[Fiction] Friday: Conjunction

[Fiction] Friday Challenge #148

March 26th, 2010: “Shhh… did you hear that?”
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“Shhh, did you hear that?”

“It was my stomach.”

“What did you eat for dinner?”

“I didn’t eat anything?”

“How come?”

“Because I didn’t feel well.”

“We don’t have to do this tonight.”

“Yes we do. Tonight!”

“But, if you’re sick.”

“Shhh. I was nervous. Toby, why don’t you quit talking and give me a hand out the window… How long have you been waiting?”

“I don’t know. My watch doesn’t have a light. Hey, keep off the gravel. Come round this way. I hid my bike round here.”

“Do you sneak out often?”

“Not really. My parents let me go wherever I want, just as long as I’m home by eleven.”

“Sure – you’re a boy. I’m never allowed to go anywhere or do anything I really want to do. I’ve never done anything like this before. You must be a bad influence.”

“Perhaps – but you suggested it. Here sit up on the bar and I’ll double you down to the beach. Which way?”

“Down here, left and then right and we’ll be in the public car park. You don’t think there’ll be crocs or anything down there?”

“If we stay away from the estuary we should be right? What are you laughing at?”

“Just an old memory that’s all… A really… old… memory. Yeah – sorry. Don’t you ever get that – you get sucked back into a memory.”

“Most stuff I’d prefer to forget.”

“How come?”

“Because dwelling on the past gets you no where.”

“Do you think of Davina much?”

“No.”

“Does it bother you if I ask about her?”

“No. I told you, she dumped me and I’m over her.”

“Is that why you agreed to come look at the moon with me.”

“No, I came to see Mars.”

“You only knew about Mars because I told you about it.”

“Why did you ask me to come down to the beach with you if you’ve never snuck out and you think I still have a thing for Davina?”

“…I wanted to see it with you. See the moon represents the things which are hidden – consciously or unconsciously and Mars is all about action and momentum. It seemed like the perfect time to sneak out. Seeing Mars sitting right up there next to the moon is pretty amazing.”

“You’re pretty amazing.”

“No. Not really. Hey – stop. You’re going to go into the resort. The beach carpark’s there.”

“Sorry. It’s dark. You were meant to be giving directions. How far down the beach do you want to go?”

“We don’t have to go far. Will you hold my hand?”

“Let me just hide my bike. So that’s Mars.”

“Yep, kissing the moon. Masculine and the feminine side by side. It will be more than a year before it is there again.”

“How do you know all this stuff about the planets.”

“Astrology – I’ve been into it since high school.”

‘You’re at high school.”

“Yeah, um right.”

“Where did you learn astrology. The newspaper?”

“That’s crap what they print in the newspaper.”

“So?”

“I can’t tell you.”

“Is it like, confidential and you could tell me but then you’d have to shoot me?”

“More like if I told you, you’d never want to have anything to do with me ever again.”

“I don’t think anything you could tell me would make me want to do that.”

“…In my world you and I don’t ever talk.”

“Your world?”

“Yes my world. Here – this is your world. I’m not from here – well I was from here once, but I’m not from here now.”

“Are you moving away or something?”

“No – look, I came here by mistake. Well, I’m not sure if it’s a mistake or not.”

“You’re not making any sense.”

“In my world, next year, in 1990 I get off the bus round there near my house and you never see me again. I move back to Victoria and that’s it.”

“Hold on – you’re talking like the future is the past.”

“It is for me. You are my past, well you were until two weeks ago. We met up on Facebook.”

“Facebook – what the hell’s that… Kara look. You’re not making any sense.”

“Listen to me Toby, because this changes everything. Two weeks ago, in my world you we spoke for the first time, because I had such a crush on you at high school I could never bring myself to even sit next to you on the bus much less talk. When you broke up with Davina, you then started going out with her older sister. When you popped up in the Facebook chat box it was 20 years. You remembered the last time you saw me. You told me you’d always been keen on me. I felt like it was the biggest travesty because I carried was in love with your for years. We had lunch.”

“So you’re saying – you’re from the future? My future or your future? Hold on – you don’t look any different than you did three weeks ago? You can’t be a different you.”

“Toby I don’t understand it either. I don’t know if I time travelled, or I slipped between parallel worlds. I don’t know how I got here or where the other me is. All I know is, I woke up on the concrete at school and they told me I walked into a pole looking at you and I’d been unconcious. And suddenly I’m 15 again.”

“How old are you?”

“35 in December.”

“Whoa. This is crazy.”

“I understand if you don’t believe me. I just wanted to tell you – well, in case this gets serious.”

“In your world you and I never get together.”

“No. You go out with Davina’s big sister for years.”

“I’m not sure I can even understand half of what you’re saying. And I don’t even like Davina’s sister. Kara – all I know is, right here, right now, I want to be with you. And if you’re telling the truth – I definitely don’t want to wait twenty years.”