The brilliant and creative mind of Yusef Assafa Powell thought often of two things -- the 2011 Norwegian Butter Crisis and Tuesdays.

He thought of the Butter Crisis because "smør-panik" (butter panic) helped him to reflect on the volatility of time and global economies.

He thought of Tuesdays because those were the days when he was expected to take the trash out -- he supposed in that way, he was actually rather simple-minded.

Still, the first time my merchant of a neighbor called me outside his lair, the sky rained so hard I thought it might leave craters in the earth.

The oh-so-riveting Mr. Powell had ushered me to the back of his house with a used car salesman's demeanor,

"My dear, Mr. Morris...In this cellar, I keep a very special contraption. I'm saying this because I trust you, compatriot."

He was stout and hunched like a scurrying hedgehog, perpetually dressed in soapy flannels and boonies. His black eyes were moons as his voice quieted to a whisper,

"I have an ongoing project...If I say too much they might hear me. It's surely better to just show you. Can I trust you?"

"Who might hear you?"

At this, Mr. Powell held a finger to my lips, a silent but powerful shhh. His thick gray beard squeezed in sync with the wrinkles of his puckered mouth.

"The Sea Eye Aid." lips mouthed.

The what?

"The C.I.A." A correction.

"Oh...for what?"

"Holding the secrets to the universe."

So he IS crazy.

But, perhaps out of boredom or curiousity or even surprise, I becamd an accomplice subservient to the whims of Mr. Powell's bidding.

I was enthralled by Yusef's lies, for one, because he spoke with the kind of convinction that builds civilizations. Everyone knew about the eccentric neighborhood nutcase -- he was infamous.

But, most importantly, I played along because, well, why not?

And who knew what secrets that old kook was hiding anyway?

"Haven't you heard of the butter crisis?"

Yusef would chide,

"I haven't, Mr. Powell...What's that?"

"I've stored nearly a hundred cartons of Land O' Lakes in my underground bunker. If they want this butter, the government will have to pry it from my cold, dead hands!"

That sort of passion, I'd been told, was the kind you only find in City Council Meetings and flat earther reddit forums.

So, I said without a second thought,

"You can trust me, Mr. Powell."

And positioned as a lookout by the cellar door, spending evenings watching over my shoulder for undercover spies.

That next morning, my wife had asked me "Aren't you too old to be playing pretend with a whackjob?"

But such was only the magic spun by Yusef Assafa Powell.

...

For the next few weeks, I accompanied Mr. Powell to his backyard bunker as an eager apprentice. The very moment I finished with work, I was already knocking at his peeking storm door, wondering if I'd done enough yet for a tour of his "underground cellar".

"Mr. Morris?" His voice asked from the kitchen, a gruff accusation.

"Yes! It's me, Mr. Powell..."

Through the sliver of an opening into his home, clothes and objects shielded any possible floor from visibility.

It was common neighborhood knowledge that Yusef's wife had passed some years ago, and his eldest daughter was military, living somewhere lavish abroad. So, I suppose, it wasn't shocking to think that the old man might just be lonely.

"Ah, yes. Come in. Make yourself at home, compatriot."

With a palm pressed to cold, exposed glass, I slipped into Yusef Assafa Powell's messy craftsman's cabin.

"Please, please, sit! Get comfortable. The tea is on the kettle, I'll be out with it shortly. By the way, did you know that there's new evidence about the faked moon landing? Y'know...Aldrin really is a terrible actor, that drunk would never make it in Hollywood."

As much as the incomparable Mr. Powell's home was a mess, it was well-suited. Sloppy but specific. Strange and esoteric. Blue cupboards full of books and a 6-pack of Faradays beside a bowl of farmer's market cherry tomatoes.

I stepped over the mountains of junk before sinking into the plastic cover of his antique settee.

A scrapbook on the armchair read "Paloma's 9th Birthday", clean and laminated -- a protected, perfect thing amongst a room of mess and oddities.

"Mr. Powell, can I ask you a question?"

"As long as you're not bugged, Mr. Morris."

Yusef laughed, a pot of tea steaming from his curled fingers.

The young girl in the scrapbook had his big black eyes and toothy smile. Her face brightened with a curiousity like Mr. Powell's, a similar wonderment. A unique heart-shaped birkmark sat right below her right eye.

"Your daughter?" I wondered.

"No, no, never....I know nothing of that child." Yusef gruffed sternly,

"She's long gone. Mr. Morris, please refrain from asking such stupid quest-ah!"

Crash!!!

"Mr. Powell, are you okay?"

The old man had dropped his kettle in frustration, narrowly missing a wave of scalding water.

I jumped to push him backward when a loose outlet short circuited from the spill, sparking with threats of an electrical fire.

Yusef groaned,

"This is a horrible development, it'll draw the enemy's attention, Mr. Morris..."

I rushed to move away piles before they caught flame, hoarded clothing and maps, film rolls and writings. I paused when an old, grainy picture flicked out from underneath a sheet.

It was so old it seemed almost like daguerreotype, but the little girl with the birthmark was unmistakable in this film. Stood behind her, in a classic family photo, was another woman in pin curls, and a noticeably younger, and more dignified, Yusef Assafa Powell.

I realized, it was the first time I'd caught Mr. Powell in an earnest lie.

So, when the old man huffed, I snuck the decrepit photo, that seemed even too old for Mr. Powell, into a pocket. As my hand grew heavy, I tried to ignore the powerful twang of guilt creeping through me.

"Mr. Morris, thank you for your help. Should I reheat the kettle? My shaman used to say 'add a little beer to your tea and you can even kill the Plague'."

It's not as if Yusef owed me any honesty -- he was deranged after all. Withholding was one thing, but lying about a family wasn't like him. At least, the him that I'd gotten to know.

"What if he was an escaped felon? A serial killer?" My wife had asked over dinner the night before.

"What do you really know about Yusef?"

"Could you do me one more favor, Mr. Morris? In case the enemy comes and I don't get the chance?" Mr. Powell proposed. I shoved the photo deeper into my pocket.

"What's that, Mr. Powell?"

"Could you help me take the trash out? It's Tuesday after all."

...

On Wednesday, when I waltzed routinely to Yusef Assafa Powell's abode, he was nowhere to be found.

No one answered the knock at the door, and no crackling voice yelled "Coming, Mr. Morris!" after calling into that mysterious lair.

I'd already circled the property twice when an untagged vehicle rolled into Mr. Powell's driveway.

A tall woman in a formidable black uniform slinked from the car's passenger side. Then, several more uniform-clad soldiers appeared to flank her peripheral.

"You there..."

I froze in place,

"Um, yes?"

"This is a code red. Do you know someone by the name of Yusef Assafa Powell?"

She flashed an official-looking badge at me, almost faster than I could read it. I blinked, noticing the familiar birthmark below her right eye.

Senior OSS Officer.

OSS? What's that?

"Never heard of him." I lied, thinking of all the times my wife had warned that hanging around Yusef might end in enormous trouble.

The stoney officer nodded once before joining her cronies at the far side of Mr. Powell's home.

After they had slipped out of sight, a whispered voice called to me.

"Shhhh, Mr. Morris -- over here,"

A familiar head peeped out from the door of his cellar,

"you'll want to hurry!"

Not needing to be told twice, I scrambled quickly after Yusef into the cold black of his mysterious catacomb.

And, like any good apprentice, I didn't ask any questions. I held my breath as not to think too deeply of the man I'd decided to trust. I only relished in the fact that I would finally learn the great Yusef Assafa Powell's secrets.

"So this is what you've been working on. All this time?"

The walls leading to his project were stacked from each ceiling with Land O' Lakes. But it was the whir of technology, tall and proud across rge room, that stole attention.

"Well, yes, Mr. Morris. It's a time machine."

"A time machine?"

"Yes, that's right. And I hate to bid farewell but I'm afraid my daughter has found me."

"Your daughter?"

As if on cue, violent knocking sounded from the top of the stairs.

"Yusef, we know you're in there! Come out with your hands up!"

My wife is going to kill me if I'm not back by dinner.

"Mr. Morris, this is truly an inopportune time to tell you, but I suppose that it's due."

"Go on, Mr. Powell..."

"I built my time machine a long time ago. Very long. And I've spent many years of my life jumping from timeline to timeline,

moving to different places, going back to fix the past. The death of loved ones. Political incidents. A wasted career. It was nice but fate had its way with me. I decided to take a break. I had the thought to retire and move out here. It's been lovely. Very lovely."

"Open up, Yusef! You've been cornered!"

"But...there was a timeline where my wife and daughter were quite affected because of my building habit. I was considered a mad scientist. My original family had a hard life because of me. I was sorry to them for it..."

As the hinges of the cellar door rang with each pound, the metal time machine seemed to whir even louder, screeching from its platform.

"In that first trip, I didn't finish building the machine until I was an old man. So, I went back in time to when my wife was still pregnant, and built the machine as a young man in my 20s. I thought that it might fix things -- that they could then benefit from my work much earlier. I asked to be heard by President Harding as a nobel scientist...but, instead, he stole my work and had me falsely locked up as a Soviet spy. I managed to escape but my daughter, in that timelime, used my documents to found the Sea Eye Aid -- a task force dedicated to apprehending me through the time-space continuum. It later becomes the OSS, or CIA, as you know it."

A loud crack sounded when the cellar door broke down.

And as officers raced down the stairs in a militant frenzy, stacks of Land O' Lakes fell to the ground.

Mr. Powell gave me a warm look before firmly shaking my hand.

"It was a pleasure, Mr. Morris. You've been a wonderful friend and apprentice. I hope we can do this again sometime in the future."

And then he was off into his time machine, followed by the all too eager members of the Sea Eye Aid.

And then the machine was gone. As so was Mr. Morris.

I grabbed my phone from my pocket, dialing my wife's number.

"Hello?" She answered on the third ring.

"Hi baby. I had a really eventful day today, you wouldn't believe it. And are we out of butter?"