Jeffrey looked up from his computer screen at the young man seated across from him, certain he’d heard him wrong.
“I’m sorry,” said Jeffrey, “what did you say?”
“Time traveler.” The young man, Kevin, smiled pleasantly.
“Your occupation is ‘time traveler’?”
“Mm-hmm.” Kevin nodded.
Jeffrey bit back a sigh. Several of his fellow CPAs, he knew, refused to take walk-ins during the week prior to the April 15th filing deadline, as there seemed to exist an inverse relationship between the number of days left to file and the oddness of the individuals that walked through the door. Jeffrey had never been one to turn down the opportunity to accept—and, more importantly, to bill—a new client, but times like these led him to reconsider that stance. He decided he’d be tacking on a few extra hours to Kevin’s bill and, of course, charging him the special “enhanced” hourly rate.
“Young man,” said Jeffrey, “this is an extremely busy time of year. I’m in no mood for—”
Before he could finish, his office door swung open, and—
Jeffrey started.
The young man in the doorway was identical to the one seated across from him. Both wore the same clunky wristwatch, ripped jeans, and faded t-shirt with the cartoon image of a disembodied blue head and the words “Kang the Conqueror” in big block letters.
“Dude, we forgot our 1099 from the DoD.” The young man in the doorway held out a piece of paper.
Kevin—the one sitting across from Jeffrey—grabbed the folder containing his tax forms from Jeffrey’s desk and shuffled through them. “Crap. I thought that was in here.”
He took the form from his doppelganger.
“Thanks, me.” Kevin grinned.
“No prob.” The other young man—the other Kevin?—reached for his watch, then paused. “Oh, when you get out of here, do not take Woodward. Traffic’s gonna get totally jacked up in fifteen minutes because of an accident at 15 Mile.”
With that, he tapped his watch, and with a flicker of multi-colored light, he vanished.
Jeffrey blinked at the spot where the other Kevin had been. Kevin—the original—slipped the form he’d been handed into the folder and set it back on Jeffrey’s desk.
“Sorry about that,” said Kevin. “What were you saying?”
“Um...” said Jeffrey.
His mind was awhirl. Had he really just seen what he thought he’d seen? How could such a thing even be possible?
But then his mind opened to other possibilities as he considered how he could make use of a time traveling client. Next week’s lottery numbers or the winner of next year’s Super Bowl were obvious. But what about, say, the state of the U.S. economy? Maybe there’s a recession coming. Jeffrey could use that knowledge to short the stock market. He’d have to be careful using such inside information, of course, but he was no stranger to shell companies and off-shore bank accounts. His mind whirled again, only in this particular maelstrom, he saw dollar signs.
As Jeffrey entered Kevin’s information into his tax software, he asked questions about Kevin’s time travel activities. Kevin’s replies, however, revealed little more than vague generalities. When Jeffrey probed for specifics, Kevin laughed and said, “Oh, c’mon, I can’t tell you stuff like that.”
Never one to be dissuaded, Jeffrey mulled over other possible tacks he could take. Maybe he could wheedle out of Kevin information on the weather and use it to make investments in commodities futures. He’d have to put his mind to it and come up with some way of turning Kevin’s knowledge of the future to his advantage.
When Jeffrey finished entering Kevin’s information, he frowned at the result. Kevin was looking at a substantial amount of tax due. While he seemed affable enough, Jeffrey never knew how a client would react to owing a large sum of money. It wouldn’t do to alienate one as potentially valuable as Kevin.
So, not for the first time, Jeffrey got creative.
In addition to multiplying the standard mileage rate by actual mileage Kevin had driven, Jeffrey multiplied it by the number of days into the past and future Kevin had traveled and deducted that amount. He took expenses Kevin incurred in the past, factored in inflation, and deducted the higher amount calculated in today’s dollars. (While, at the same time, he mentally hand-waved away the need to discount to today’s dollars amounts Kevin spent in the future, instead deducting the higher future amount.) He took the Foreign Earned Income Exclusion to eliminate most of Kevin’s wages from taxable income, justifying it by the year-and-a-half Kevin spent in Europe last June. By the time Jeffrey was done, Kevin was getting a refund.
He was about to ask for Kevin’s authorization to electronically file the returns when, with a flicker of multi-colored light, another Kevin appeared. This one looked a bit older, with a stubble beard and longer, shaggier hair.
“Dude, we gotta go.” The other Other Kevin shot Jeffrey a rather unpleasant look as he snatched the folder from Jeffrey’s desk. He grabbed Kevin’s arm and dragged him from the office. Jeffrey thought he heard Other Kevin mutter something about “an IRS audit,” but he wasn’t sure.
He started to close the tax software, but hesitated. Should he file the return anyway? Kevin hadn’t actually told him not to. Jeffrey could just get Kevin to sign the authorization form later. No sense in letting the hard work he’d just done go to waste. He’d be billing Kevin for it, that much was certain.
As Jeffrey considered how to proceed, he grabbed the mail he was going through when Kevin had first walked in. He frowned at an envelope on top of the pile, from the Michigan Association of Certified Public Accountants. He would’ve sworn it hadn’t been there before.
When he opened the envelope, his frown became a curse.
“Are you kidding me?” said Jeffrey. “An ethics investigation?”
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Matt Krizan is a former certified public accountant who writes from his home in Royal Oak, Michigan. His short fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in various publications, including Factor Four Magazine, Daily Science Fiction, and, previously, in Stupefying Stories. Find him online at mattkrizan.com, on Blue Sky as @mattkrizan.bsky.social, and on Twitter as @MattKrizan.
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