Changing the past

It was on one of my trips to the Ecuadorian Amazon region that I first heard the story of a mysterious coffee.

It was a unique species since it came from the interior of the jungle, an area not very favorable for the cultivation of coffee. However, because of those mysteries that one never knows where they come from, there was in the middle of the jungle a very high mountain, permanently cloudy, on which some coffee bushes grew.

According to legend, in the years when there were many eclipses of the moon and sun, the harvested crop produced a coffee capable of crossing the frontiers of time, allowing one to literally travel to any place in the past or the future.

After learning that information I dedicated myself to researching the matter, so I was able to know the exact month in which the beans harvested in the last quarter of the year were processed.

I studied with dedication the astronomical yearbooks of the last decades and I realized that this year there had been more eclipses than in previous years.

I moved to the Ecuadorian jungle with the objective of finding that coffee. I had to ask a lot of questions, the locals were jealous of the information, but I was fortunate to get a guide who took me to a hamlet at the foot of the mountain, where for a few dollars I got almost a kilo of that strange coffee.

On the way back the guide was emphatic in warning me about a few things. The first was that the product was not guaranteed; one never knew if that year's coffee had the magical properties. The second thing was that if I managed to travel in time, I should never, never let myself be trapped by the people of the other era, since I would be trapped there until the end of my days; neither could I bring to the present any object from another time, and much less try to alter the events that had occurred.

Being in the peace of my home one afternoon I decided to try that coffee.

With the first sips I noticed that its taste was different, it had a certain unpleasant aroma, as if it had been stored for a long time. After the third sip I felt my body lighter, I began to think of ancient Egypt and suddenly I saw myself in a kind of cavern from where I could see outside. I remembered the guide's words and hid until the end of the night. Covered by the shadows I dared to reach a small town of narrow dirt streets and small low houses made of adobe bricks. That day I had no more courage, I returned to the cave and with the last drop of coffee, I returned to the armchair where I was lying down. The feeling of lightness accompanied me for the rest of the night until the next day.

Little by little I learned to travel where I wanted and beforehand I had some clothes made that would allow me to go unnoticed. In order not to arouse suspicion, I would tell the seamstress that they were clothes for plays.

In this way I traveled to places of great interest to me, I was in medieval Europe, in the North America of the times of the North-South struggle and in some other places. To be able to be present in those places of the past was really extraordinary.

One day I shared that information with a very dear friend, I made him part of my secret.

At first he doubted my word, something very logical since the idea of traveling to the past, just for the sake of drinking coffee, was not very credible. He asked me for some proof and the only thing I could show him were the clothes I had had made. However, he saw the sincerity in my eyes and had no more doubts. He mentioned the desire to travel to the past, to a time in his mother's youth.

Two nights later I took advantage of his visit to invite him to live the experience. My friend did not think twice and agreed. I told him the same warnings that the guide had told me in the jungle.

While my friend drank the coffee I could see him, he had gone into a kind of trance. For a moment I could read his thoughts and was horrified. Disobeying my instructions he had decided to change the past.

His mother had suffered a lot because my friend's father was an alcoholic and abusive man. So he used the trip to the past to get to the exact day those two had met. Somehow he managed to thwart that meeting and his mother was unable to meet his father.

As my friend drank the coffee he became transparent. At times he could see through it the new direction his mother's life had taken. After a few minutes the coffee cup crashed to the floor. My friend had disappeared, as if he had never existed.

Thank you for your time.

Image sources. I II

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Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

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