this was getting out of hand. He probably found something real this time, George thought.
“Bring it on,” said George, looking at one of the two dozen watches in the room, hoping for them to stop ticking and for time to wait for him.
The professor reached into his attaché case, pulling out a manila coloured folder. Some pink and white forms were sticking out a bit. It seemed nothing special, but the gleam in André’s eyes told otherwise. He quickly browsed through the bunch of documents, until his fingers stopped at a yellowish document.
“Look,” he said, handing George the piece of paper.
“Uh, what’s this, doc? I can’t read Spanish, man.”
“It’s not Spanish, it’s Portuguese.”
“Doesn’t make it any more special. Or less, for that matter.”
“Look closely, George. Look at the names. See if you discover anything special.”
George looked. And again. And with a rather blank look, he stared at the professor, who snatched the document out of George’s hands.
“What are you, a chimpanzee? Read, man, read! Look at that. Right there.”
André pointed to a name.
“What does it say?” He didn’t have much hope of Mr Henderson actually giving a normal answer, but it was worth a try.
“Uh, now, let me see. Cristoble Colon? Probably a surgeon or something.”
“Close enough for a chimpanzee. It’s Cristobal Colon. Does that ring a bell?”
“Oh, good that you mention ringing. Will this take long? Because if it will, I have to call my wife that I can’t make dinner.”
“Oh, you bet this will take long. If you are willing to go all the way, that is.”
Going all the way was something you didn’t normally hear out of Mr Lacroix’s mouth, and going all the way was something that George hadn’t done for quite a while; not since the incident with the bicycle.
“Okay, hang on, don’t go away, I’ll be right back, André.”
“And he’s a proper poet too,” André chuckled.

Frank was still happily hacking away on the keyboard when George exited his office and entered the hallway. Well, hallway wasn’t perhaps the best of names, since it was a sort of lobby/office/canteen.
“Time for you to go, Frank, what are you still doing here?”
Frank hurriedly clicked some windows away.
“Was that what I think it was, Frankie?”
“No… I…”
But then the MSN Messenger window popped up above the clock: ‘frank? where are u?’
“Ah, you were chatting with your girl. No problem, but you may continue it at home if you like. I’ll close up the joint today. Enjoy your weekend.”
After saying goodbye to his girlfriend (which involved i luv u and some kiss and heart smilies), Frank left the office, red-faced but happy to be able to go to the movies with his girl. George wished he was in his shoes right now.
He slowly walked to the phone, reluctantly lifted up the horn, and dialed the number. One beep. Two... and already she picked up.
“Hello?”
“Uh, hi, baby, it’s George here.”
“Hey. You haven’t forgot about our dinner date tonight, huh?”
“Uh, no, no, I haven’t. But…”
“You won’t be able to make it.”
“Heh. Women are so perceptive, it’s cute.”
“Sigh… what’s it this time? Another stupid laptop need fixing?”
“No, it’s your professor.”
“My professor?”
“Well, you know, the dude you assigned to my case, to figure out my family roots, because you – because we think it’s so cool and awesome to know and stuff. You know.”
“Oh, him. Well, can’t you tell him to bug off?”
“Could be important.”
Again, Lori sighed.
“It’s your call, dear. I could tell him to buzz off, but then we’ll probably never find out anything cool. And it sounds pretty adventurous, actually.”
“Okay, but be home before eleven, or you are sleeping on the couch, mister.”
“In that case, you can count on me, baby.”
“Yeah, I’ll just grab myself a TV dinner…”
“Great! I love you, snookums.”
“I love you too…”
“Bye!”
Click.

Needless to say, Mrs Henderson was not amused. But George just kept telling himself that this would be important. He entered his office again, faking a big smile as the professor turned around.
“Ah, you’re back. Your wife didn’t mind?”
“Well, yes, but it’s her fault, partly. She got me into this mess.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Oh, never mind. Must be the lack of caffeine. I’m hallucinating. Seeing things I don’t hear, you know how it is.”
“No, I don’t. But let’s get on with this. We were talking about a name. Cristobal Colon. Christopher Columbus.”
“Aaaahh,” George said. “Now that does ring a bell. The guy who discovered America!”
George was actually gleaming with pride at this point. And then his face changed to its usual blissfully ignorant stare again.
“But what about him?”
André chuckled.
“Well, I set out to find information on your family history. Right?”
“Uh… check.”
“And I came back.”
“Check again.”
“With a name…”
“Aha! Checkmate!”
“George, you are crazy.”
“I know. But I also know that the man who discovered is my ancestor.”
“Exactly.”
André grabbed inside his jacket, and pulled out two plane tickets.
“If you want to, we can go to South America to trace back the footsteps of Columbus.”
“Sure thing! I’ll call Lori, and then we’ll leave.”
“Great. Can you swim?”
“Uh… why? We’re flying, right?”
André waved the ‘plane tickets’ about under George’s nose.
“Boat tickets…”
“Oh. Okay.”