THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE [2009]

Henry: You do understand why it is I don't know you?

Clare: Of course.

When you're older, you'll travel back to when I'm a little girl.

For me... I mean, I've known you since... since I was 6 years old.

Since you appeared in the meadow behind my parents' house where I used to play.

Clare, put her journal on the table: I wrote down every time that you came to visit me.

Henry: Which I gather I did, or will do, fairly often?

Clare: The last time that I saw you, I was 18.

Seems that you got back to the same places a lot.

Henry: Yeah, it's like gravity.

Big events pull you in.

Clare: I was a big event.

Henry: So it would seem.

Clare: This is weird, I never knew you at this age.

I mean, I've only known you at this... mature worldly person.

Henry: I'm competing against myself.

Clare: How's it feel? I mean, I know what i's like to watch you go, 

but what's it like to always be the one that's going?

Henry: Sometimes it feels like you've stood up too quickly.

Your hands and feet are tingling and then they're not there at all.

Sometimes it feels like your attention has wandered just for an instant,

then you're standing naked someplace.

Maybe you've been there before, maybe you haven't.

You don't know how long it's gonna last,

so you start walking till you find some clothes.

Then you seem just like everybody else.

Except you're stranded and all alone, just waiting to disappear.

Clare: But you get to see people from the past.

People who are gone, like your mom.

Henry: Yeah, but the thing is, you can't change what happens to them.

I've tried.

It just happens anyway.

Gomez: Why don't you tell me what this is about?

Henry: You wanna know? I'm gonna tell you.

Because you and I are gonna be friends for a long time.

So you might as well know now.

Gomez: Know what?

Henry: I look older, right? That's because I am.

I've come back to this night from the future.

I'm a time traveler.

Gomez: Oh my God, you are out of your mind.

Henry: Started when I was 6 years old.

I have fits. I disappear. I travel through time.

I've come to this night from 2003.

What year is this?

Gomez: 1995. I don't like this.

Henry: I get dislocated in time.

I never know when it's gonna happen or where I'm gonna end up.

I have to break and enter, steal clothes from the first person I see.

You name it, I've done it.

Gomez: There's something wrong with you.

Henry: Yeah, there is.

But I care about Clare more than you can imagine, so don't worry about that.

Gomez: Whoa, hey, I'm reassured. 

Listen, in the future do Charisse and I get married?

Do I go bald? Does Charisse go bald?

Henry: I'm not gonna tell you things about your life.

Knowing stuff in advance makes you crazy.

Gomez: You're full of shit! You know that!

Henry: You won't think that in a minute.

Gomez: Yeah? Why's that?

[Henry disappear]

I've been waiting for him my entire life and now he's here.

I mean, it's already happened.

I couldn't even change it if I wanted to.

~Clare

Henry: I'm getting married.

Richard: Who would marry you? Does she know about...

Henry: She knows everything about me. Everything.

Her name's Clare. Clare Abshire. She's an artist.

And I'd really like to give her Mom's wedding and engagement rings.

That's why I'm here.

And I think Mom would really like that.

Richard: How would you know what your mother would like?

You barely knew her.

Henry: I know her. I still know her now.

I've just seen her on the subway.

I see her pushing me in the stroller. I see her with you too.

This thing I have isn't always a curse.

Richard: Then why don't you keep her from getting into that goddamn car?

Henry: I would if I could, you know that.

I've watched her die hundreds of times.

I can never get there in time to change it.

Henry: My wife had a miscarriage.

Dr. Kendrick: I am very sorry about that but I don't see what I can do to help.

Henry: What if the baby's a traveler like me?

What if it has the same genetic anomaly?

What if it traveled out of the womb?

Dr. Kendrick: You need help.

Not the kind of help I can give you.

Henry: How can I prove it to you?

Dr. Kendrick: You can't. It's impossible.

Your brain emits a blast of electromagnetic energy akin to an epileptic's

right at the moment you travel.

~Dr. Kendrick

What, you think that I wanted this life?

This husband that disappears without any kind or warning?

Do you think anyone would want that?

Who would want that?

~Clare

I'm pregnant...

Do you remember the night in the parking lot, when I came to get you?

You were younger.

Before the surgery.

I mean, it's not like I cheated on you.

~Clare

Henry: This is the first time we've ever met.

Alba: How do you do?

Henry: How old are you?

Alba: 10. How about you?

Henry: 38.

So tell me about you. 

How's school? What are you learning?

Alba: Well, not much at school.

But I read all the time. I read about Egypt.

Mom and I are reading The Lord of The Rings.

And Grandpa teaches me the violin.

And I heard Grandma sing. It was beautiful. At the opera, Aida.

Henry: What, you time traveled?

Alba: Mom says you and I are exactly alike.

Except Dr. Kendrick says I'm a prodigy, because sometimes I can choose where I go.

Henry: You can control it?

When you go and when you come back?

Alba: I'm learning.

Alba: I love you, Daddy.

Henry: I love you too, honey.

Henry: Alba.

Clare: Alba?

Henry: We name her Alba.

Clare: You met her?

Henry: Yeah. She's so beautiful, and so smart.

You're gonna love her so much.

Alba, age 5: Try to stay, Daddy.

Henry: How do you do it?

Alba, age 5: When I feel like I'm going, I sing... I sing to myself.

Henry: Let's try then.

[they start to sing as Henry start to disappear]

Alba: Tell me the story of how you and Mom met.

Henry: Doesn't she tell you?

Alba: She does but not like you do.

Henry: Well, it was right here in this meadow.

And one fine day, your mom -who's just a tiny little things-, 

goes out to the clearing and there's a man there...

Alba: With no clothes.

Henry: Not a stitch on him.

And after she gives him a blanket she happens to be carrying,

he explains to her that he's a time traveler.

Now for some reason I'll never understand, she believes him.

Alba: Because it's true.

Henry: I'm going.

Alba: No, Daddy... Sing!

Henry: I can't sing.

Clare: Why didn't you tell me you were coming?

I would've been here waiting.

Henry: I didn't want you to wait.

I don't want you to spend your life waiting.

Alba: Sometimes I think he's in the trees, deciding when to come out and surprise me.

Clare: I used to think that when I was a little girl,

that he was always here, even when he wasn't.

Alba: I guess he is, isn't he?

*****