Him

JA: can I call u?

NF: (typing something)

JA: Nat? can I call u?

NF: not right now

JA: ????

NF: my phone is dead. I’m charging in a coffee shop.

JA: and?

NF: and the cable’s too short, I can’t raise the phone higher…just…wait

JA: what?

NF: I h8 this thing

JA: let’s just talk, I wanna hear ur voice

NF: babe, listen. Ill call you when ready, ok?

JA: but

NF: babe, promise

JA: ok

Half an hour later she called. I was taken aback by her voice. That was Nat alright but she sounded…small. She had the voice of a mouse.

“I can’t believe you found me” she said.

“Course I did” I replied.

“God, I’m so stupid, I completely forgot about freakin’ Facebook” I cried.

“It’s okay. We’re ok now, right?”

“Are we? What the hell is going on, Jamie?”

“I don’t…I don’t know” I replied.

“Where are you?”

I froze. All the guilt and dread from the weekend came back, culminating with the image of Christine…just being Christine.

“In town, in my old apartament” I replied.

“Of course,” she sighed. “Can you come see me?”

“I think so…but babe, if this is real…”

“Yeah?”

“If this is real, it’s going to be extremely weird for me to show up and your parents’. They have no idea who I am. You should have no idea who I am.”

“Yeah, but I don’t care. I want to see you. Please come. Look for a flight and come over!”

“Yeah, a flight…”

Did I mention I was now broke? All my savings were now hanging by the fate of one Lebron James and the Miami Heat. And the resolution of that was a few weeks away.

“So?” she kept waiting for a confirmation.

“Ok, I will. Just…give me some time. It’s kind of a tricky situation here”

“Yeah, no kidding! Jamie, I have a math exam coming up.”

I laughed. Jokes still bounced flawlessly between us. Good!

“I guess there’s no chance of you doing the trip instead?” I suggested.

“Hmm…let me see. I’m 18, my final exams are closing in. Hey mom and dad, can I burrow some money in order to fly across the country and meet this guy you never heard of before? He’s amazing, I promise. You’ll like him too…in 10 years!”

“Fair point” I replied.

“C’mon, how bad are you right now? You can’t make it over here?”

She was getting desperate.

“I can make it,” I said.

I could hear her sobbing, slowly trying to hold the tears back.

“I love you…” she whispered.

“I love you too, Nat,” I replied. “Just, hold on babe. I’m coming”

Well, that sounded dramatic and manly, didn’t it? My 24-years-old self would have been proud. My real 24-years-old self. You know what I mean.

There were a few options on the table, none too ideal. I started running through them:

Ask Christine for some money. Suddenly I remembered that she used to keep a stash of cash at home in a book. Was it ‘War and Peace’? Yes, it was! The book she vowed to read but never actually got the courage to do it. Not during the time we were together, at least. I was suddenly staring at a couple thousands, right there for the taking. At the time Christine was the whole package. Hot, fun, smart and most remarkably – financially independent.

I was already feeling like a piece of shit for having had sex with her that weekend while thinking at Nat the whole time, but now to also steal her money? Should I just ask her? What would I say? Hey Chris, I need some money to fly to the other side of the country. Why? What do you mean, why? Because my actual girlfriend lives there and she’s eighteen. Barely.

I decided I had already been a piece of shit with Christine. I had to find another way.

Who’s next? Maybe Jon? I realize now that I never talked about Jon. There’s a reason for that. And it’s quite painful. But I’ll get to that later. Jon was my best friend. My only real friend. I’d say he was THE friend and the others were…acquaintances that I got along with.

Here’s the gist of it. If you ask Nat, I’m the friendliest guy she knows. I’m easy-going and people kind of…drift around me. They like my company (she kind of exaggerates it to a degree). That’s great, right? It usually is, especially when you’re younger. But there comes a time when you realize it’s all superficial. There are entourages and there are friendships. When you figure that out, you begin to care more for the real friends. You begin to keep them closer and to realize that you actually don’t care that much about the others. They don’t care that much about you, either. Jon was different. We knew each other from high school and we grew together. We had each other’s backs and I cared for him dearly. That said, it was 2012 and I realized that Jon was in the boat I was, moneywise. Also, I didn’t trust myself not to tell him everything and make a fool of myself. That would be for another day.

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So, who else? This wasn’t supposed to be so difficult. Without realizing it, I began patrolling the area near ‘War and Peace’ again.

The real 24-year-old Jamie would not have hesitated to call anyone from his gang and get the money. Easy. But there I was, a 36-year-old trapped in the body of my younger self. All the looks but none of the simplicity I looked at life with back then. On top of all that, I was an emotional wreck, still dealing with this whole time-travel thing.

Do I get to call it that? Time travel? Was is really that?

In the end, I did the only thing that I could do. I grabbed my phone and made the call:

“Mom? Hi, how are you?”

**

Her

One of my worst memories dates back from my final high school year. It left such an impression on me that every couple of years or so I would dream of that moment in nightmare form, all the awfulness amplified.

So, what happened? In the final semester I took up an optional class in Psychoanalytic theory applied in literature. Good stuff. It was a no brainer, given that in college I ended up majoring in Psychology. The optional sounded fun on paper, but it had one big problem – it was scheduled late in the afternoon at 6:00 PM while all my other classes ended by 5:00 PM. So, there was always a gap time there.

You’re thinking – why not do something in that gap and then attend the class? I was doing something, or better said, someone. I mentioned Theo before, right? Theo was my gap hour activity and we were so much into one another that I’d have trouble attending the classes altogether.

You know how it is:

“Wanna hang out?”

“Sure!”

“Wanna make out?”

“Why not!”

“Let’s go to my car!”

“Ok!”

“Oh, Jesus! What time is it?”

Something like that. I missed the first two weeks of the course because of Theo. The third week, with enormous efforts, I managed to make it on time. Relieved, I took my place in the classroom, hoping to attend a nice lecture and make up for the previous two weeks.

Professor Shepard had other plans. She had fixated on me the moment I said “Present!” during the roll call. Once she was done with that, she bombarded me with questions from her first two lectures. I stood no chance. Not only that, but at the end of her tirade she ended with one painful remark:

“If you’re not interested in what we’re doing here, why sign up for the class, young lady? I’m sure there can be other activities more in line with your interests.”

She was staring at my neck. I had a hickey there and she was staring right at it. Or was she? Was it all in my mind? It was hard to tell at the time. In any case, I was devastated.

I will never forget that day and how it made me feel. She’d been nasty with me but I was more frustrated with myself for getting in that position to begin with. I really thought that I was smarter than to fall into such a trap. Why not ask for the materials beforehand, why not study before attending? Because I was in love, that’s why. I really was interested in the course but at the same I was eighteen and dumb. Stupid hormones…

You probably know where this is going. That day was May, the 15th 2012. One day after I had spoken with Jamie on the phone. I knew he was trying to get to me, but it was easier said than done. I could feel it in his voice. He had a money problem. He was probably hustling, trying to get around it. I decided, for the time being, to just follow my routine. Lay low. Fake it till I make it. I swear I was getting as stupider as I had been at eighteen.

5:00 PM on May 15th, who do I bump into? Theo.

I was so exhausted by that whole day until that moment - just trying to behave like there was nothing wrong with me. Meanwhile I was obsessively checking my phone for any calls or texts from Jamie while my mind was also desperately searching for an answer as to why this time-trav…phenomenon happened. Will it happen again? Can we reverse it? Can we control it, somehow? What happens if we change something? Didn’t we already change things just by existing in this state?

So, there I was, bumping into Theo.

Let’s talk about Theo. Theo was two years older. He had finished high school and decided to work his family’s business. It was a small town, we knew each other since we were kids. We were friendly. Until the day I had a gap hour and he ran into me, suggested we hang out for a bit, only for me to ask him to show me his car’s backseat thirty minutes later. Things got even friendlier from there.

It had been so fun that we decided to make a habit of it. He’d wait for me at the end of my classes and we’d just hang out. Do other things too. We were not a couple per say. That would come up later. But that was how it started.

He came so close to me that I got startled. I almost let out a scream as he grabbed me by the hips and kissed me.

“Where were you yesterday?” he asked.

“Sick. That time of month,” I answered nervously. He didn’t seem to notice.

“Well, that’s too bad. Feeling better now?” he asked as his hands kept caressing my back and his lips slowly touching my neck.

“Fine…” I said. His lips were getting insistent.

I had a revelation and pushed him off. No hickey for me, today, thank you. He didn’t seem to mind. He shrugged briefly and held my hand:

“Where do you want to go today?”

“Nowhere. I still have a class.”

“That’s what you said last week,” he said, trying to come closer again.

I smiled:

“But this time I mean it.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yep.”

I couldn’t help thinking at how different he was from Jamie. It was so striking. Theo had no reaction, he remained serious. I had forgotten that about him. He could be intense.

“Wanna’ meet up after your class, then?”

His look was so penetrating that my feet started trembling like a teenager’s (oh ha ha, very funny).

“I really need to get home later.”

“Ok, then I’ll drive you home,” he replied.

“It’s…a five-minute walk.”

“We’ll take a small detour,” he concluded.

The phone rang. Was it Jamie?

“Sorry, I really have to take this.”

He took me in his arms again (he had some big arms) and kissed me firmly. I gave him a small caress on his cheek, trying to act ‘normal’. Then he strolled back to his car, slowly.

Yes, it was weird. It was uncomfortable. First time around this discussion went way differently, believe me. I was shaken with a mix of emotions that I’m really not able to put into words. Overwhelming. It was all too overwhelming.

I checked the phone. Message from Jamie:

“On my way, see you tomorrow at your house.”

I had hoped this would give me some relief, make me feel better.

I felt worse. On top of everything that was going through my head, I was now feeling guilty.

An alarm rang, calling me to class. When I stepped into the classroom, I realized what was going to happen. Professor Shepard was at her desk. We were going to have our first interaction again.

It was just like in my dreams. She called my name. Fixated me with her dark eyes until the end of the roll call. Then she stood up and addressed me:

“Remind me, miss Fisher, you were not here for the first two lectures?”

“I was not…family iss-“

“That’s fine. Please tell me your definition of psychoanalytical literary criticism.”

I stood there, quiet, small and powerless. Reality is always harsher than nightmares, isn’t it? But then you get to wake up in the end.

“Depends on the which psychoanalysts’ school of thought you’d like for the answer to adhere to” I replied.

I could feel the air in the class getting colder. The others were paying attention. I took Professor Shepard by surprise.

I have a major in Psychology. I have mentioned that, didn’t I?

“So, which one would you like me to quote, Professor?” I asked. “Freudian, Jungian? Should we talk about Horney, if we’re feeling like it?”

She was taken aback.

I continued by slowly summarizing main ideas from Freud, Jung, Horney and Lacan. She was done. I was done.

“Thank you for that, miss Fisher. Since you’re so knowledgeable, perhaps we can continue enjoying your answers for the rest of the course, what do you say?”

“I’d be happy to,” I said.

And that was how I killed my first dragon. I didn’t know it then, but that was the moment in which I could find true meaning to what had happened to us. To me.