Gross Innocence

"It can't be done," barked Smith.

"Yes it can," replied Jones.

"You presume too much. Too much of yourself and of other people," Smith sighed and stirred her tea.

"I think we can make major changes, and for the better." Jones whispered but spoke sternly and passionately.

Smith dropped her head back. "You new Clockers all think you can make changes. Time travel is a gift, a commodity. It's been carefully searched, tested, traveled, recorded, and simply put, not allowed for major changes."

Jones looked around the street cafe, strange yet familiar. "Then why do we do it?"

"Tourism. Because tourism was decided as a safe enough choice for travel. We can spend some money, bring old items back to the present, and make little differences in commerce. It's been studied as only effecting less than one-one-thousandth of one percent of people in interaction in long term studies. And those effects were minimal. 'Men In Black,' type stuff."

"What's 'Men in Black?'" Asked Jones.

Smith looked at her watch, "Right, it's 1995, that movie hasn't come out yet. It'll be huge in about 15 months." She looked at her travel partner and snickered.

Jones looked around the street, beyond the cafe. The fashions were familiar yet foreign. "I can't believe this is normal and not ironic." Jones made eyes around the street behind her Ray Ban sunglasses. "The hair. The clothes. And why is everyone so invested in a trial about juice?"

Smith nearly spat her tea. "Holy shit Jones," she laughed. "If you're going to come here, you gotta study a little." She wiped the tea from her chin. "And when you get the chance, you need to fix your make up, no one knows how to contour yet. Pick up a Cosmopolitan. It will feel ridiculous putting it on, but trust me, you'll look right."

Jones tried to hide behind their copy of 'A Debt Of Honor' by Tom Clancy. "Seriously though, a juice trial?"

"No. O.J. - O.J. Simpson. Not orange juice. He killed his ex-wife last year and another guy. The whole trial is a whole big circus." Smith looked around to another table and grabbed an abandoned newspaper. She tossed it to Jones without even looking at it, "I promise you this, there's something in there about the Simpson murder trial: Marcia Clark or Johnnie Cochran's bizarre defenses or Robert Kardashian--"

"Kardashian? As in?" Jones interrupted.

"Don't get me started." Smith shut down the tangent before it could begin. "This is the trial of the decade. This whole thing spans nearly two years and touches all parts of the media. It's going to get made fun of on TV shows and in movies. This will be made into movies. I guess I thought you would have seen at least one of them since we were coming here."

"I guess I didn't think studying the cultural significance of things was as important. Sure, I studied the world leaders, books, TV shows, songs, slang. The usual stuff."

"How did this not come up?"

"They didn't talk about it on Friends, Wings, and Seinfeld," Jones said matter-of-factly.

"What's the deal with that? Who are these people?" Smith said in her best Jerry Seinfeld impression. Jones just looked confused at the reference. "Never mind."

"Why did you want to come here, Smith?" Jones asked with genuine curiosity.

Smith took a deep breath and looked around. "Look at them. They're so innocent. They're out of the Cold War. Clinton's in his first presidency. Hardly any one has internet, and that alone is in its infancy." She scoffed a laugh, "The O.J. trial." She looked across the street at the building being built, 'Coming soon: Starbucks.' "There's a certain magical innocence about the mid-90s that is about to go up in smoke in the next several years."

"Ugh, speaking of," Jones ticked her head to the smoldering ashtray at the next table. "Does everyone fucking smoke? It's so gross."

"Much less now than 20 years ago, believe it or not. You know it gets better." Smith got up, grabbed the ash tray, moved it to a further table away; close to the waiter station, and sat back down with Jones.

"I still think it can be done," said Jones. "Major changes, and for the better."

"I promise you you're wrong," said Smith.

"What about the O.J. Simpson trial?" asked Jones with a smirk on her face.

"O.J. Simpson trial," Smith tried to say it quietly to hide her shock. "The football player - Naked Gun - O.J. Simpson? I know he lost a bunch of money because of domestic battery in his divorce, but no criminal trial." Smith pulled the newspaper out from Jones' hands. "You mean the Tim Daly murder? That crazy stalker that got him and his wife?" She opened the newspaper. "I swear, every week for the last year, something new about the trial. Just awful what happened to them. It is the trial of the decade."

Damn it! Jones took another note in the margin of her book for next time.

***

For all thinks Tinka