“In the beginning, there was darkness. Then, the Lord created the heavens and the Earth. He put us in a paradise, but we forfeited that access to paradise after we cursed ourselves with the knowledge from the forbidden tree. All God had asked from us was to not eat from the tree! This cursed knowledge is why so many sinners who have not yet seen the light of God have such cold, unloving, and unsympathetic lives. Now, kids, Jesus was a lot like, uh, what is cool nowadays? Drake? Well, Jesus was a lot like Drake, even though he only had twelve followers and a whole lot of haters…”

My youth pastor continued his rambling to the six middle-school-aged kids strewn around the dark green carpet at his feet, seemingly oblivious that three of them were on the cusp of falling asleep and that the other three were more excited by the raindrops racing down the window than his sermon. I was part of the latter group, fiddling with the heels of my rain boots. I’d already heard these sermons hundreds of times before, and at this point, the only thing I knew better than the history of the Bible was probably the lore of Transformers. I turned my mind back to more pressing issues, namely, my English paper due the next day.

Write about an interesting experience one of your family members had before you were born. What would you have done if you were them? What would you tell them if you had been with them?

I hadn’t started writing yet because the question seemed simple enough. I figured that I’d write about some distant ancestor of mine who had a hard day farming or something like that, but decided at the last moment to try to come up with something more creative. My English grade was banking heavily on this assignment after all.

I wonder what life was like for my first ancestors, I thought to myself.  I guess they’d be Adam and Eve, right? I wonder what I would do if I went back to meet them…

I could feel the Time-Boy in my pocket beckoning me. I still couldn’t believe that for just nineteen dollars and eighty-five cents a month, you could go back to any point in time for a week—and be comforted by the knowledge that you would return to the present if your life was endangered. (The ad said it all: “Go back for a week, and come back if things look bleak!”) Well, it’d get you as close as possible to the past by bringing you to a simulation of it. Still, it’s a pretty good deal.

I looked out the window. The sky was saturated with the strange oranges and yellows present on a cloudy day just before sunset. The rain, was well, just a plain November rain.

“Now everyone, open your bibles up to Genesis Chapter 3 verse 6 - Bill, what is it?”

“Can I use the bathroom please?”

“Yes, you may. But make it quick. You will be quizzed on this next week.”

Jesus could wait, just for today. I had an interview to do.

I hurried out of the room, down the halls, and into a toilet stall, tearing my Time-Boy out of my pocket and fumbling with the controls. I set it to bring me all the way back to my first ancestor, closed my eyes, and pressed the button.

I awoke to a vast blue sky dotted with picturesque clouds and filled with cheerful birdsong. A light breeze packed with the overpowering aroma of flowers, fruit, and grass grazed me as I sat up. Immediately I realized that I was sitting in the cool mud by a shallow creek populated by animals I had only seen in pictures. To my left, a rhino was casually drinking from the shallow water with three of its calves. Directly ahead of me was a flock of peacocks basking in the sun– a sun which had recently risen and shone through the clouds at a seemingly impossibly perfect angle, scattering rays of crisp golden sunshine through the valley.

I remained seated there, wondrously gazing around at all of these beautiful sights when all of a sudden, I heard footsteps and laughter approaching.

I rushed up and brushed some mud from my pants, wanting to appear well-kept for my ancestors. Before I was done patting down my hair with the creek water, a man and a woman burst from a thicket of olive trees. 

They were… naked? 

It took me a second to recover, but another thought immediately followed the first.

Hold on, if these two– my ancestors– my first ancestors– are here naked, in this… garden… 

I paused mid-breath.

I was looking at Adam and Eve.

The only people seemingly more unprepared for this meeting were Adam and Eve themselves. As far as they knew, they had been the sole human inhabitants of the entire world. 

I stepped back and raised my hand to give the duo a wave. “Um… Hello.”

Both Adam and Eve responded with a wave and what I presumed to be a greeting of their own.

Huh? Wait, what did they just say?...

It was then that I realized that I couldn’t understand anything they would say. This shouldn’t have surprised me, but I wound up still feeling frustrated that they couldn’t help with my English project.

I laughed a little to myself. Here I was, standing amid a miracle of, well, biblical proportions, worrying about some middle school English project.

The three of us stood there, awkwardly gazing at each other until Adam took a deep breath and began talking for a long time without a trace of discomfort. 

“Blah, blah blah blah? Blah blah blah blah…”

He paused and began staring at me inquisitively, eagerly awaiting a response. Eve stood beside him, eyes wide and hands behind her back, clearly also expecting some sort of reply.

It dawned on me that they had expected me to understand whatever they were saying. They were both handcrafted creations of God and had no reason to suspect I would have been made in a different language setting.

“I’m sorry… I don’t understand… uh…”

My weak reply didn’t help. The pair looked at each other quizzically and then back at me. Their eyes narrowed into an inquisitive squint and the first man and woman turned back towards one another. The duo then slowly began whispering between themselves, and it slowly devolved into what sounded like a guttural whisper rap battle. Upon its conclusion, Eve motioned for me to follow them. I did, seeing as I had no better options available. They brought me to an empty meadow sparsely dotted with patches of flowers ripe with every color of the rainbow, and Adam moved his hands up and down slowly with his palms facing downwards.

Stay here, I thought, they want me to stay here.

I took a seat in the tall lush grass as Eve curiously glanced at me before hurrying into a thicket. Adam was scoping out the area around me, looking for something. He rushed to pick up a large flat piece of bark that rested near a large flat rock and followed Eve. I considered following them, then decided that it was best to stay where I was. I wouldn’t want unexpected visitors snooping around my home.

As I began to study my surroundings, I realized that this meadow was also overflowing with life. A vole carrying something in its mouth scurried across my feet, and overhead, a flock of doves passed by. About thirty feet ahead of me, a herd of horses grazed lazily, stopping once to look at me. Looking back up at the sun, I could tell that it had already been a few hours since I arrived.

These people aren’t so different from me, I thought. It’s just that they happen to live in paradise. It’s funny. Adam and Eve feel… human. It’s weird seeing them acting like regular people. They aren’t the imposing figures that people make them out to be. I guess it only makes sense. They are part of my family after all. Maybe I-

Suddenly, the entire garden froze. The birds stopped chirping, the horses looked up, and a pack of deer I hadn’t noticed rose from the grass. The instantaneous silence that filled the garden was deafening. I stood up and squinted in the direction that Adam and Eve had run, wondering what had happened. A horse caught sight of me and called a warning to the rest of its herd, immediately running away with them following. The deer all quickly sprung away upon hearing the horses’ call, and a large flock of ravens hurried from trees in the direction that Adam and Eve had gone.

I began to make my way in that direction, and after a few minutes, I stumbled into another meadow covered with a single tree planted in the center and a large pond with a cliff dropping into it. A small pile of apples, figs, and bananas lay beside a large piece of bark by the tree.

I scanned the surrounding area for Adam and Eve, unsure of what to do. A sense of surprise filled me as this garden that was just teeming with life was now suddenly silent. Loneliness was quick to replace the surprise within me as the stillness saturated my every sense.

I’m all alone, I thought, searching my surroundings.

I wish I had been right.

As I was busy probing the treeline for signs of Adam and Eve, I suddenly heard grass shifting and plants being brushed behind me. Turning around, I saw a large snake in the yellow grass slowly inching towards me. It locked eyes with me, and I immediately started slowly backing away. It hissed aggressively but stopped getting closer. I didn't understand why until I backed right into the pond.

I plunged deep into the water, surprised to notice that it wasn’t cold. I fought to raise my head above the pond, but I couldn’t even swim in a manicured pool, much less a murky pond with rain boots on. I struggled to free myself from my boots, kicking furiously, desperately trying to break free of the water’s seal that trapped me.

After a few minutes though, I found the struggle to be useless. I couldn’t hold on anymore and felt myself sinking. The light from the midday sun was growing dimmer, and I finally succumbed to whatever principles of science that were pulling me down. The last thing I remember seeing was an outstretched hand.

I took another bite of my apple and set it down by my AP biology textbook. My gaze shifted down to the Time-Boy in my hand. It had been nearly six years since I last let myself hold one, much less use one. I had spent the last six years thinking about my last trip. After a few months, I didn’t even know if it was real. None of it made any sense. I couldn’t reason out anything that happened there. My parents tried to convince me that I couldn’t have gone back to Adam and Eve. They tried to make the same trip themselves but never got there. After finding me soaked in the bathroom, my Sunday School teachers figured that I was just another kid “playing in the rain without my coat” and making “nonsense excuses for skipping Bible discussion.” After a while, I began to believe them.

Christianity too soon faded beyond the realm of reality. The whole thing was all just based on blind trust, and after doubting myself for years, trust was the last thing I had much of.

Time and time again, I’ve tried to work up the courage for another trip back. But time and time again, I’d hesitate. Would I even want to see everything again? Would I want to know the truth? But over the years, curiosity gnawed away my apprehension, and my hesitation became slowly replaced by an anxious longing.

I wouldn’t–I couldn’t believe myself until I could see it with my own eyes. Again.

I looked out the window at the clear, sunny sky. The weeklong rain had finally cleared up, and a rainbow was slowly materializing outside. Outside, a bird was drinking from a puddle left by the November rains, and scurrying away from it was a squirrel with its mouth full of acorns. I opened up the Time-Boy and set the setting to my first ancestor again. I swallowed and pressed the button.

I awoke to an endless sea that stretched as far as my vision would go. The sky was a glowing sulfur, and the air reeked of sewage and used fireworks. The air itself was blisteringly hot, but thankfully, the sea provided a cool refuge. I struggled to tread water while scanning the waves for any sign of Eden—or any land, for that matter. As I looked around, though, I found myself struck by a sudden and indescribable sense of solitude. There was nothing but ocean for as far as the eye could see, and no land either. I was alone.

It was then that I suddenly realized why I was here. This was where my first ancestor was, swimming with me in this endless sea. 

That just made me feel even more alone. Knowing that I was the only creature on the face of the Earth, maybe even the universe, besides a single-celled organism. This primitive organism was part of my family, yet it was unsympathetic, unwelcoming, unloving, and most importantly… inhuman.

Just swimming here somehow made all my experiences in the Garden of Eden feel real. If I could be here, treading water on Earth nearly 4 billion years before I was born, why is it so hard to believe I met two people in some garden?

If Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden were real… then where am I now? Why am I here? Who am I swimming with? Who…no– what– is my true kindred?...

And the last thing I remembered was sinking. My arms and legs had seemingly been slowly gaining weight since I began swimming, and it was only a matter of time before I gave out. In the end, there was darkness.