10 Question Literature Quiz: 11/22/63 | Stephen King

Answer: Two minutes

Jake Epping, a Maine English teacher, is called up by local diner owner Al Templeton who, in less than a day, seems to have aged years since Jake's last meal. Al, now afflicted with terminal lung cancer, levels with him. One day, he found something in his diner's pantry-- a couple steps in and you would appear in another time, specifically 11:58am on September 9th, 1958. No matter how long he spent in 1958, he could return the way he came and only two minutes would have passed in the diner. Sure enough, Jake 'falls down the rabbit hole' and spends a short time in 1950s Maine, enjoying a root beer before returning from whence he came.

It's an interesting prospect to Jake. It's clearly supernaturally fascinating, but potentially dangerous. Al levels with him-- he wanted to go back and change a watershed moment in history. What if, he suggests, someone went back in time and saved JFK? The big issue is the butterfly effect; if Jake goes back in time and changes something, it could affect his original timeline. Even having the root beer changes something that Al once tried to affect on his last visit.

But there's not much time to do something. With Al expected to die of his affliction, the diner is likely to go up for lease. He asks Jake to do what he couldn't-- to save JFK-- but Jake insists on something smaller scale first. He settles on following up on a story one of his GED students once wrote for him. Harry Dunning's family was killed by his crazed father who attacked his mother and brother with a hammer one night in 1958. If Jake can go back there and save Harry, then maybe he can aim higher.

Answer: Derry

Jake returns to 1958 and makes sure to be careful not to go too far off the script to avoid what he and Al realize might create a butterfly effect. He makes a number of stops-- he gets a haircut, goes to the bank, buys clothes, buys a car-- and before he knows it he drives off to Derry to execute his plan. He dislikes Derry from the get-go; there's something that seems to cast a pall over the sleepy town, on top of which there are numerous Dunnings living there. He digs for information, but there aren't even records at the town hall. It's almost as though something is acting against his purpose; the past, after all, is obdurate.

The leads do show up though, often through sheer coincidence, and Jake finds himself situated in Derry for seven weeks before locating Frank Dunning, a butcher at the Derry Center Street Market who's been living in a rooming house five blocks away from his family in town. Jake reasons that there might be many ways of stopping Frank from committing his awful act, but the simplest way to do so, and to prevent him from causing harm in the future, would have to be by killing him. He buys a gun the next day.

Answer: Halloween

It doesn't take much digging at the local bars for Jake to determine that Dunning has a hidden bad temper. Though he's perfectly charming to his customers, rumours of his domestic outbursts have been circulating. He accumulates his notes before discovering that a local source of information was put up to telling him what he wanted to hear by a man named Bill Turcotte.

When the fateful night of Halloween arrives, Jake finds that the obdurancy of the past is in full force. Sick all morning and afternoon, he barely manages to make it to the Dunning household in time with his gun. He's stopped by Turcotte upon his arrival and he uncovers the fact that Turcotte came to do the same thing-- Frank Dunning killed his sister Clara years ago. Turcotte, however, is also a victim of the timeline; he experiences devastating chest pain, enough for Jake to overpower him and head into the household just in time for Frank to arrive with a sledgehammer. The man manages to hit Ellen and kill Arthur, Harry's eldest brother, but Bill manages to gain enough strength to enter the house and stab Frank with a bayonet.

Before anyone can catch him, Jake gets to his car, takes the turnpike back to Lisbon Falls, and takes the step back to 2011. Mission accomplished.

Answer: Substitute teacher

When Jake makes it back to 2011 he finds that an earlier picture of Harry Dunning is not on Al's diner wall. Due to the actions he took in 1958, Dunning never grew up to become a janitor. Al warns him that if he goes back into the rabbit hole, as he most certainly will, he'll reset the timeline, but for now, Dunning never met him. Additionally, the larger the changes Jake makes, the more the past will resist his actions. Because Jake tried to save all of the Dunnings, it had stronger obdurancy.

And sure enough, Jake's actions stuck. Turcotte died of a heart attack on Halloween night at the Dunning household. When Jake calls an older Ellen Dunning, she informs him that Harry died in Vietnam. Jake heads to Al's to get more information only to discover that the man killed himself to end the pain. And it's with little more than a stack of detailed notes that he returns through the rabbit hole, back into 1958 to reset the clock. That being said, this time he enters the past to find that things have already changed-- a man with a yellow card in his hat, waiting at the rabbit hole, has slit his throat. Previously, he'd been there to meet passers-through.

Jake changes course slightly to change the past. Taking on the name George Amberson, he pushes back against the pass to kill Frank Dunning early, catching him at the graveyard where his parents are buried. Jake shoots him while he's laying flowers at their tombstone before leaving Derry altogether.

He also follows through with Al's plan to save a young woman named Carolyn Poulin from a stray bullet, doing so by occupying a Maine hunter, Andy Cullum, so that he doesn't go hunting on that fateful day. He succeeds on this front too. And with that he heads to Florida and then Louisiana, teaching, gambling with stacked odds (knowing the past thoroughly enough from Al's notes), and then heading to Texas.

With the plan to spend three years laying low, he settles in the town of Jodie, just outside of Dallas, and gets a job as a substitute teacher. It's then that he meets Sadie Clayton (nee Dunhill), and that's when things get complicated.

Answer: She is married

Though he starts living a quiet, but meaningful, life in Jodie, Texas, Jake doesn't lose sight of his goal. He starts by preemptively purchasing audio gear to commence his surveillance of what will become the Oswalds' first family home in the U.S. He rents a house owned by the Templetons in Fort Worth and uses a lamp to hide a surveillance bug there, but his efforts are partly marred by other goings-on. The past always finds a way.

After chaperoning a Sadie Hawkins dance with Sadie, he builds a truly meaningful relationship with her, to the point where he vows he can never go back to his present day. Becoming engrained in life in late 1950s Texas, he suggests to Sadie that they can be together, but they clearly both have secrets. While he hides his identity, she hopes to remove herself from her toxic marriage to a man named John Clayton. When she finalizes the divorce, they can be together.

As the past is wont to do, things get bad again. Tragedy strikes at their school, but Jake turns things around as much as can be done to help his students, his friends, and his community. But there is an inevitable collapse of his house of cards just over a year into his stay in Jodie.

Answer: Honky Tonk Woman

The issues begin when Sadie hears Jake sing "Honky Tonk Woman" out loud during a drive, a song that would be seven years too early for their date in time. He realizes, in this argument, that she bears a striking resemblance to Doris Dunning, Frank's wife, and that the past might be harmonizing with itself. The pair are forced to break up, since Jake can't come clean about his motives. The situation worsens when Jake loses his job; the school catches wind of his hazy past when they try to dig up his vaccination records. He's quietly asked to step down. It gives him the opportunity to move into a place on Mercedes Street only weeks before the Oswalds return from Russia. He spies on them at the airport on the same day Sadie flies to Reno to end her marriage, as planned.

Jake determines that one step in his plan should be to visit George de Mohrenschildt, Oswald's only friend and the man who, according to Al's notes, would convince him to kill JFK. Al's suggestion was to take him out. To learn more about the situation and avoid the possibility that Oswald didn't act alone, he purchases an omnidirectional microphone and sets it up before the family settles in Fort Worth.

With the lamp in the Oswald home bugged, Jake is able to listen in on a heart-to-heart between Oswald and De Mohrehnschlidt. As unnerving as it is for the prospects of his mission, it's then that he seeks out an apartment at 214 West Neely St., where Oswald and his family would live next. He bugs that location too, knowing there's still opportunity to get to the bottom of the situation.

Answer: Her ex-husband

By Autumn 1962, a year before the date of the assassination, Jake finds himself constantly thinking about Sadie. Slipping out during another instance of marital strife in the Oswalds' apartment upstairs and while the tensions of Cuba's nuclear capabilities heighten, he drives to Jodie to find Sadie, in her bedroom, knocked out on a dangerous combination of barbiturates and alcohol, having taken them in her frenzy and fear of nuclear war. Jake sobers her up as much as possible and tells her a lot of things he couldn't possibly know about the future in an effort to calm her. It's that night, after saving her and attempting to tell her the truth, that they get back together, and by New Years Day, most of Jake's relationships in Jodie have mended. As the year flips to 1963, he worries, knowing what's ahead.

In March 1963, the Oswalds finally move into the apartment on West Neely and Jake takes the opportunity to buy a gun. Marina, Lee's wife, starts teaching a local woman Russian. Ruth Paine, Jake knows, is the woman who Marina would live with at the time of the assassination. During a critical meeting between Oswald and De Mohrenschildt, Jake listens as his audio bug cuts out. Once again the past has a way of blocking him from learning more.

Before a major date in the timeline, Jake tells Sadie his real name. That night, she asks if there's anything she can do to help him complete his mission. There isn't, he claims, but he does ask her to marry him.

On April 10th, 1963, Jake packs his gun and plans to head out to intercept Oswald moments before Marina appears at his door looking for her husband. The visit is short, but it's long enough for Jake to be home for an unexpected phone call. It's John Clayton, Sadie's ex-husband, and he's at her house, having broken in to harm her. Jake decides to rush to her rescue, going with the whims of the past, and calls Deke to assist him. They make it in time to save her life (though she's horribly disfigured), and as they leave Clayton alive (since Jake can't arouse suspicion with the police), he uses the knife he brought to slit his own throat. And Jake is no closer to understanding if Oswald will commit his crime alone or with help.

Answer: He's beaten up by the mob

Sadie is left permanently disfigured by Clayton's acts and it forces Jake to reevaluate his business. While he could kill Oswald before the assassin spends months in New Orleans, he realizes he's too tied to Sadie's life. Starting over to come back and save her all over again would take years of his life without a guarantee of success. And with that, he decides to stay with her and wait for his next opportunity.

A new Jodie Jamboree is organized to pay for Sadie's mounting hospital bills and treatments, and it takes months before Jake is able to resume his work. He asks Sadie if she would leave Jodie and their time and never come back if it would fix her face and, in turn, he admits he's from the future. She agrees to join him, over time, as he places his last bets for extra cash (based on Al's notes), and aims to speak directly to George de Mohrenschildt (a decision that gets him no closer to understanding if Oswald committed his act alone).

The bet Jake makes on a televised prize fight ends up being one more opportunity for the past to be obdurate. He wins the bet but his bookie's mob connections track him down at his home, beat him up, and send him to the hospital with severe injuries. Enough to keep him out of commission for months.

Answer: Yes

Jake's injuries were severe-- so severe, in fact, that he suffered amnesia that hindered his understanding of his mission. The past would, as always, find a way to attempt to stop him. It takes weeks of effort and rehabilitation before his memory is jogged; he recalls Al's notes, hidden in a bank vault, and recovers them to fill in the gaps. It comes back to him, but he realizes that his healing efforts will restrict his abilities and time, and his only real chance to get to Oswald is on the day of the assassination before he assembles his gun in the Texas Book Depository. He leaves a couple days early, hiding out on Mercedes Street to avoid getting Sadie involved, but she pieces the clues together and finds him there, forcing him to bring her along.

On 11/22/63, the past tries to stop them. Sadie's car is quickly ruined on the drive downtown. They catch a bus, but it collides with a dump truck on its route. They steal a Studebaker, but it breaks down a few blocks later. The past is obdurate, as they relearn, but it also harmonizes. When they find a Sunliner not unlike Jake's old car, they find keys inside and make it to the building with minutes to spare.

They get into the Book Depository and take the stairs (to avoid the elevator breaking). Reaching the sixth floor, Jake spots Oswald and fires his gun at him, missing several times. It's enough to help, however. Oswald's shot goes wild and he's distracted enough to forget the motorcade (which gets away). He turns to fire and hits Sadie with a single bullet to the chest before the President's bodyguards bring Oswald down. She dies in Jake's arms.

Answer: Strings

Jake is immediately taken into custody and in a Dallas police station he strings together his loosely-fitting story for detectives, implying he knew Oswald from the past several years. The story works well enough, and before long he's able to leave (though not before a phone call from JFK himself). He also makes a quick call to Deke, insisting that the notes in his briefcase be destroyed. The only thing he can think of is Sadie, dead in his arms, and the possibility of heading back to reset it all and prevent her fate. Within a day, the Feds attempt to sweep him under the rug, and that's to his benefit. It allows Jake to get away scot-free. He's provided a bus ticket and he ends up heading to Little Rock, Pittsburgh, and back to Maine.

There's a problem, however, and it's a big one. After resting in Maine for a few weeks in his preparation to head back to 2011, a massive earthquake hits Los Angeles, killing thousands. That never happened in his original history. When he heads back to Lisbon Falls, he's met by a man with a green card in his hat, not unlike the yellow card man from his earlier visits. The man introduces himself as Zack Land, and he lets Jake know that problems have been created. Everything he's done in the past five years has spurred issues spawning from the butterfly effect and it will get worse. Every time Jake and Al went back and forth through the rabbit hole, they created new strings, and eventually, with more strings, they risked more chances of snarling those timelines. Lang asks him to go back through the rabbit hole to see what he's done. When he comes back, he can reset the timeline. So Jake does.

When Jake walks up the steps he finds that he doesn't reemerge into a pantry. In fact, he ends up in a completely new spot in 2011 Lisbon Falls, and it's much more dystopian and apocalyptic than when he left it. It's by coincidence that he finds Harry Dunning, out in the street in a wheelchair, and he can ask him what happened. With a brief history primer, Jake discovers that the earthquakes only got worse, likely a result of the changes with time. The earthquakes destroyed a nuclear reactor in Vermont in 1999 and the resulting radiation leaked into New England and Quebec. When JFK was reelected, no civil rights movement happened. There were race riots; Saigon fell; nuclear war occurred in the Middle East and Asia. Earthquakes, Harry noted, would end the planet by 2080 at their current rate. Jake has no choice; he heads back into the rabbit hole and back into 1958.

Lang is on the other side of the rabbit hole and things have changed again, partly due to the new string Jake has created. If Jake passes back through the hole and back to his regular time now that 1958 has been reset, it will fix both timelines. He decides to run instead, endangering reality, but it's important for him to determine his next actions. He can pass through time, find Sadie, and save her, but he knows there's a chance they couldn't go back to his time.

He ultimately decides to return to his time, closing the passageway and leaving without any major trace.

It doesn't take him long before he uses the internet-- a luxury of his time-- to look up Sadie Dunhill. He finds her, quickly, because it seems she led a fairly good life. After surviving John Clayton, she had an accomplished career in the school system, eventually becoming mayor of Jodie and a philanthropist. He flies to Jodie in 2012 and meets her during a celebration honouring her life. He lets on that he knows a bit more than he should and she recognizes a familiarity with him. When Glenn Miller's "In the Mood" plays, Jake invites her to dance.