Steven Lloyd was taking a walk through his town’s Graveyard to put flowers on his mother’s grave. As he approached it, the words on the grave came into focus.

A Great Woman and Mother
Cynthia Lloyd
1941-2004
RIP


Steven gently laid the flowers in front of he grave and stood there for a moment. Suddenly, he heard a voice behind him.

“Hello,” the voice said. “I’m very sorry for your loss.”

Steven turned around and saw a man who had a sad look on his face. He looked like he was in his mid-40’s, with slicked back brown hair and soothing blue eyes.

“Thank you,” Steven replied. He stuck out his hand. “Steven Lloyd.”

The man shook it. “Jack Ringwald,” he said. The name sounded eerily familiar, but Steven thought nothing of it.

“Nice to meet you,” he said, turning to walk home. He realized he had never asked Jack why he was here. He turned to ask him, and was stunned.

Jack was gone. What a fast walker, Jack thought, and he turned and left the graveyard.
***

The next day Steven woke up and had a revelation. He had seen Jack Ringwald in the same newspaper that contained his mother’s obituary. He went to the LA Times archives online and searched “Jack Ringwald”. Two entries came up, October 26th, 2004 and September 9th, 2004. The September 9th entry was the same day his mother’s obituary had been in the times. He wondered…

Steven clicked the first entry and an article opened up in a new window.

Horrific Crash Kills Five
October 26th, Los Angeles¬¬â€” Five people, all LA citizens, have died in a car crash, when their car crashed into a coffee shop on Lake Street. The car was hit in the side by another car whose driver was allegedly talking on a cell phone.
On impact the car rolled over three times before busting through the front glass windows of the coffee shop. Luckily, no one inside the coffee shop was injured.
The five people known dead are Jack Ringwald, Sal Moleski, Jamie Springer, Tex Jones…


The article went on, but Steven stopped reading. That couldn’t be right. He clicked back to the previous page and clicked the second link. Another window opened up and Steven gasped.

It was an obituary, with a picture of the man he had seen. The newspaper was wrong. It had to be wrong. Steven ran to the graveyard, hoping Jack would be there.
***

Sure enough, Jack was at the graveyard walking around. “Jack!” Steven yelled, dashing into the graveyard.

“Hey, Steven!” Jack replied, happy to see a familiar face. Steven kept running and finally reached Jack.

“Hey,” he said. “I need to talk to you about something. Everyone thinks you’re dead! The LA Times ran your obituary back in oh-four! You have to come with me!”

“I can’t,” Jack said sadly. He turned away. Steven looked down in frustration. He looked back up.

“Why can’t⎯” Steven stopped. Jack had disappeared. That was not possible! Nothing on the whole earth could possibly move that fast, even at full speed. This was really weird. What was going on?

Steven sighed but decided to look for him. For twenty minutes he looked through the graveyard and found nothing. He gave up and turned around to leave. But as he did this something caught his eye. It was a gravestone. Could it be?

Steven approached it and read the gravestone.

Jack Ringwald
RIP 1961-2004
A great man, died young.


Steven froze. Now it all made sense. The disappearing, the articles... Was Steven going insane? Was Jack Ringwald—

“Dead.” Steven wheeled around and saw Jack, holding a gun. “Two years ago.”

“Jack, please,” Steven pleaded. “Drop the gun.”

“I can’t,” Jack replied, a cold look in his eyes. “You know my secret. I hate having to do this, but it’s something I must do.” Jack paused. “Goodbye, Steven.” And with that, he pulled the trigger.

Steven heard a bang and looked down. Suddenly, he couldn’t hold his own weight. He collapsed and tried to scream but could only muster a squeal. The world began to spin very fast. Around and around and around and around…


LA Times September 8th, 2005
Obituaries:
Steven Lloyd (1966-2005) Steven, a lawyer for Sears Corp., committed suicide in a Northern Los Angeles graveyard Thursday, shooting himself in the stomach. Steven was born in Sacramento in July of 1966 and lived in Northern LA. He is survived by two daughters, Kendra and Jaclyn.