8 “I have to prevent what’s going to happen this afternoon.”
8
“I have to prevent what’s going to happen this afternoon.”
I lift my head up from the pillow and hold my breath like I’m waking up from a nightmare. I still have the cold from last night on my cheeks, even though it’s starting to warm up under the bedspread. The heat of a spring morning.
I look over to the window to see if I can guess what time of year it is from the color of the light coming through the curtains, but my eyes stumble over a naked back. A man’s back. Svelte. Firm. I could study anatomy running my fingertips over what’s on display under his skin.
I don’t understand. I don’t understand this jump. Shouldn’t I have woken up the day after our second “date,” strictly speaking? That time when he fingered me in a taxi on the way back to my house after we drank a bottle and a half of wine in a Japanese restaurant. Is this part of the domino effect? Is he the person sleeping next to me?
I get closer to his skin and caress his shoulder. It’s soft. It smells like his dense cologne. I know the pattern of freckles that start on his left shoulder and form an almost-exact replica of the Little Dipper. It’s him.
I bury my nose in his back and press myself into Tristan, who shifts and clears his throat. I don’t know if he’s asleep. Tristan has a couple things that aren’t exactly fitting for the hunky protagonist of a rom-com, like how he snores. His snores sound like two brawling kangaroos. The first time I slept with him, I barely slept a wink. He snores like a brown bear, and he does it even when he’s face down. It depends a lot on the conditions: when he’s drunk, it’s like the rumble of a train; when he smoked, he sounded like a jumbo jet…but in the last few years, it improved a little. So I don’t know how to use it to figure out the timeline. Is he not snoring because he quit smoking already? Is it at the beginning or at the end of our relationship? Is he awake already?
“Mmm,” I hear him moan hoarsely when I press myself against him.
I clamber up him until I can smell his neck and the place where his short, dark hair starts. My left hand is working its way into his short locks of hair while the right is pulling him closer to me.
“Are you already causing trouble?” he murmurs, his voice much rougher than normal.
I don’t answer. I just want to smell him. Touch him. I think the kiss from yesterday made me weaken. God. Couldn’t I just stay and live in one of these pleasant memories? Hunker down, hide from time.
“Are you awake, or are you trying to violate me in your dreams?”
A giggle escapes, and he looks at me over his shoulder before he turns all the way around. Fuck. He’s so hot. I’d screw him even in a coma.
He kisses me, but it’s a restrained kiss, just two closed mouths pressing against each other. It’s the typical good morning kiss when you haven’t brushed your teeth yet. When he opens his eyes again and looks at me, I’m watching him raptly, and that seems to make him uncomfortable for a few seconds, but I put my right hand on his face and stroke his skin with my thumb, down to his lips, juicy, full, swollen from sleep. I’d like to kiss him again, stroke his nose with mine, leave my mouth hovering near his…but he pulls away.
“What time is it?” he asks.
“I don’t know. I don’t even know what day of the week it is.”
“Saturday.” He smiles.
Blessed time jumps, from Saturday to Saturday. Does that mean I could spend a month waking up on Mondays? Don’t fuck with me.
I don’t want to worry now about how long these jumps will last, but I can’t help it. It’s obvious nobody can live this way forever without losing their mind.
I curl up on Tristan’s chest, nuzzling into his chest hair with the tip of my nose and my upper lip. I get the feeling that he’s stiffening up a little.
“Listen… I have to go home,” he murmurs.
One doubt dispelled. This “memory” isn’t from the last two years. It’s earlier. Maybe I shouldn’t be so affectionate? Or maybe I should? Why not?
He turns onto his back, and I snuggle into his side.
“I can’t.” He laughs. “We fucked three times last night. At my age, these feats get a little more complicated. You should’ve met me when I was nineteen.”
“Shut up.”
It’s true the pulsing between my legs seems to hint of good sex. Good and pretty intense. An exhausting exercise. I try to remember as I sling my leg over his thigh until it’s wedged between his legs. My fingers meander across his skin, and my nose finds his neck. A little purr escapes him.
What day is it today? We’re in my room, so it can’t be that jaunt we took to the mountains. I think that was our record for most times in one night. We practically only did one thing the whole weekend: fuck. We stopped to eat, shower, and sleep. Those good memories only wake me up more.
My hand runs down his flat, tight belly. If the comforter wasn’t covering him, I’d see his belly button, the shadow of the muscle that sports have developed over the years, and the obliques that draw down and disappear under the elastic of his underwear. Tristan plays sports like someone who smokes, drinks coffee, watches television, or reads. It’s partly for entertainment, partly a vice. He finds a certain pleasure and peace of mind in feeling completely exhausted. He doesn’t do it for aesthetic reasons, although he likes what he sees in the mirror when he comes out of the shower. Me too, for the record, because years ago, I learned to be grateful for every inch of my skin and to stop wasting time wishing I were someone else.
“Miranda…seriously, I have to go home.”
“Why?”
I need to get on top of him. Get naked. Feel how he pushes into me and how my body welcomes him, wet and hot.
“Because I have that call I told you about yesterday. And because I want to shower and change my clothes. And because”—he reaches up to my ear and whispers—“I can’t. It’s going to fall off.”
He pulls away smoothly and climbs out of bed. Under his boxers, there’s something shyly protruding, but I won’t insist. Watching him walk around the bed to where he left his clothes is enough pleasure for me. That and the memory of tiredness in my body. I follow him to the bathroom with my eyes. Then I squeeze my thighs and feel a slight pain inside. Yesterday’s session must have been…muscular and passionate. The bedside table proudly displays the silvery remains of, at a glance, three condom wrappers.
He doesn’t take long to come back into the bedroom. As he does, he’s pulling a white button-up over a white T-shirt, with his pants open and the belt clinking against him with a pretty sensual noise. It doesn’t improve my situation. Now I want him on top too.
“Come here.” I pat the bed.
“No fucking way.” A polite smile quickly disappears. He washed his face, and he still has a few drops clinging to his temples. “I’m serious. I can’t. Plus my fucking contact lenses are stuck to my corneas.”
Wait.
Wait…he slept here and he didn’t bring his “stuff”? His contact lens case. His toothbrush…
“What day of the month is this?” I ask.
“When you do that…” He shakes his head and sighs.
“When I do what?”
“When you ask what day it is and all that…you sound super weird.”
“I’m scatterbrained.”
“It’s the twentieth of February,” he clears up.
He seems kind of serious. Or tense. Or…what?
“Okay, I’m going,” he says after he buttons up his pants briskly. “I’ll message you later.”
“Okay. Do we have a plan?”
Tristan, who is kneeling on the bed to give me a kiss, furrows his brow.
“We haven’t decided on anything, no.”
“Oh, okay.”
“Why?”
Oy, everything is so tense, right? I don’t answer, and he kisses me on the lips, with his mouth closed again.
“I’ll text you later.”
“Wait, I’ll walk you to the door.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
I catch up with him almost in the entrance hall, where he’s pulling on his coat. He pauses in front of the door for a second when he sees me, and I open it for him myself as I try to adjust the tie on my silk robe. We stay there, halfway out of the house, very close to each other, not sure whether to talk or kiss. If he gives me a hug, I’ll burst into tears. I know Tristan well enough to know that he wants to leave because he’s uncomfortable. And before anyone asks, I’ll tell you motu proprio that I am too.
“See you later,” he says, looking at my lips.
“Yes.”
I almost add an “I guess,” but before I can, he leaves me hanging with a quick peck on the lips, his feet heading down the stairs. As soon as I close the door, I run to the table I use as my “office” in the living room, where I always leave my planner right when I get home. I don’t find it.
After I turn everything upside down, I find it in the bag I use to go to the magazine: a black sack du jour from Saint Laurent, which fits absolutely everything I need to survive a workday. I think I could even fit myself in there if I curled up tightly enough.
I put a Post-it in the margin of the current week’s page, so I find it quickly. Right. Saturday, February 20, four years in the past. And the worst part is that date doesn’t mean much to me. I spent New Year’s Eve with my friends in Ivan’s parents’ house in a village in Toledo. It’s a special day for the gang, since we can’t always see one another as much as we wish we could because of work. It was a fun party where I didn’t worry about anything besides laughing a lot with Ivan and everyone else.
Tristan went to Vigo with his friends. He texted me at one in the morning to send me a picture of a dog that was hoping to be petted under the table. The only caption he added was “Happy New Year, Miranda.”
Everything was good in January. Normal. We had that weekend in a little rural hotel where the sex started to become kind of intimate, and I don’t remember anything else that would be important. Wait… I sit down on the sofa and make an effort to remember. January, fine. January, normal. January, a little mini break. And in February…was February when I went to Milan with the magazine? No. That was in March. But in March, he and I…so in February…
“Shit!”
Ivan opens the door dressed in one of those free marketing T-shirts and navy blue track pants that he must have worn to gym class in high school and are now a little short on him.
“You’re the worst-dressed stylist I’ve ever met,” I blurt out.
But of course, I blurt it out before I realize what’s crowning his head: a bun. A bun the size of a pineapple.
“Wait, what the fuck is that?” I point.
“Jesus, babe, what’s going on with you? Stop yelling.”
“What’s that on your head?” I ask, horrified.
“A bun, for fuck’s sake. It’s not like it’s the first time you’ve seen me like this. I was going over a few things on my laptop, and having my hair loose was bugging me.”
As soon as I step into his apartment, he yanks out the hair tie holding the bun up, and his hair falls loose. Long black hair, straight and shiny, falls like a waterfall down to his chest. I have no words. Ivan’s hair is famous. This long hair thing is new. Is it a wig? He wouldn’t get extensions, would he?
“What are you looking at?”
I swear, my voice won’t even come out. I point at his hair.
“I did a keratin treatment the other day. That’s why it’s so shiny.”
“Ivan, you look like you’re wearing the wig they put on the wolf in the second Twilight movie. Or the third.”
“What are you talking about, you nutjob?”
He’s so quick smacking me on the back of the neck that I don’t even see it coming. And I don’t complain. I deserve it.
I flop down on the couch and stare at him in shock. I can’t explain it. I saw him yesterday, and he had short hair. His usual hairstyle, a little longer in the front, with a swoop that makes even me jealous. I can’t imagine how jealous it must make men who are losing their hair. There’s no way his hair could’ve grown this much in the two months between yesterday’s “memory” and today’s. I can’t even string together coherent thoughts.
“Can you stop looking at me like that?”
“Can I ask how long you’ve been growing out your hair?”
“Are you stupid or what?” He’s glaring at me. “Look, girl, you’ve been really weird lately. And by the way, it’d be nice if you could call before you just show up here. One day, you’re going to find me with someone, and you’re going to want to die.”
I roll my eyes. I wish I could tell him I know exactly when I’m going to find him with someone. I know now.
Listen, what if…?
“Ivan, how tolerant are you to paranormal stories?”
“If there’s a ghost in your house, I don’t wanna know about it. Hey, your face looks good. You’ve been fucking.”
“Yeah, shut up. Can you answer me?”
“With Tristan?”
“You know Tristan?” I exclaim.
“Well, you haven’t talked about anything else since the day you met him at El Corazon.”
I’m changing the story. Just the details or can I change the fundamental parts?
“If I tell you something really weird, do you promise not to admit me to a mental institution against my will?”
“I mean, it depends.”
“I’m time traveling.”
Ivan leans against the corner of the living room, next to the kitchen, and blinks exaggeratedly while he twirls his hair around a finger.
“Are you on drugs?”
“No. You know I vomit if I even take one hit of a joint.”
“Pills? Shrooms?”
“Ivan, nothing. I hate drugs.”
“Then explain it to me, because now you’re freaking me out.”
“I’m time traveling, Ivan.”
“Like, how? You get in the freezer, you clap twice, and you show up in the Pleistocene era?”
“You think this is funny?” I ask him very seriously.
“No, exactly the opposite.”
“Ivan, listen to me. Three days ago, when I went to bed, it was the spring five years in the future. When I woke up, it was November 11, five years in the past. I don’t know how I did it. Or how it’s happening. Or how it works. Because the next day, when I woke up, it was December 10. And the next day, today…February 20.”
“Are you trying to tell me that you’ve spent three days reliving days in the past?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. Give me the winning number for the lottery.”
“It doesn’t work like that.”
“Oh no? What’ll happen, you’ll violate some interstellar travel law?”
“Do you think I’m fucking with you?”
“I mean, of course. I think your phone is in a group call right now, and your whole gang of hyenas are laughing your heads off at me.”
I take my phone out of my bag and give it to him. I take off my coat and yank my sweater up, defending myself like I’m deranged.
“See? No wires!”
He asks me to stop.
“Do you always wear such slutty underwear? For the love of the universe. You look like a bag of oranges.”
“It’s called lace.”
“It’s called ‘buy a fucking cotton set because that must be bad even for your tits.’”
“Ivan…” I flash him a look that’s begging him to focus. “I can’t tell you the winning number for the lottery because I don’t know. I wasn’t paying attention to that. I don’t play, you know that. If I woke up tomorrow in five years and then came back to this year, duh, I’d bring you a clue so that you would be filthy rich and not just filthy.”
We’re driving each other nuts. He’s looking at me, not even trying to hide that he doesn’t believe me, and I’m looking at him, incredulous that he doesn’t believe me. Fuck, this is like a tongue twister.
“I can’t give you that fact, but I can give you something else.” Something just came to me.
“Okay, so spill the tea.”
“But you’re going to have to take a leap of faith, Ivan, because you’ll know it’s true when it happens but not today.”
“Well, you tell me the whopper, and then we’ll see.”
He flicks his hair off his shoulder, and I balk. But when did he decide to grow this Renaissance virgin hair? Enough.
“Wait, I’m trying to remember what happened that year.”
“Of course, you must have so many memories to choose from…” he says sarcastically.
“You’re an asshole, but you know what the problem is? There’s so much mess in your life, and there’s no way to remember it all.”
I stand up and stare at him like I can see through him, remembering all the stupid things this human being has done over the last few years. And suddenly, I remember. I remember one of the famous things we still reminisce about at group dinners.
“I think it’s next month. Or the one after. I don’t remember exactly, but…you’re going to be on a work trip, and suddenly, when you’re on the way back from the bathroom, you’re going to find Thalia barefoot in the hall, and she’s going to ask you to help her hook a sequin bra.”
He looks at me with his brow super furrowed.
“Girl, you’re nuts.”
“Please…I’m your best friend. You have to trust me.”
“Are you hearing yourself? You sound like you stuck your finger in a socket and it made you gaga. You’re really freaking me out now.”
I collapse back onto the sofa, defeated. He’s my partner in crime in all the crazy shit I’ve done in my life. How can he not support me in this?
I mean…the truth is if he showed up at my house with a similar story, I would think he had been hit on the head and needed to go to the hospital.
“I went to have a brain scan in November,” I inform him. “The first time it happened. Everything looked fine, whatever that’s good for.”
Ivan is squinting at me with his arms crossed.
“Now I’m going to be unhinged until I run into that whore Thalia.”
“But you’re going to have so much fun that night.”
He sucks his teeth, grabs a chair, and sits across from me.
“I don’t believe you. You know that, right?”
I nod.
“And right now, I think you drank spiked gin and you’re going to spend the rest of your life delirious.”
“Okay.”
He sighs.
“But we’re going to pretend like I believe you.”
I clap giddily a few times and pounce on him, covering him in kisses.
“Get off,” he says and shoves me away. “Based on the premise that I believe you, then what?”
“I have to prevent what’s going to happen this afternoon.”