As Mikomi continued to fiddle through his pockets, Ryan noticed the look on his face. Even though Mikomi didn’t have to say anything to explain the situation, he still felt the need to apologize. Plus, if he talked through it, perhaps he could come up with a solution to prevent sending a ripple through time.
“I’m… I’m sorry, Ryan. I must have left my wallet in my backpack.”
“I see…” said Ryan with a depressed tone and a completely defeated look on his face.
“Man, I really screwed up! Who would have thought that doing something as simple as leaving a backpack in your locker could have such a massive effect? Hmm… There might be a way out of this. I just hope that my fourteen-year-old legs are up for the challenge.”
“Say, mister? Would you be willing to hold that game for him for just a little while longer? Asked Mikomi. “Our school isn’t that far away. I’ll run there, get my wallet and bring the money back. I’ll be gone for maybe a half-hour tops. Would that be okay?”
Ryan’s face lit up as he looked at the clerk with a renewed sense of hope. The clerk took one look at Ryan’s face and let out a hearty laugh.
“He’s been in here every single week for two whole months waiting for this game. I think I can keep it out of public view for another thirty minutes or so.”
“Great! I guess you can just wander around the mall for a bit. I’ll go get my wallet now.”
Ryan’s face said it all. He was incredibly moved that Mikomi would go so far out of his way just to give him the money to buy the game. It was to the point where Ryan was almost on the verge of tears.
“I… I don’t know what to say, Mikomi… thank you!”
“Not a problem! I’ll be right back in a jiffy!”
Mikomi took off running from the store, exiting through the front doors of the mall. Thankfully, at this point in time, malls were pretty lax when it came to security. Any young kid bolting for the entrance of the mall at top speed ten years from now would instantly be nabbed and detained for questioning. People were just a little more trusting back then and Mikomi was certainly thankful for it. As he ran along the sidewalk, his thoughts rushed through his head.
“Dammit! How could I have been so careless!? I knew this was a pretty big detail and yet, I made this stupid mistake! I just hope this doesn’t change anything. I mean, Ryan will get the game in the end, right? Thirty minutes isn’t that much time… Ryan couldn’t possibly do anything to change the future that much, could he? I’ll just get in, open my locker, grab my wallet, and zip back out. That’s all I have to do and everything will be fine!”
His thoughts carried him back to school. Despite running all that way, he was barely out of breath. He could only thank the power of youth as he knew he would have to do it all over again on the return trip.
He approached the front door and remembered that once school was let out, they would usually lock the doors for the day. Mikomi’s heart began to beat just a little bit faster as he reached out and grabbed the handle. With one press of his thumb, the latch released and the door opened, causing him to breathe a sigh of relief. He let out a deep breath and was thankful that the doors weren’t locked yet.
Once inside, getting to his locker was pretty easy. With no kids in the school, it was just a clear, straight route straight to his locker. He had to take a few corners to get there but as he neared the final one, to where his locker was, he accidentally ran into someone he didn’t expect to be there and knocked them down to the floor.
“OH MY GOD! Are you okay!?” asked Mikomi frantically when he realized just what he had bumped into.
He knocked down a girl, but it wasn’t just any girl… it was one that he recognized. Many of the other students made fun of her because she wasn’t very outgoing. She was often seen alone, reading a book, barely talking to anyone. A lot of kids started rumors that painted her in a very negative light. He knew that all too well because Ryan had become one of those people in the future.
In the other timeline, Mikomi had never said anything to or about her. In fact, he truly felt sorry for her but was always afraid to say anything out of fear of becoming an outcast sympathizer. With the way others perceived her, including Ryan, he was more afraid of damaging his image than anything else. It was one of the biggest regrets he had in his other life. While he knew he had a second chance to change everything, he knew there was nothing he could do about it at this moment… especially with an impending ripple hanging in the balance. Still, he couldn’t just ignore what he had done. He reached out and offered her a hand which she accepted.
“I’m really very sorry. I was in a rush and I wasn’t looking where I was going. I hope I didn’t hurt you.”
The girl stood and brushed herself off. She wore an oversized gray hoodie and baggy dark blue jeans to match her long, yet messy, black hair and light blue eyes. Her pale white skin told the tale that she didn’t get outside much and that’s probably why some of the rumors started up.
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As she finished brushing herself off, she squeaked out a reply in a quiet, yet gentle voice.
“It’s fine.”
She began to walk away when Mikomi noticed she left a book she had dropped behind. He picked it up and turned around.
“Hey wait! You forgot your book.”
The girl stopped and turned back to look at him, her black hair covering her left eye, but she still saw him through the hair strands. She took a step forward and grabbed the book out of Mikomi’s hand with some force. She held it close to her body and in that same gentle voice…
“Thanks...”
She turned to leave, but Mikomi stopped her again. Despite knowing her from the other timeline, for some odd reason, an important detail about her couldn’t be recalled. Hoping that it would help him remember more, he asked a pretty common question.
“Say… Uhm… What's your name?”
The girl stopped in her tracks for a brief moment as if she were thinking about telling him her name but after a few moments of silence, she continued on her way. Mikomi was a bit perplexed that he was just blown off like that. The more he looked at her, the more captivated he became by her cute looks. Mikomi’s mind began to wander about this girl as she just seemed too familiar to forget and yet here he was struggling to remember even the most basic of details about her.
“Uhm…”
Mikomi reached his hand out but she just kept walking away. Mikomi withdrew his hand as he looked a bit perplexed. This overwhelming feeling that he, somehow, knew her plagued his mind. He couldn’t quite figure out why she seemed so familiar outside of her reputation but before he could dwell on it too much, he came to a sudden realization.
“My wallet!”
Mikomi took off running in the opposite direction. The girl then stopped and looked back to see Mikomi running away. She let out a sigh of relief and continued to walk away.
Some time had passed, but Mikomi made it back to the mall albeit a bit low on oxygen. Despite his fatigue, he continued to run around people until he made it back to Game Lot. He hunched over the counter and gasped for air as he tried to catch his breath, his chest heaving in and out. Once he got his breathing back under control, he reached into his pants pocket and pulled out his wallet.
“Sorry… I’m late….I brought…. my wallet…” said Mikomi in between heavy breaths.
Mikomi tossed it over to Ryan as he leaned up against the counter completely focused on recatching his breath. At this point, he didn’t care if Ryan emptied his entire wallet. He was just thankful that he had prevented a major ripple from ripping through all of time and space. At least, he had hoped his actions had done such a thing. There was no real way to tell if anything had changed by a simple half-hour delay.
“Take… what you…need… Oh God, I’m dying....”
Ryan opened up Mikomi’s wallet and pulled out a $20 bill. He combined it with his $45 and handed it to the clerk who, in turn, handed Ryan the game.
“A-W-E-S-O-M-E!!” exclaimed Ryan as he held the game cartridge up above his head. He looked like a young boy on Christmas morning after opening a present and seeing the one and only thing he asked for. Ryan walked over and gave Mikomi a huge hug.
“Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!”
“Okay... I get it.. you’re thankful.. let go of me, please!”
“Come on! Let’s go back to my place. I’ll let you play it first!”
“Does it require me to run some more?”
“No worries, we can take our time. In fact, now that I have the game, I can play it anytime. Want to stop by the food court first and get something to drink? My treat!” he said as he held up Mikomi’s wallet.
Knowing full well that Ryan had no money and it would really be his treat, he still took Ryan up on the offer. After all, a quick refreshing drink to replenish his energy was sorely needed right now.
After plopping down in a chair with a giant root beer in front of him, Mikomi couldn’t help but notice Ryan reading the back of the game’s packaging over and over again. His eyes darted around from corner to corner as he was taking everything in as much as he could. He knew that by sitting there and resting, he was only delaying Ryan from playing the game he was looking forward to but the fact that this little pitstop was his suggestion meant that he was making a bit of a sacrifice since Mikomi had done the same for him.
Mikomi sucked down his root beer at a slightly higher-than-reasonable pace. It only took him a few minutes to polish it off and by the time he did, he felt his strength return.
“My God, this stamina. Even though twenty-four is still considered young, I wish I had this much recovery power. You truly do slow with age. I mean, I’m no slouch in the future but there’s no way I think I could run that much and recover this quickly. And what’s even better is that my feet aren’t even that tired. I guess all that time sitting in an office chair and in board meetings took its toll more than I had realized. Note to self… when I get my company back, buy a treadmill for my office.”
“Ready to get going?” asked Mikomi.
“Yeah!” said Ryan with excitement.
Ryan walked away with Mikomi in tow The two of them exited the mall and headed toward Ryan’s house, which was still a walk and a half by itself. To get there, they had to cross the highway and walk about fifteen minutes to Mikomi’s house. From Mikomi’s house, you had to walk down his street to the very end, turn left and walk to the fourth street on the left, which took about another ten minutes. To make matters worse, Ryan’s house was the last one on the left on that street, right before a dead end. Usually, the trip wasn’t all that bad, but Mikomi did just end up running a marathon for the sake of a video game.
Mikomi had put forth tremendous effort to make sure that the flow of time went undisturbed; however, Mikomi’s efforts were in vain. A ripple had already begun because of this one small miscalculation. As Mikomi and Ryan walked side by side down the street, Mikomi was unaware of just how far the ripple had begun to spread and what changes were ahead of him.