Museum of Alternate History

I came out of the night shift at the electric plant on an ordinary Wednesday evening, walked to the corner and made the usual left turn heading for the bus stop and a groggy 45-minute ride home. There was a full moon out and the streets seemed lit brighter than normal this evening. I figured it was due to the full moon until I realized the unusual illumination was from the light in front of a building I never noticed before. When I got closer, I saw the sign in front of the door which said “Museum of Alternate History.” I never heard there was a museum scheduled to open around the corner from the plant. I figured it must not have opened yet, and even if it did, it must be closed by 11 pm. I looked at the door for a list of hours or an admission price. There was nothing on the door, just a glass pane from top to bottom. My curiosity was piqued, so I gingerly turned the handle and was surprised to find I was able to open the door. There was eerie silence that greeted me as I slowly took a step or two inside, as if I was sneaking into a place where I didn’t belong. The long cavernous hall was barely lit, but I could see the silhouette of a figure behind a desk that had a plaque that said “admission.” “I’m sorry,” I said, in the direction of the silhouette. “Is this museum open?” There was a moment of silence as my voice echoed down the hall. The shadowy figure turned on a lamp that lit up her face. She appeared to be a youngish woman with her jet-black hair severely pulled back in a bun, black framed glasses, and a totally poker face. “We are always open,” she replied in a calm, serene voice, that nevertheless had an intensity about it. “In fact, we’ve been waiting for you.” My adrenaline started pumping and I was tempted to bolt out the door. The place seemed so weird and foreboding, but I had to figure out what was going on. I knew this was not a dream or nightmare. “You were waiting for me?” I stammered. “How do you know about me?” “Oh, we know all about you Steven,” she replied. This is the museum of alternate history and we know the paths your life would have taken if you made other decisions.” “But why me?” I replied. “And how in the world do you know my name?” “You will find out in due course,” she answered, never changing her expression. “My name is Savanah. Come with me and see where the other paths you could have taken would lead to.”

She led the way to a smaller back room which had a round table. Around the table sat three middle aged men who looked to be about my age, vaguely similar in in physical appearance to me, but with significant differences. One looked older than his apparent age because of his heavily lined face and gray hair. He was more conservatively dressed than me and had a professional bearing. Another one had his long, brown hair pulled back in a pony tail and a serene look on his face as if he was deep in meditation. The third one had a hardened look, a scar on his neck, and a scowl on his face. None of them looked at me, but continued to stare straight ahead as I walked in. “Meet the Stevens you could have become,” Savanah said as she opened her arms wide. She looked at the first man and said, “This is the Steven who didn’t join a fraternity in college, buckled down, and was admitted to medical school as you considered doing. Why don’t you ask him how his life turned out?” I looked at the first Steven and he looked at me for the first time. I couldn’t tell if it was contempt or disgust in his expression.

“So, you went to medical school and graduated?” I tentatively asked.

“Yes, I did," he replied. It sounded more like a confession than a statement of pride,

“What is your specialty?” I continued.

“I’m a proctologist,” he replied

I couldn’t help but chuckle. “Of all the specialties, you picked that one?”

“It was the one with the least competition, so I figured I had the best chance of getting accepted,” he said.

“I can’t believe I was smart enough to get into medical school,” I thought to myself. “How did that work out for you?”

“I’m jealous of you,” he replied. “You work an eight-hour shift in the plant and never have to think about work until you go back. I’m always on the job, always on call, and I’m burned out. I realize now I was never cut out for this life. I wish I never went down this path and it’s too late to go back. I have to keep working to pay back all the loans I needed to pay tuition at medical school. I’m still 50k in the hole.”

At this point Savanah asked if I remembered wanting to drop out of college to join some hippie commune in Oregon. I sure did. Some of my friends did it, but we lost touch and I always wondered what happened to them. I didn’t have to wonder anymore. Steven number two did exactly that. I asked him what happened after he made that decision. Steven two looked down and then finally looked at me for the first time. It felt like he was looking through me instead of at me.

“I stayed on at the farm after the others in the commune left for a more mainstream life. I grow my own food make my own clothes, and got into eastern spirituality, meditation, and ayahuasca. It may seem like I’m serene out in the countryside with my partner and three kids, but I feel very isolated and alone much of the time. I dropped out of society, and I no longer know how to go back to feeling like I belong. Once you drop out for a long period of time there is no going back. I wish I grew up and left when the others did. I’m too old to change now.

I turned to look at the third Steven and winced. He was painful to even look at. It just looked like he went through the mill, his hair falling out in patches, the scar looking like it was from a knife fight, and the perpetual scowl indicating he was angry and alienated. After looking him silently for a long while, I asked, “What happened to you?” He looked up, his blue eyes fixed as they stared back at me like a laser. “I’m the one who took the worst path,” he said. “Remember those druggies you used to hang out with in high school because you wanted to look cool? Well, unlike you I never stopped hanging out with them. I never went to college; I just went to the school of hard knocks. I got busted for drugs at 18 and did time off and on from then until now. Got this scar at Rikers and almost died on my first day there when a gang beat me up. It went downhill from there. I couldn’t get a job, lived on the streets, and then the hallucinations started. Between the looney bin and the slammer, I never really had a place of my own.

I looked at the mystery woman who stood silently this whole time, never showing any emotion at all as I winced at each story. “Did you bring me here so I could appreciate my life and make me realize how I could have gone down a worse path?” I asked. She slowly smiled for the first time as if she was amused at my naivety. “No,” she replied, “definitely not." "I will explain why I brought you here. All of you Stevens actually exist simultaneously. There are many more Stevens, an infinite number actually. I just brought you three representatives to give you an idea. But now your turn is up. You took the path that leads to oblivion when you walked into this museum. Your path ends here, but there will always be another version of yourself in another world. It’s known a quantum immortality.” I had thought of bolting again, but when I turned back towards the door, I didn’t find it. Instead, there was a solid wall all around with no exit. I tuned back towards the table and there was now an empty seat. A strange calmness overcame me and I no longer wanted to leave. I figured out this is where we all end up, in the museum of alternate history when our path comes to an end, only to be trotted out as an example when another copy of us is about to come to an end.

The radio cackled in the squad car as the early morning sun was rising. A staticky voice called out “10-100 at 471 Sycamore St.”. “That’s the construction site,” said police offer Savanah Smith, as she adjusted her black fame glasses. She turned to her partner, Ralph Cirillo, as she continued, “I used to work security there before I joined the force.” “It’s just about 5 blocks to the left,” said Ralph as he switched on the siren and stepped on the gas. They quickly reached the site in a few minutes and entered the partially constructed building, walking around the “Danger” and “Stay out” signs at the entrance. A young man in a hardhat stood over the prostrate body of a middle-aged man. Ralph checked the body for a pulse. He noted there was none as an ambulance siren wailed in the background. He took out a pad and started to write while he asked, “Tell me your name and what happened.” The man replied, “My name is Manuel Ruiz, the chief of the construction crew, and I saw this man on the floor when I entered the site. I thought he had just fell and tried to lift him up, but his body was cold like he was dead for a long time." Ralph leaned down and pulled out the dead man’s wallet. “Apparently, his name was Steven Johnson and he worked around the corner,” he said as he took off his cap and scratched his head. “I thought he looked familiar,” replied Savanah. “I think I saw him walk past me a few times on the way to the bus stop when I was a security guard. He might have even said hello to me once.” “I wonder why he would enter an active construction site when there are warning signs all around,” said Ralph. “It’s even more puzzling that there are no signs of struggle, no marks on the body, and no apparent cause of death like falling debris. Maybe the coroner can figure it out,” he mused as he put his cap back on his head.