"Hello?" Fiddleford picked up the ringing phone eagerly. "Fiddleford Computer Majigs, how can I help you?"

"Fiddleford McGucket!" A deep voice on the other end laughed. "How have you been, buddy?" A look of confusion crossed Fiddleford's face, followed by a look of elation.

"Stanford?!" He replied, still awestruck at hearing the sound of his old friend's voice after almost a decade. "I- I've been great, what about yourself?"

"Pretty good, pretty good.. Listen, it's good to hear your voice and to be catching up with you, but I have something to ask you. You've always been so much more skilled with engineering and quantum physics than myself, and what I'm working on right now deals heavily with those two fields. I was wondering if you'd possibly come to assist me?"

"Oh. Uh.." Fiddleford was taken aback by the request. "I'm sure I could, but could you give me a little more information?"

"Oh, of course. Firstly, it'd be best if you would come and stay with me at my cabin. That way we'll have easy access to the portal. And-" Stanford's reply caused Fidd's face to light up, and he couldn't help but interrupt.

"Did you say portal?" He asked, incredulous.

"Yes I did. I want to build a gateway to other worlds, possibly even other times, planes of existences, dimensions!" Stanford was getting audibly more excited as he listed the possibilities out loud. "Like I said, you'd have to come live with me, probably for about a year, just for the sake of efficiency. And of course, I'll be paying you."

"A year?" Fiddleford asked, dismayed. He wanted to go and help his friend, but he couldn't just leave his home in Tennessee, especially since he'd recently gotten married and had a son. "Stanford, I'd love to come help you out, but I need to think about this."

"I figured you would say that." Stanford replied softly. "Take all the time you need, buddy."

"Alright. Thank you, Stanford. I'll call you back when I have a verdict."

"Sounds good. Goodbye."

"Goodbye." Fiddleford hung up the phone and stood. Feeling slightly overwhelmed at the decision he had to make, he ran his fingers through his sandy hair before grabbing his banjo and leaving the garage he worked out of to enter his house. Upon his entrance, a small voice rang through the small bungalow.

"Daddy!" A young, brown haired child came running at Fiddleford, and he crouched down to the boy's height to wrap him in a hug.

"Hey there, Tate!" Fiddleford greeted the boy after letting him go and standing up. "Where's your mother?" The skinny man wondered aloud, looking around his home.

"In our room." A feminine voice called quietly.

"Uh, Tate, go play with Jazzy for a while, ok?" Fiddleford told his son. Obediently the little boy nodded and walked off to find the old farm dog.

"Ada?" Fidd walked into his bedroom to see his wife sitting on their bed, looking at some old papers. "Can we talk?"

"Yeah, of course." She replied without looking up from the documents in her hands.

"Ok. I just got a call from a university friend." Fidd started, sitting down on his bed next to the lithe brunette woman. "And he has a job offer for me."

"That's great!" Ada cut in, grinning. "We don't need to talk about that, just take the job!"

"Yes, we do. Here's the thing- he lives in Oregon. And he wants me to come stay with him for a while to help him build something."

"Oh.." Ada's face fell. "Well.. how long would you be gone?"

"Stanford said probably close to a year." Fidd's knee began to bounce slightly. It happened to him whenever he was irritated, agitated, or upset.

"A year?!" Ada exclaimed with wide eyes, horrified. Slowly Fiddleford nodded. "Don't you think that's a little bit long?" The brown haired lady raised her eyebrows slightly.

"Yeah, but I mean, sometimes machines hit roadblocks, or... You run out of materials... Things can go wrong. You've seen how long some of my computers take to fix."

"That's true." Ada sighed heavily. "Do you want to go?" She asked her husband, looking into his eyes.

"Yes." Fiddleford answered hesitantly. "But now that I think about it, it really shouldn't be too much trouble. I've got a phone, I could call every night, and visit over the holidays." Ada nodded a couple times, but continued to frown.

"I'm still not really convinced.."

"I haven't gotten one customer call yet. The computer business is going no where." Fidd whispered after a minute of silence. "There's a lot of money wrapped up in this deal, and we both know that we need whatever extra cash we can get." Ada sighed and her eyelids fluttered closed. She knew that Fidd's statement was true.

"Ok." She finally relented. "But you have to call every night, and make sure you visit during the holidays." Fiddleford smiled.

"I was going to do that anyways, hon." He kissed her forehead and stood up slowly. "Now I have to go call Stanford back and tell him I'll be coming to work for him." Fidd's smile widened as he walked toward the garage.

"Hello?" Stanford's voice sounded from the other end of the phone.

"Stanford, it's me- Fiddleford. I called to tell you that I'm coming to work for you."

Sorry that this first part is pretty short, and if it felt a bit rushed. I honestly don't know how long each of these parts are going to be.

There are a few things I want to mention, too. Such as the name Ada. I picked that one because Fiddleford is definitely from the south, and the name Ada just screams Southern Belle, to me at least. The other thing I wanted to mention was this- in a lot of books that are centred on Fiddleford, especially the Fiddauthor ones, his wife is abusive, but I don't like that. I see her as a sweet and loving lady- so that's how I wrote her.

I really hope you enjoyed this first chapter! Please leave a vote or comment if you enjoyed this! \(:D)/There will be another part coming within the next few days.

(P.S. Thank you LadyCaesar for making the awesome cover, and for somewhat inspiring this story with "Strange"! Go check her book out if you haven't, it's a great story with lots of feels!)