All of a sudden the music stopped, and I heard Marilyn's footsteps rushing toward the kitchen. "I'm done," she said.

    "Great," I replied. "Want to do something fun?" Marilyn nodded. "Yeah, let's go downstairs." "Well, Carolyn's working on this project - " "The time machine," Marilyn said casually. "I know all about it." She ran to the top of the basement stairs, and called down, "Hey! Are you done yet?" "No way!" Carolyn replied.

    "Well, can me and Mary Anne come down?" There was a pause. "What's the password, Marilyn?" Marilyn exhaled. "I forgot." "Warp movement!" Carolyn whispered loudly.

    "Oh, yeah, warp movement," Marilyn repeated.

    "Okay, come on," Carolyn replied.

    I held back a laugh. Carolyn may have been a good scientist, but she was a terrible secret- keeper. We walked down the wooden steps to a large, unfinished basement. It had cinderblock walls and a concrete floor, with exposed pipes hanging from a low ceiling. I had to duck to avoid cobwebs.

    There was a boiler against the far wall. To one of its pipes, Carolyn had tied ropes and wires. They fanned out in a kind of network, attached on the other side to a stack of wooden crates. Scraps of metal, tinfoil, crumpled-up paper, and tools were strewn around the floor. Nailed to the crates was a cardboard sign that looked like this: "What a mess," Marilyn mumbled.

    "Hello?" I said.

    Carolyn popped out from behind the crates. She was wearing a pair of cat's-eye sunglasses, and the "flux capacitator" was strapped to her forehead with a terry cloth headband.

    "When I am finished, you will go where no girl has gone before," Carolyn said, in a voice like a TV announcer, "to enter the final dimension, through a warp of time - " Marilyn was practically shrieking with laughter. "Carolyn, you're warped!" she said.

    At that moment, the boiler clicked and made a whooshing sound. Carolyn screamed and jumped away, knocking over some more crates that were off to the side. Marilyn laughed even louder.