I can’t believe what I am looking it, it’s a letter to me, but that doesn’t make any sense. How could the message be to me.

“To Christine Netterman, 415 Augustine Drive, Thousand Oaks, CA”

Maybe there was a chance that there was some other Christine that had been there, I was named after my aunt. But that time doesn’t work out either, that would have only placed the letter maybe 20 years older. The texture of the page clearly feels like its a hundred years old. It’s unlike anything that I have ever had my hands on, the texture is weird stiff and unmoving. It’s also much heavier than any letter that I’ve ever had in my hands.

“I know that this letter is going to find you well, but that you are going to be slightly disturbed by it’s presence. Please remain calm and try not to panic.”

Well that was more than an understatement. Great and now everyone is looking at me, but I guess that makes sense. If you were to open a 100 year old time capsule and the only thing that was still in good condition was a letter addressed directly to you and no one else, there would be a little bit of confusion. The thing that they don’t tell you about time capsules is that when you dig them up most of the contents are completely destroyed. As it turns out we really aren’t good at making things that you can bury for a long period of time without the contents getting reclaimed by nature. But the letter that I have in my hands is the only thing that is not completely destroyed, in fact it doesn’t look like it’s aged a day, despite being over 100 years old.

“I assure you that all of this will make sense in the coming days, but as someone who was standing, staring at you read this letter I can understand and share your discomfort.”

Wait… so the person who sent the letter is standing in the audience right now. But I can’t see anyone that looks like they are our of place, and clearly there isn’t anyone that’s over a hundred. So how can any of this make sense.

“You can stop looking around the crowd, at the time that I was standing there I didn’t know that I was going to be the one sending you the letter.”

I think that who ever sent the letter is trying to make me feel better about the whole thing. But that’s not really helping me at all. Why would any of this be happening, right now it’s just me looking over a group of people expecting me to say something. They are looking for a 16 year old girl from California to explain to them why opening a 100 year old time capsule, there was a letter addressed to me. Maybe if I look deeper into the letter then they will go away.

“I can only assume that you are feeling very awkward about the whole thing. I remember feeling really bad for you watching you on the stage, but I can give you some help. At the end of everything you are going to tell everyone that this was clearly a prank, then run off. Not really sure where you go, but everyone kind of takes it for a cool magic trick then goes along their own way.”

Is it really that simple? All I have to do to make this end is just tell everyone that it’s a prank and then they will go about their lives.

“You do actually have to say it with conviction, your first attempt doesn’t really sell it. But in the end you get away. When you go make sure that you take this letter with you, the contents are important as they will help you to survive the next two weeks. I know that either way you will make it out, but hopefully if you follow these directions you will impact the present as little as possible.”

Okay, this is too weird. But here goes nothing…

“Sorry everyone, it appears that there has been an elaborate prank that’s been played.”

Why did my voice choose that moment to crack, if I don’t believe it then there is no way that I am going to be able to make them believe it.

“Seriously everyone, sorry for the confusion… it was someone trying to create a scene with a little bit of slight of hand.”

Now all I have to do is walk off the stage slowly and disappear into the bushes. I don’t know what’s going on but as soon as I find the person who wrote this letter I am going to give them hell. This isn’t a funny joke. This is clearly going to mess me up for years and Dr. Wright is going to have a field day with this. But what do I tell her, you’ll figure that out just keep walking, luckily it looks like the letter was right, no one is following me. Just a couple hundred more yards and I should be able to ease up a bit. I need to stop gripping the letter so tightly, I’m creasing the paper and I have no idea what is in the contents.

“Okay, I am assuming that you are reading this part after you have left the assembly. First let me apologize, and know that when you were reading the letter I had no idea that I was the one that sent it to you, I was fully convinced that is was a prank walking away from the meeting. It wasn’t until many months later, that I had to send you the message. You see I’m kind of stuck here a hundred years in the past. Based on the way that I think the science works, there isn’t much chance of me coming back. But with that said there are still something’s that we can do to make sure that everyone makes it out okay. I’m sorry that I’ve mixed you up in this, but when you are trying to contact someone from a hundred years in the past you really don’t have a lot of options. With each iteration we are getting closer to equilibrium, for the sake of everyone involved please don’t let apathy win.”

There is literally no way that this is real. The letter is right, this has to be some prank that’s being played on me. They are talking about time travel and I know for a fact that’s not a real thing. I’ve watched my fair share of Doctor Who and that doesn’t happen in the real world, although I could be convinced by David Tennant…

“At this point I can only assume that you are thinking that this whole thing is crazy and that there is someone that is pranking you. But here is the think, in my timeline, I have a letter from you too. Which means that you have to follow through with the plan at least a little bit, the letter says that you should know that ‘Kerry was a jerk’ and that what she did wasn’t right.”

Okay, how the hell does she know that. That happened when I was in middle school in Kansas, I’m not even sure that Kerry would remember the sleepover. Stop and think, there are only three people who could know about that. Weighing the likelihood that one of those three people was trying to pull a prank on me is on one side, the other is that time travel is real. I just have to get to some place safe where I can read the rest of the letter without being bothered. But where to go…