

@Kaylee1
A sample chapter from When in Rome, book one of The Broken Clock Saga, available on Amazon June 15, 2025.
2025/2015
At first glance, she couldn’t tell if the strangers were also time travelers, and if so, what decade they came from. Aside from the tall guy’s hair, none of them had any distinguishable elements pointing towards one or another period in world history. In fact, she couldn’t tell anything about the three strangers lounging in the drunk tank, because, like Kaylee, they were naked.
She pulled the rough blanket tighter around her shoulders and waited for someone else to speak.
“Alright.” The blond guy decided to go first. Unlike the others, he was standing up, his blanket held around his waist. In Kaylee’s experience with twenty-somethingwhite guys, she had to assume this stance was planned to show off his taut stomach and the shadow of a six pack. “Can we assume we’re all in the same boat?”
“What boat’s that?” the other guy asked. He was thin, tall – even sitting down – black, with a dour expression and bleach-blond hair.
“You all just…woke up naked somewhere?” the blond guy suggested.
The other guy opened his mouth, looking like he was about to say something snarky, but decided against it and just said “Yeah. In Central Park.”
“And you two?”
Kaylee looked up. The blond guy was looking at her expectantly, and the redhead didn’t jump to reply. “Me too,” Kaylee said. “I was in Central Park too. I think. I don’t really know New York.”
“I didn’t see you,” the black guy told her.
“You too?” the blond guy asked, and the redhead nodded somberly. She was sitting on the floor beside Kaylee, across from the bar door, blanket wrapped around her shoulders, chubby thighs and calves crossed tenuously in front of her.
“And we were all naked,” the blond guy reiterated, “So I guess we don’t have to wonder why we all got arrested.”
“Some guy called me a chink,” Kaylee said. “All I did was ask him what year it was. Naked.” That wasn’t the entire story, of course, but she wasn’t about to tell them how enthusiastically she’d approached that guy on the bench, or how she’d thrown modesty to the wind in her excitement to yell “What year is it?” at the nearest bystander. She’d been especially excited, despite her situation and the man’s ready use of racial slurs, when he was too thrown off to answer her – and she was through the roof when she found herself rummaging through a nearby garbage can for a discarded newspaper.
“Well that was exceedingly helpful of him,” the black guy said. He was gay, she decided, and very much so, to the point where even her rusty gaydar could pick it up. It was more in his voice than his bleached hair. “You can probably imagine how the pigs treated me.”
“Oh, yeah,” Kaylee said.
“I’m sorry Mel,” the redhead murmured. “That must’ve been awful.”
“It wasn’t great,” the black guy – Mel – replied.
“Oh, we forgot to do names,” the blond guy said, gesturing to Kaylee. “I’m Noah, this is Mel, Sofie. Before you ask, no, none of us knew each other before we got here.”
“I’m Kaylee,” Kaylee said. She knew she was smiling, and she knew the others were put off by it, but she couldn’t stop. She couldn’t tamp down the excitement. This was real. This was happening. She pulled the blanket tighter around her tiny frame, afraid she might let it loose in her excitement.
“We all, the three of us,” Noah said, gesturing towards the cell at large, “Last thing we remember is going to bed on June 15, 2015.”
“I didn’t go to bed,” Mel said, raising his hand. His blanket hung loose over his shoulders, an invisible hand keeping it tight over his crotch. If all these blankets were the same size, Kaylee thought, then Sofie must’ve had at least one nip slip; Kaylee was able to keep covered only thanks to her compact Chinese frame and total lack of T&A. “But yeah, last thing I remember is the night of the fifteenth. I mean I think it was. I must’ve PTFO’d.”
Kaylee realized the others were watching her expectantly, and she had a sudden unfortunate flashback to the unending sequence of non-sequiturs that was high school. “What was the question?”
“Is the last thing you remember the night of June 15, 2015,” Noah repeated.
“Ah ha!” she cried, levying an accusatory finger at him, careful not to let her ugly wool toga slip off. “Now I know this isn’t some simulation to entrap me. Cause if it was, you would’ve wanted me to volunteer that information! You wouldn’t’ve just given it to me!”
Noah stared at her, then exchanged a look with Mel. Dang it, she thought, she had always wanted to do a double take like that. “So…it is?” Noah asked.
“Yeah,” Kaylee said, sheepishly. “June 15, that’s right.” She wondered for a moment if it actually was, but the image of the date on her phone above the dialogue box reading alarm set for three hours and six minutes from now was seared into her memory. “Technically sixteenth. It was after midnight.”
“Could’ve been for me too,” Mel agreed. “I wasn’t paying attention.”
“Alright.” Noah ran a hand through his surfer boy locks, looking tentatively relieved. He looked like a cartoon character, Kaylee thought. The girls in high school would have secretly found him really hot, but would’ve pretended his less-than-impressive height reflected poorly on his looks. Kaylee had no opinion. “I guess now we just gotta figure out where we are.”
Kaylee’s stomach lurched as she realized this was it. This was the moment she had never believed would actually come. She had only almost allowed herself to believe she’d be given this opportunity when she realized the truth of her situation, when she’d rushed to experience the thrill of lesser deliveries. Almost tripping over her words in excitement, Kaylee spouted out, “The question isn’t where – it’s when!”
The others turned to look at her in unison. She grinned, sheepishly, her eyes watering in that way they often did when she was the only one laughing at her own joke. This moment passed in a silence that grew only more awkward as it elongated into infinity.
“1977,” Mel said.
“Yeah,” Noah agreed. “I thought we knew that.”
“We all figured that out,” Sofie added.
“I meant we gotta figure out if this is jail-jail, or just a holding cell,” Noah explained.
“I know I know,” Kaylee said. “I just always wanted to say that.”
Noah narrowed his eyes at her, looking almost suspicious, as if he thought she might have some explanation as to how they’d ended up here. Which she didn’t. As far as she knew. Not unless someone Up There had granted her childhood wishes. “Let’s just focus on how to get out of here,” Noah suggested, “Then we can wonder about the quantum physics. Worst case scenario, there’s no way to get back to the future, in which case, we’ll find some hippies, smoke a metric fuckton of weed, dodge the draft, and assassinate Ronald Reagan.”
“Isn’t he just an actor?” Mel asked.
“And Baby Hitler’s just a baby,” Noah replied. “Now. What’s our story.”
“We’re a delightfully diverse group of strangers in a strange land,” Mel said. “I’ve seen a TV show like this, but thankfully we’re not on a tropical island.”
“You’d rather be in the drunk tank than a tropical island?” Noah asked, and of course he would: if he wasn’t naked, he would probably be wearing puka shells.
“There’s no evil smoke monster in the drunk tank,” Sofie murmured.
Noah didn’t ask for clarity on the reference. Clutching the blanket around his waist, he sat lightly on the bunk suspended from the wall, and immediately hopped back up as if he’d sat on a tack. He had just discovered why the others were sitting on the floor, Kaylee assumed. He seemed like a confident guy, but confidence didn’t necessitate voyeurism. “I meant what’s our story when the cops give us the shakedown,” Noah said. “I know this is New York, but they probably don’t usually pick up four naked, non-crazy people in their twenties in the same district every day.”
“I’m thirty-one,” Mel said.
“Yeah why are we naked?” Kaylee asked. “That has to tell us something about the rules of time travel, right? D’you think it’s like Terminator, where only organic material can go through the time machine? Or maybe they wanted us to get arrested so we’d find each other.”
“Who’s they,” Mel asked.
“I dunno,” Kaylee said. “Whoever put us here and sent us back in time. Probably the Illuminati or something.”
“Do you know something?” Noah asked, sounding more curious than accusatory. “Like, how we got here?”
“No,” Kaylee admitted, “But I’m really really excited to figure it out.”
Noah nodded, apparently trying to comprehend her. It really wasn’t that hard. She liked time travel, as a concept. And her new friends didn’t seem to understand how exciting this all was.
“I think we shouldn’t pretend we all know each other,” Noah said. “We don’t know anything about each other, and they’re gonna ask questions.”
“But why would we all be naked?” Kaylee asked. “At the same time?”
Noah hesitated, and Kaylee realized he was about to suggest something very inappropriate, but he relented and came up with a new idea. “What if we all got mugged,” he said. “By some new gang whose whole thing is stripping people down.”
“They had members in all four of our sizes?” Mel retorted.
“They don’t wear the clothes,” Noah explained, “They just leave people naked after mugging them. Cause it’s funny.”
“And they decided to start doing this just today.”
Noah made a gesture of ignorance. “You got a better idea?”
Mel thought for a minute, moving like he was going to stretch but seeming to remember his clothing situation. “What about hippies?”
“Hippies?” Noah repeated.
“Cops hate hippies, right?” Mel reasoned. “They’ll love it if we say they turned violent.”
“I don’t think that will work,” Sofie said. Her voice was soft, Kaylee had noticed, not necessarily quiet, but almost melancholy. If she was depressed about something, it must have been something huge to override the hype of spontaneous time travel. “They’ve probably never heard of someone getting robbed by a hippie, they won’t believe four at once.”
“Unless the hippies are also gangsters,” Noah said, “Who strip down their victims cause it’s funny.”
“What about bikers?” Mel asked. “Did they have bikers in the Seventies?”
“Where there’s motorcycles, there’s bikers,” Noah replied, though Kaylee wasn’t sure there actually were motorcycles. “We can say they were bikers, it doesn’t really matter. The important thing is we all got mugged by the same people, but in different places, and we never met each other before.” He frowned, putting his hand to his chin, and a moment later added: “Actually, let’s make it more complicated. Mel, how about we were on the same street and saw each other getting mugged. Maybe I saw the gangsters attacking you and I ran over to help, but they got me too.”
Mel gave Noah an ostentatious look up and down, from his blond head to his bare feet and back again. “And why exactly did you think you’d be able to stop them?” he asked.
“I didn’t,” Noah said, “I just wanted to help. I fought bravely, but they beat me down and took my clothes.”
“You’re remarkably unbruised,” Mel pointed out.
“Okay fine,” Noah relented. “You saw me getting mugged, but not beat up, you came over to help, but they had knives, and they said they wouldn’t shank us if we gave them our wallets. And our clothes. Cause it’s funny.”
“Guys,” Kaylee said. “Guys. Guys.”
The three naked strangers again turned to look at her, Sofie and Mel’s eyes on her level, Noah staring down from above. She felt her ability to speak deserting her, not out of embarrassment, but because she didn’t have the words to encapsulate her disorientation.
“Why are we talking about this?” she wondered aloud. “We’re sitting here talking about what we’re gonna tell the cops, like we’re some drunk college kids. But we literally just time traveled!” She lowered her voice to speak the powerful phrase, both for a sense of mystique and out of fear of being overhead. There must have been a cop somewhere outside the cell. “This is huge!” she continued. “No one’s ever done this before! I mean, maybe they have, I don’t know, but unless someone here is lying, this just suddenly happened with no explanation. We’re like – this is like – ” She threw up a hand, unable to continue. She couldn’t even define her feelings in the wordless communication of her own brain, let alone in the limited dialect of human speech.
“Insane?” Noah suggested.
“That’s one way to say it,” she agreed.
“I agree, it’s insane,” Noah said. “And trust me, I freaked out bad when I woke up naked on a park bench. Well – maybe not right then, but eventually. But we’re compartmentalizing here. We need to get out of here, cause if we get arrested, we’re screwed: we don’t have any records, let alone any character witnesses. So let’s just make sure we get our story straight, okay?”
Kaylee nodded, saying nothing. She wanted to argue, to push a discussion of their situation, but she knew Noah was right. Annoying as it was, she was also impressed by how well the other three had adjusted. She had always figured that someone in this situation – someone else, obviously, not her – would have a panic attack, or a mental breakdown, just trying to comprehend what had happened. But then again…how often had they all lived this moment vicariously through fictional characters? Twenty-first century culture was so saturated by fiction exploring every hypothetical feat of science or magic that most people had already seen every possible reaction to every possible (or impossible) event. She had watched Michael J. Fox yelling in surprise as he crashed into Old Man Peabody’s barn; she had laughed along with Future Bill and Ted’s explanation of their dubiously-cyclical timeline; she had seen handfuls of pretty modern twenty-something girls looking around in astonishment as they realized first that the TARDIS was bigger on the inside, then that it really could time travel. She had read along with Stephen King’s first-person everyman protagonist as he swallowed his disbelief and accepted his mission to prevent the assassination of John F. Kennedy. That may be the end result of pop culture and escapist fiction dominating the decade, she thought: everyone had become desensitized to the impossible.
But Kaylee didn’t want to be desensitized, dammit, she wanted to be amazed. She wanted to have her mind well and truly blown by all the possibilities that had opened up during the early morning of June sixteenth, 2015, when she and three strangers had suddenly warped back in time thirty-eight years.
“Did anyone say they were from the future?” Noah was asking.
“I think I said something about not being where I was supposed to be,” Mel said.
“I bet the cops loved that,” Noah replied.
“Sure did. They said they were happy to take me back.”
The cell was silent for a minute, Noah leaning against the wall, the other three sitting on the floor. They needed to get out of here as soon as possible, so Kaylee could allow herself the freedom to ponder what was really important: how had this happened, what type of timeline were they operating under, and how could they get back to 2015? If, of course, they all agreed they wanted to go back to 2015. Kaylee would take modern day over the Seventies, no question there, with the added convenience of smartphones and the slightly easier lot of Asian-Americans, but if they all suddenly warped ahead the way they had warped back, she would lose any chance she had to explore the possibilities of time travel. Not to mention exploring the Seventies.
“So can we all agree on that?” Noah said eventually. “Mel and I got mugged at the same time, in an alley, but none of us know each other. Kaylee and Sofie, you got mugged right around where you woke up. Doesn’t matter if you don’t know the area, you can say you’re visiting from…wherever you’re really from. That made it easier to mug us. Feel free to use our names, but make it seem like you just learned them for the first time.”
“We did,” Sofie reminded him.
“Great.” Noah clapped his hands once. “I actually do live in New York, back in the real world. Brooklyn, but I know my way around Manhattan, so that should help a little. Obviously no one mention you’re from the future, and try not to get into a conversation about current events. We were victims of violent criminals, so hopefully they won’t count this as indecent exposure. And I’m guessing without the Internet they won’t be able to look up anyone’s records, if you say you’re from out of town.”
“What about you?” Sofie asked.
“Good point,” Noah said. “Okay, I guess I’ll say I was visiting too. From where I grew up.” He sounded disappointed, Kaylee thought, as if he didn’t want anyone to think he lived anywhere other than New York.
“What about drugs?” she asked, just trying to make herself useful. She was trying hard not to ponder timelines.
“I’m a fan,” Noah replied.
“Shit,” Mel said. “Oh, shit. They’re gonna drug test us, aren’t they?”
“I don’t know,” Noah admitted. “Is that a problem?”
“Yes it’s a problem,” Mel snapped. “I was coked out of my mind last night. If they piss test me I’m fucked.”
No one replied. No one knew what to say.