The cheerful computer voice rumbled to life:
‘Welcome home, Marty, oh master of the house, king of the castle, lord of the manor!’
The computer greeting - that must mean that Marty Senior was coming home!
She heard another noise behind her - a soft, shooshing. noise - the same sound she had heard the last time the front door opened. And she was still in the middle of the room!
There was another door, half-open, at the far end of the living-room. She jumped inside. She glanced behind her long enough to see she was in a bathroom - not all that different from bathrooms she knew. She quickly closed the door behind her, leaving just enough space for her to peek out.
Her heart almost stopped when she saw who walked through the living room and past her toward the kitchen. It was Marty Senior, her Marty, decked out in a business suit - although for some reason he was wearing two ties. But he looked so much older, so much greyer. Could he have changed this much in thirty years?
‘Hi, everybody,' he called as he walked into the kitchen, out of Jennifer's view. ‘I’m home!’
Maybe, she thought, she should get out of here herself. But where could she go? She turned around at last to get a good look at this bathroom.
Wait a minute. This bathroom had another door, right behind her back! She was lucky that no one had walked in while she had been looking out the other way.
She turned to the second door and cautiously opened it a crack, and found herself looking into the kitchen.
Grandfather George waved from his harness.
'Hi, son...'
Marty senior grinned at his parents.
'Hey Dad, how're you feeling? how's the back?’
'OK ...' his father answered after a moment's thought.
Lorraine stepped forward with that sweet, motherly smile of hers.
'How are things at work, Marty?' she asked gently.
; Marty shrugged and sighed.
'Oh same old, same old.'
So everyone was in the kitchen. Jennifer realised that maybe now she could leave through the other door and get out of this place without anybody seeing her.
She turned back to the door she’d entered through, and realised, as soon as she looked through the crack she'd left there, that everybody wasn’t in the room beyond. Marty Junior stood in the next room, calling out numbers at a big screen. The screen responded by showing six different pictures for six different television programmes. The thing Marty Junior was watching was some sort of giant, multi-channel video screen - a screen that hung crooked on the wall. Jennifer had to push back an urge to rush out there and try to straighten the picture out.
Marty Senior walked into the room behind his son. He picked up a pile of papers from a basket and quickly sorted through them.’Ah,’ he muttered to himself. ‘Nothin’ but junk fax!’
He turned to his son. ‘Junior! Dinner time!'
Junior didn't budge.
‘But I'm watching TV!' he shouted over his shoulder. ‘Well, get your glasses,’ Marty Senior insisted. ‘We eat at the table when your grandparents are here.’ Junior got up as slowly as he could.
‘Aw, Dad,’ he whined, ‘I can only watch two shows at once on my glasses!’
Marty Senior laughed and shook his head. ‘Yeah, you kids really have it tough! When I was your age, if I wanted to watch two shows at once, I had to put two sets next to each other! ’
Marty Junior didn't seem impressed. He wandered back toward the kitchen. His father straightened the video screens, adding ‘Let's have some art, please!'
The six TV programmes disappeared, replaced by what looked like a very large, bright painting of a bowl of fruit! Marty Senior turned and followed his son from the room.