A Friend Like Filby Read online

  A Friend Like Filby

  Mark Wakely

  Copyright © 2021 by Mark Wakely

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  Any likenesses or references in this book remain the intellectual property of the holders, and their use is strictly for reference and parody sake. I do not claim ownership of anyone’s intellectual property.

  This is a work of fiction. Any characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Printed in the United States of America

  ISBN: 978-1-953910-89-9 (paperback)

  ISBN: 978-1-953910-90-5 (ebook)

  4697 Main Street

  Manchester Center, VT 05255

  Canoe Tree Press is a division of DartFrog Books.

  ADVANCE PRAISE

  A Friend Like Filby

  “Mark Wakely weaves an unusual tale with characters that are both emotionally and psychologically rich… The story is told from George’s perspective and in a first person narrative voice that is as clear as it is compelling. The prose is beautiful and evocative at times and I enjoyed the author’s peculiar turn of phrase, the humor, and his knack for vivid descriptions… It is a delightful read.”

  —Readers’ Favorite

  CHAPTER ONE

  So It Begins

  It’s early. Real early. Dave and I are the first ones to arrive. It’s as quiet as a morgue, with most of the hallway lights still off. With no one else around, I was surprised the doors were open since the place is usually locked down like the prison it vaguely resembles.

  Dave picked me up right at dawn. Since he has a car and I don’t, I reluctantly agreed to roll out of bed way ahead of my regular schedule. Real early was still better than a terrifying, barely-in-control school bus ride later on, like the ones I had to take when a ride from Dave wasn’t possible. He said he had “something to do,” and now I know what it is. Dave’s standing on a classroom chair, yelling into a security camera. Never mind that it doesn’t record sound; I guess his expression and unfriendly gestures are enough to get his message across. The chair seat is flexing and groaning under his weight, and I’m standing by apprehensive, waiting for the seat to splinter and for Dave to come tumbling down like Humpty Dumpty, cradle and all and whatnot.

  He’s still angry about some decision the school administration announced yesterday regarding student organization budgets or benefits or something. Not that Dave really cared about any of that—he just loves any opportunity to act offended at anything the administration does. I guess putting it all on tape for some unsuspecting security guard or secretary to see was his way of making his displeasure known.

  The second week of our senior year and already Dave is in rare form. He’s screeching now in full rant, his face just inches away from the camera lens. It was a beautiful performance, gloriously obscene, a marvel of four-letter words strung together like a true maestro.

  When he was finished, he gave the camera a lewd gesture with both hands.

  Spent and out of breath, he climbed down from the chair and dragged it back where it belonged.

  Dave calls our school “The Big Brown Box,” where we’re “processed” and “churned out like obedient zombies.” I guess it’s Dave’s calling to be a rabble-rouser, but I’m not sure you can make a living at it. If you could, though, Dave would make a very good one.

  “So. How was the rant?” Dave asked, still out of breath but beaming with pride.

  I thought a moment, comparing it to his past performances.

  “Oh, I don’t know. I’d give it a solid B, maybe a B-plus.”

  Dave seemed pleased with the grade. “Thanks. It wasn’t a personal best, but it was pretty good, wasn’t it?”

  “Sure, Dave. Sure.”

  I patted the big guy on the back, and then we headed off to the cafeteria to sit at our favorite table and wait for them to open so we could get our usual morning cup of joe.

  Our Big Brown Box was one of those sprawling eyesores of a building—ominous, pompous, and dreary, not unlike a few of our teachers. Built in what seemed like record time, it towered over the neighborhood. Metal detectors by the main doors were installed our sophomore year, as were the surveillance cameras and doors that locked electronically when classes began. The joke was they were either trying to keep the bad guys out or the inmates in. Even the drug-sniffing dog they brought in unannounced on occasion seemed afraid of the place and always bolted out the door when its job was done.

  “Hear that, people?” Dave said loudly one morning, when all those electronic locks kicked in with their usual thunk that reverberated down the halls. “Homeland Security cares about you.”

  Even though our senior year had just begun, oddly enough I was already getting a bit nostalgic, and was thinking lately about my freshman year. Freshman year was essentially boot camp that never ended. Yeah, we were the scum, the newbies, the dorks and freaks and nerds and geeks that nobody loved or wanted. There were notable exceptions, of course—the few girls with supermodel looks already and an even smaller number of jocks with overactive thyroids who towered over the rest of us and made first team without even breaking a sweat. (Actually, Dave was one of those.) But like I said, they were the exceptions. The rest of us had to bow and scrap to the upperclassmen, even those who had little status otherwise. It got old fast to find all your stuff in the trash if you left it unattended for even a minute, or have someone cut in line in front of you just because you’re new.

  At least no one ever beat me up cliché-style for my lunch money, although rumors that could actually happen resurface with every freshman class like some kind of cruel urban legend that just won’t die. It’s one of those stupid things you would think no one would ever believe, but it was always amusing to see the freshman lined up in the cafe with their money clutched tight in their fists while glancing nervously around for any sign of some lurking, hungry bully looking for a free lunch.

  It would have been amusing, that is, if I hadn’t done that myself when I was a freshman. More out of pity than anything else, I leave the freshman alone. They’ve got enough problems.

  Sadder yet are the handful of recent graduates who just can’t let this place go. You see them the first couple of weeks of every new school year hanging around the hallways with their wistful little puppy dog expressions as if hoping they could fit back in somehow.

  “Man, when I graduate, I’m putting this place in my rearview mirror and that’s it,” Dave said when we saw one being gently escorted out because classes were about to begin.

  “Agreed,” Onion said. “High school’s not going to be the high point of my life.”

  But enough about all that.

  My name is George Wells. At home there’s my dad and my younger brother Kenny. My mom died when I was ten. We live in a ranch house in an older part of town, far from The Big Brown Box, which is why I depend on Dave to get there. I’ve got my driver’s license but never had any great desire to own a car, although on rare occasion Dad will let me drive his buzzy, bouncy econobox he bought for the fuel economy. And that’s good enough for me.

  Before you write me off as too ordinary, I will admit to one obsession that’s a bi
t unusual. Actually, it’s one that drives both Dave and Onion nuts. They’re among the few who know about it since it is a bit . . . well . . . strange, and the last thing you want to be known as in high school is strange. You get the whole shunned and scorned deal if that happens, so I mostly keep it to myself. I’m sure Dave and Onion wish I had a normal obsession like jogging or singing or something else totally mundane.

  At any rate, here it is. Not long after my mom died, just by chance I saw the classic 1960 version of The Time Machine with Rod Taylor and Yvette Mimieux. It was almost as if my whole life I had been destined to see that movie, as if that movie had been made expressly for me, and ever since I’ve been fascinated with the idea of time travel. That isn’t what drives Dave and Onion crazy, though. The problem is that I kept quoting from The Movie—that’s all we call it now, just “The Movie”—since I have the whole thing memorized. I think I’ve watched The Movie at least thirty times through and have yet to grow tired of a single minute. If you haven’t seen it yet, you must; if you haven’t seen it in a while, see it again—it’s an absolute masterpiece, easily one of the best movies ever made.

  The Time Machine is based on the book by Herbert George Wells—no relation, sad to say. It’s the story of the far future, where the human race has been divided into two groups: the peaceful though uneducated Eloi on the surface, and the brainy but monstrous Morlocks who live underground and prey on the Eloi above.

  Spoiler alert here: George, the time traveler, helps the Eloi win their freedom from the Morlocks and then rejoins them at the end to restore human civilization.

  Shortly after I saw The Movie for the first time, I began collecting wind-up clocks that chimed—mantel clocks, cuckoo clocks, you name it. The time traveler’s parlor was full of chiming clocks and I thought that looked beyond cool. After years of garage sales and gifts—“Well, at least you’re easy to buy for,” Dave once told me—I now had dozens lined up in our living room on the mantel, tables, and walls. Basically, they’re everywhere you look, just as I had planned. My favorite is probably the miniature grandfather clock I found in a secondhand store; that’s center stage on the mantel. It has a few dings and is missing a decorative piece on the front, so it’s probably not worth much, but it has a nice loud chime. Unfortunately, my dad said no way was he going to listen to them all going off every hour on the hour, so I had to silence them. While none of the clocks are priceless heirlooms or anything like that, it’s pretty impressive to hear them all ticking, and whenever I was home alone I would un-silence them and try to synchronize them to all chime together. There was usually one or two that sounded a bit early and a couple that sounded a bit late, but still it was just like The Movie, as if the chimes were announcing that hidden somewhere in the house was a time machine of my own, just waiting for me hop on board and explore the far past and future.

  My dad thinks my obsession with time travel has something to do with my mom’s death and my desire to go back and try to save her—or at least see her again. But that’s not it at all. Sure, it would be great to see her again as she was, with her long brown hair and always-glad-to-see-you smile, but I know it would just be a visit, a moment in time that wouldn’t change the here and now. Besides, it would be sad to have to leave her behind again, knowing she was to die much too young, although with a time machine I could always pop in to see her again anytime I wanted.

  There are lots of people I would like to meet throughout history, and while my mom and grandparents are at the top of the list, they aren’t the only ones. I like the idea of owning a time machine for three reasons, really. First, it would be great to witness some of the big moments in history and meet famous people I could talk to, like Ben Franklin, Mark Twain, Edison, and Einstein. You know, the really super important people like that. Second, it would be fascinating to see what’s going to happen to mankind in the future near and far. And third and most important, because I want to find a friend like Filby, the time traveler’s faithful friend who never abandoned him. That was my ultimate quest. Filby was the best friend anyone could ever have, the nearly perfect friend. Filby and George had a friendship that transcended death and time itself, as you would know if you ever saw The Movie. Filby was forever loyal, Filby was forever caring, Filby would have done anything for George, the intrepid time traveler.

  Somehow, somewhere, I was sure to find my own Filby. The only real question in my mind was when.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Onion and Dave

  Her name is Nancy, but everybody knows her as Onion. Dave gave her that name early in our sophomore year, before the three of us had become best buds. Nancy always wore layers of clothes no matter what the weather. The look was definitely unique, almost to the point of being a classroom distraction.

  So one day Dave says to a bunch of us in the cafe, “She’s like an onion. If you peeled off all her clothes, layer by layer, soon there would be nothing left.”

  The name stuck.

  Now, you would think a girl would hate a name like Onion, what with the bad smell and bad breath connotations. But the day after Dave’s comment went viral, Nancy showed up wearing something like half a dozen blouses—no two alike—two hats, two pairs of pants, and a skirt, willing to go along with the joke. She made of point of coming by our table at lunchtime to show us.

  “You look like a pumpkin,” Dave said.

  “Why, thank you,” she said. “Aren’t I glamorous?” And she spun about like a rock star, her arms raised as high as all those clothes would let her. “Besides,” she said, more seriously, “if you can’t laugh at yourself, who can you laugh at?”

  Dave stared hard at her. “You mean you don’t care what the sheeple say about you?”

  I could tell he was testing her the same way he tested me on the bus the day we first met.

  She didn’t hesitate to answer. “Why should I? I live my life the way I want to, not the way the sheeple do.”

  It was then that both Dave and I realized she was more than just okay. She was a kindred spirit. We cleared a space for her at our table and she’s joined us ever since.

  In time, Onion became like the sister I never had and Dave the older brother I never had, even though Dave was older than me by only a few months.

  Dave used to joke that Onion’s mom and my dad should get married so Onion can be my stepsister, but I could never imagine it. My dad and Onion’s mom are two completely different people. While they say that opposites attract, there still has to be some basis for two people to get together in the first place. My dad only spoke when there was something to say; Onion’s mom—like Onion—was always talking. My dad never showed any outward signs of worrying about anything, while Mrs. Gordon couldn’t wait to tell you what was troubling her. Thanks to his stint in the Navy, my dad liked things orderly and shipshape—“A place for everything and everything in its place” as he said a thousand times—while Onion’s house overflowed with their strewn belongings, on the tables, the chairs, everywhere.

  “Not too much more than this,” Dave once whispered during a visit as we stepped over a pile of Onion’s clothes, “and they’ll officially be hoarders.”

  “Maybe that’s why Onion wears so many of them,” I whispered back. “Just to get them off the floor.”

  When Dave persisted that my dad and her mom should meet “just to see what happens,” Onion finally shut him down.

  “Please. Let’s not turn this into The Parent Trap or anything hokey like that, okay? Just stop already. Stop. That’s an order.”

  Dave never brought it up again, which should tell you who’s in charge.

  And if you ever have any doubt about that, you should see Onion in gym class. She doesn’t just want to win—oh no, she wants to crush and thoroughly humiliate her opponents, and usually does. With every goal or point Onion scores, she cackles in delight like it’s the most fun she’s ever had. Needless to say, nobody wants to play against her, and when
players are picked to form teams, she’s always picked first. Onion didn’t win any friends in gym, but at the same time I think it makes all the girls show her plenty of respect both in and out of it.

  “What can I tell you?” she said once at our cafeteria table when I brought up her total lack of mercy. “I’m a tough broad.” She grinned.

  Dave and I just grinned stiffly at her in return like a couple of idiots. Neither of us would have ever dared call her that, even though it was absolutely true.

  Every now and then, Dave would engage me in discussing The Movie since he had a vague interest in time travel from a philosophical point of view. Mostly, though, he just made fun of the plot.

  At our usual table in the cafe one day, we were discussing the scene where George the time traveler rescued Weena—one of the Eloi and the time traveler’s eventual love interest—from drowning.

  “So Weena’s screaming for help—”

  Dave broke out in laughter.

  “Sorry,” he said, rubbing his eyes. “The name just struck me as funny. Who names their kid Weena, anyway?”

  I stared at him. “It’s thousands of years from now, remember?”

  “So what? It will always be a stupid name.”

  The one thing Dave never laughed about was when I started talking about Filby. Dave seemed to grow impatient if I gushed too much about what a great friend Filby was, an ideal friend whose friendship was unparalleled.

  “Nobody’s that perfect,” Dave would argue, refusing to look at me.

  “But he supported George no matter what other people thought.”

  “So? George was an eccentric inventor. Of course everybody thought he was crazy. Who wouldn’t?”

  “Filby,” I countered.

  Dave didn’t respond.

  Why Filby was such a sore point with Dave I didn’t know. I guess he thought that kind of unwavering friendship was impossible, while I still hoped to find my own Filby someday.