Free OMG, A CUL8R Time Travel Mystery by Bob Kat Page B

“Hey guys.  Man, I was sore last night stocking shelves.  I thought I was in shape to board a couple of miles.  How about you, Kel?”
    “ I thought that football players were tough guys.”  Kelly smiled and winked at Scott.
    Austin gave her a suspicious look.  “Are you telling me that you aren’t sore today?”
    She laughed.  “I’d be lying if I did.  But it was a lot of fun.  I want to do it again . . . just not today . . . or tomorrow.”
    Scott had lost patience with the discussion.  “When you old folks can stop talking about your aches and pains, I’m ready to get to work.  I was at the antenna thing until midnight.”
    “What did you do?” Austin asked.
    “I redid the antenna on the roof of the shop and made it exactly the length needed to match the radio’s tuner.”
    Kelly noticed Austin wasn’t following Scott’s explanation.  “He meant the three to five kilohertz frequency band that Edison figured spirits communicated on,” she tried to clarify, although she only knew the facts, not the science behind them.
    Scott looked at Kelly and raised his eyebrows and nodded.  “That’s right.  I think we’re all set.  The tubes are hot.”
    “I thi nk Kelly should do the talking,” Austin commented.  “That girl or whatever she was seemed to respond well to her.”
    “Okay.”  Kelly sat down near the microphone.
    As the Spirit Radio vacuum tubes glowed red, Kelly could feel the heat radiate from them. Just like before, the static and whistles and scores of voices began to fade in and out as conversations began and ended mid-sentence.  It was like walking through Grand Central Station at rush hour and trying to pick up on a single voice from the crowd.
    Kelly depressed the microphone button.   “Wendy . . . Wendy can you hear me?  This is Kelly, Wendy, are you there?” She released the button.
    Austin, Scott and Kelly waited patiently for Wendy to answer back.  Kelly tried again and again.  Austin began to pace around the small room and Scott checked and double-checked his antenna connections.
    Suddenly a voice separated from the rest.   “ Kelly . . . Kelly? ”  The voice faded, then surged again.  “ Kelly . . . this is Wendy . . . I’m sorry . . . ” Her voice was overtaken by a younger man’s voice who sounded as if he was crying and apologizing for something.
    “Is there anything you can do, Scott?” Austin asked.
    “ Kelly, ask her where she lived and when,” Scott prompted.
    “Wendy , are you dead?” Kelly asked, needing to have some sort of confirmation.  She still wasn’t sure she believed this whole talking to the dead premise.
    “ I died in . . . 66 .”  The static swelled, crackling from the speakers.  Wendy’s voice pushed its way through, “. . . South Beach High . . .”
    “Wendy, was that in Fort Myers?”
    More voices, then Wendy’s surged, stronger than ever. “ . . . I couldn’t graduate . . . I thought he loved . . .”  Wendy’s voice fades.
    “Was that South Beach High in Fort Myers?  Did you live here?  Wendy . . . please answer me !” Kelly let her head fall against her hand, exhausted emotionally and physically.
    A burst of static and the voices ebbed.  Wendy’s voice came forward. “ South Beach High . . . . Fort Myers Beach . . . shouldn’t have done it . . . help me. ”
    In unison Scott, Austin and Kelly turned and faced each another. Their eyes were wide and mirrored their shock and confusion.
    “Is it possible?” Kelly asked.  “How can we check this out?”
    Austin threw his hands up in exasperation.  “It could be 1966 or 1866 or 1766.  Or that might have been some sort of address.  Where do we start?”
    “I t’s probably not 1866 or earlier because Fort Myers wasn’t established until around 1886.  The original South Beach High School was built in 1926.  All grades from kindergarten through high school were in the same building.  They separated into different campuses in 1959, so it has to