I ran down Caron street until I made it to the diner where Ann worked. Heads jerked toward the front as bells on the door cracked against glass at my wild entry.
"Ann!" though I already had her attention. She slowly lowered the blue mug she was drying and came out from behind the counter.
"What is it this time?" she asked with less compassion than I was hoping for.
"What do you mean 'this time'?"
"Well, about a month ago you came in here freaking out about how you'd met the man of your dreams at open mic night, and just two days ago, you gave our poor door similar treatment and came in scaring off the customers, screaming you're engaged."
"What?!"
"All those scratches along the tile are from you, ya' know? And the chips in the wood along the window. I'm still surprised the glass is in-tact."
"It's worse than I thought," I moaned, slouching over a stool and ignoring Ann's complaints.
"And those bells used to be round, by the way."
I smacked my head against the faux marble veneer a couple times before resting it in my folded hands.
"How can we be engaged already, Ann?"
"Uh... That's what I asked you on Tuesday, and you got all pissy, told me I just didn't 'get you,' ran out of here, slamming the door again, and this is the first time we've talked since." Her raised eyebrow and folded arms told me how unamused she was by my shenanigans.
I leapt to my feet and crushed her in a hug.
"I'm so sorry, Ann. I'm an idiot, and you're right about everything. But I'm going to listen to you this time. Things will be different."
"Fine, Laura. Just let me go so I can finish my shift."
"No, you can't! There are more things I have to talk to you about!"
"God, Laur. It can't wait twenty-five minutes?"
I sighed and conceded. She made up a hot chocolate on the house to soothe me back into my senses.
We decided to walk to the small park by a bus stop and chat on a bench there. Ann didn't want to sit around in the restaurant after she got off.
"So what earth-shattering event do you have to tell me about now?" she asked, frowning.
. . .
"What do you mean, a "portal'?"
. . .
"No, Laura. You are NOT from the future."
"I AM, Ann! I swear!"
"Okay, Ms. Time-traveller. If you're from the future, what happens here in exactly five minutes?"
"It's not like that. This isn't how things happened before."
"If you were from the future, then in the future I would have already had this conversation. Did I ever mention it to you?"
"Maybe I tell you not to for some reason or your memory gets erased. I don't know! I'm not here to argue the logic of time travel with you. We have more important things to discuss."
"Like?"
"Have I introduced you to Kyle yet?"
"Your fiancé?"
I groaned and my stomach tightened at the mention of the word.
"Yeah. That. Have I?"
"No."
"I was just talking to him."
Ann leaned toward me and grinned like a child. "Did you freak out and tell him you were from the future?"
"You are evil. Why does that amuse you so much?"
She just shrugged.
"Well, I just appeared there, in front of him. I don't remember what exactly I said, but I basically screamed at him then ran off."
"Did he follow you?"
"God, I hope not."
She raised an eyebrow and tilted her head.
"I don't understand," she said. "You were head over heels just a few days ago. What happened since then?"
I let out a sigh and doubled over, my hands and head resting in my lap.
"That's just the thing, Ann."
"What? I can't hear you. You're mumbling into your knees."
I sat up and tried again.
"It hasn't been a few days. It's been a few years. Six years."
"You're from six years in the future?"
"Yeah."
"So, in the 'future,' how do things turn out?"
I opened my mouth to tell her, but had no idea how to summarize it all. I closed it again, and just shook my head.
"Not good," was the reply I settled on.
"Well, then keep the not good things from happening."
"How?"
She looked at me and shook her head like I was an idiot. Which I was.
"I don't even know where he is. How can I break up with him - AH!" I screamed and jumped off the bench.
"What??"
I waved my left hand in front of her.
"I haven't worn this for six years! Why is it on my hand?"
She reached out and pulled off the silver band.
"Better?"
"Yeah."
"Can you stop screaming now?"
"Maybe."
She glared at me.
"Okay! I will. But I really really don't want to talk to him."
"Just take this," she placed the ring in my hand, "and tell him you changed your mind."
I tried to picture it. I imagined what I would say. My eyes unfocused as I pictured the conversation, and I already started to feel a strange kind of release.
"I think I'm going to tell him a lot more than that."
"Good. This is South Side on a Saturday afternoon, so if you walk up and down the sidewalk long enough, you'll probably run into him."
I made a beeline back toward Carson.
//
[to be continued . . .]
