even colloquially. I can’t not change, it goes against being human. I gotta learn from my actions. Imagine a world where nothing changed. As in nothing at all. Time would be frozen. I constantly want to change for her, but she’s constantly telling me that it’s fine I don’t make a lot of money. She didn’t care about my appearance. Every time I see her, it only solidifies that I’m her biggest fan. And out of my periphery there she was. She looked so breathtaking with her black hair swaying, laced with new red braids. Her coat matched her highlights so perfectly, for a second it looked like they were connected. She had a teal scarf and black jeans and teal boots. She’s an extremely talented artist and that outfit screams creative and bold. She’d been gaining fame lately, as she should. She’s a true genius. I felt a bit inadequate with my probably illegal grey Champion hoodie, ripped jeans, and off-brand sneakers. I hope she doesn’t mind. I’ve been struggling to make ends meet so bad I had to sell all my good stuff. But I was so excited about this date that I came anyway.
“Hi Cas.” she had a soft smile.
The smile she uses to deliver bad news. I saw her use it last week when she had to tell her museum director she wouldn’t be able to deliver a project this month.
“What’s wrong Rita?”
“Cas,” she sighs, “you’re the sweetest of them all. I hope you never change.”
She always says that, and knows why I don’t like it. I just feel like something is very different here.
“Is a park date okay? I know you said you just wanted to talk so I hope it’s quiet enough here. You look amazing by the way, the color palette is phenomenal.”
She holds out a piece of paper, “Yes, and it’s important that I give this to you.”
Before I take the page, I notice a familiar face behind her.
“Cas!” says my wife.
“Who’s that?” smiles Rita.
No no no no nononono
“Do you know her from high school? Or work? She’s very pretty.”
No way I’m dealing with my wife and my girlfriend. I spin on my heel and start to bolt away from them. I can just explain it to them both later… somehow. I’ll figure it out. Suddenly though, I catch myself stumbling at what’s in front of me.
“It’s torture seeing you run like this for eternity.”
The air is suddenly heavy. Molecules that normally brush by me sit on my skin. A creature cloaked in a dark mist stands against the background of frozen time. I’m struck with terror at its appearance.
Writhing and clicking tendrils swarm from the black mist surrounding a mess of dark matter, its form ever-warping, shifting in and out of the dimension. Its voice echoes in the corners of my mind without a mouth to speak.
“I-I you what? Where? How…w-what?”
“You are back in your body right now. On Earth. And Rita there, is real. If you just talk to them instead of running, you get a second chance at life. And I hope to never see you again, I’m starting to get bored of this game with you. But you can’t do that with the bias of this review, it has to be because you want to do it,”
I say nothing so he continues.
“You are revisiting a moment to achieve retribution. The only way to escape is if you accept the consequences of your actions. Until you do that, we will revisit the reasons and you will be given a chance to renegotiate. You cannot pick a new moment to relive. Each time we restart, you forget what happened the last time.”
I have the strongest feeling I’ve heard this for centuries.
“Forget? What happens if I don’t have my memories erased? And isn’t the definition of insanity repeating without changing anything? How am I supposed to learn? Didn’t you say that watching me run away each time is torture for you?”
His wall of mist grows, silencing me, “Why are you questioning my motives?”
His low growl sends shivers down my spine.
“I-I think understanding… is fair, sir.”
“You want to understand my reasoning: not to be difficult, but to be fair?”
“Y-yes. Yes, um… whoever you are…”
“I am Chronikitimoria, God of Time.”
“Why would a God choose me, of all people, to make this deal with? What did I do to offend you so much?”
“I’m more so saving you.”
“Saving me? Why would a Time God want to save me? I don’t understand sir, Chronikitimoria, sir.”
“I have already told you all you need to know. There is no point in explaining the intricacies of my realm or reasoning to you.”
“I at least deserve to know why you’re putting me through this!” I shout, immediately regretting it as his tendrils lash out at me.
They wind around my arms, legs, and torso. Clicking as they tighten, I realize they resemble the seconds ticking on a clock. And it’s louder in my ears from over here.
“You don’t deserve anything, adulterer. But this is the first time you’ve inquired. I will tell you what your special circumstance is. Can you guess how rare it is to find a being whose death in one instance can be avoided by changing one thing?”
“Uncommon?” I guess, staying as still as I can out of fear. I was guessing struggling against him will only piss him off even more.
“Very uncommon. It happens once every 3 million years. In all of human history, I have only seen it once. You. You are a coward and run away and always die in some way. The only way you survive is when you go against your nature and stay right where you are.”
I feel slapped by the reality check, and the mist stinging my eyes just rubs salt in the wound.
“My only goal is to oversee the events following,” he trails off, I assume because he doesn’t want to let on what he knows, or maybe what he doesn’t know. “You humans can be unpredictable.”
“So I don’t really have much of a choice except… don’t run away?”
I’m met with silence, but the tendrils around me start to loosen and the clicking gets softer.
“Okay, let me try again.”
“That’s something that never changes,” he says with a hint of exhaustion.
And I hear a snap.
Stop telling me to never change. It- wait. You know what else goes against being human? Being in a time loop.
Chromatophore must’ve forgotten to erase my memories this time around. I’m probably never going to get another chance like this. Unless he planned this? I wrap my hands around my biceps for some comfort. I can still feel the tendrils and mist… no… I can’t think about that right now. My wife and Rita are going to walk up any second. From last time, both would assume the other is just a friend, but this time both of them are going to find out the truth. They’re both too smart to believe any lie I can come up with in the next five minutes. I know I should just come clean right away.
“Cas!” Rita exclaims, almost singing. Why is she more excited to see me this time?
“Rita! Hello.” I give a slight wave as she hurries over to me.
“I have great news!” she holds out the paper from before, “I finally figured out my exhibition!”
Her exhibition? The week before this, she didn’t have anything finished to turn in.
I open the page, “When impressionism was introduced as a new media, the majority of critics claimed the paintings looked unfinished. As an homage to the brave artists who expanded it and therefore the freedom art provides, widely respected up-coming painter Rita-”
Suddenly something whips so close to my head that I get caught in its wind for a moment. I follow its trajectory and see a baseball leave a dent in the metal bench across from the other bench I was waiting on.
“WOAH!” Rita giggles, “Lucky we weren’t an inch to the left, eh?”
“Um, heh… yeah…” I mutter as my heart starts racing.
“Hey, Cas, it’s okay. Keep reading! You seemed kinda down when I was walking up, I’m really hoping this cheers you up.” she says with that adorable soft smile and a tiny shoulder shake.
“Ok,” I smile, “Super amazing, awesome multi-media artist Rita,”
“Stop! Immediately, oh my goodness Cas,” she says tapping my shoulder and kissing my cheek.
She wraps her arm around my neck and lingers there, “You haven’t even gotten to the best part yet.”
“Cas!” I hear a familiar voice, angrier than I’ve ever heard it before.
“Who’s that? Do you know her from work?” Rita asks.
“I- Rita, I’m-” I feel some sweat drip down my back and my adrenaline rushes through me pushing, begging me to run.
Ignore your nature so you survive. Ignore your nature so you survive.
“Rita, I-I’m very sorry. I haven’t been honest with you.”
“Cas?” Rita’s sad eyes make my heart curl.
I look at Darlene storm towards me and my stomach twists.
“That’s Darlene, she’s my-”
“His wife.”
My wife was pissed. She and I had been spending so much time in therapy strengthening our relationship. I was being so unfair to her, while she had the patience to spare for me. Her eyes flashed with a wish that we didn’t waste so much time in therapy for her to be tricked into falling deeper in love with me. She trusted me so much more, and instead I had been lying to her about who really was occupying my mind.
“Please guys,” I close my eyes and place my hands over them, hearing clicking and breaking all around me, “This is too much. I don’t know what to do.”
Click, rip, click click click, crack
The Earth rumbles and my eyes start to sting again. I open my eyes and fall to my knees staring at the cracked reality I see in front of me, my wife and girlfriend glitching in and out with the main break originating between them.
“Disappointing. Look at this mess. This is so much worse. I should’ve known you remembered. The timeline was off. Your wife showed up too late. Rita acted differently. The baseball…”
“I remember, I do! I’m sorry.” I sob, throwing my arms out to the side and I look up at Chronikitimoria, “Please! I don’t know what to do!”
“Enough. I’ve already made my decision. Do you have any confidence you can fix either relationship?”
“Yes! Yes. Please, give me a chance. I could even fix both!”
He laughs, a slow, airless, overlapping laugh, “No. You can’t”
Chronikitimoria outlines the two glitching women in front of me. The majority of his tendrils coil around my wife.
“Darlene, your devoted wife.”
He motions the misty twines over to Rita’s side.
“Rita, a woman caught by your captivations.”
“That’s way too oversimplified to describe either.”
Chronikitimoria becomes much more aggressive than before, slamming his cirri and barbles onto the pavement surrounding me, trapping me in a cage of filament and thick mist. I cough and wipe at my eyes, desperate to see while trying to stand back up. The ground still shakes and I fall into the bars.
“YOU WILL CHOOSE ONE. And there will be no do-overs,” he commands and disappears into the crack of reality.
I stare at their frozen pictures, “I just have one question.”
Click… click… click…
“What was Rita’s idea?”
“Read the page.” Mr. Big Time echoes. Obviously done with my shit now. I wonder how terrible I was to him in previous restarts.
I look down at the paper in my hand and read the last sentence: “widely respected up-coming painter Rita will showcase half-finished realism/impressionism styles. Come view her delicate and precise works against the grit of ‘why even bother?’ Enjoy refreshments as 50% of the proceeds go to finishing local affordable housing.”
She’s a genius. I love her creativity and kindness so much. They’re qualities my wife never had.
Time comes back to life as I follow my gut, grabbing Rita’s hand.
“Rita, I love you so much. I had to go to marriage counseling to say I’d try, but you are who I want. In the back of my mind, always. I can’t love anyone else the way I love you. You are so enthralling and knowledgable and charitable. I was going to leave my wife for you, and I still will. I just couldn’t lose my chance to have you when I had it. Please Rita I can’t lose you.”
She gently pulls her hand away, “You are pathetic. Our relationship is built on a lie, and so many calculated decisions. That she and I were never included on.”
“If you wanted an open relationship, I had begun to trust you enough to be comfortable talking about it. I loved our relationship, I thought we were so transparent with each other. Where did you even find the time for her?” Darlene flatly, and softly adds in. Clearly feeling defeated, a single tear falls down her face.
“Cas, don’t compare people to each other. I don’t like being the cause of people feeling inferior. I didn’t know you were this emotionally unintelligent. I’m thankful I got to see this now and not later. Lady, I am so sorry about this. You deserve so much better,” she pats my wife’s shoulder and takes the exhibition document out of my hand, and gives it to her, “come to my showing and I’ll make sure you get the guest of honor treatment. It’s the least I can do.”
I shudder at the eyes she gives me, “I don’t want to see you anywhere near it or anywhere around me ever again.”
My eyes sting again and I unconsciously look around for the mist. Instead, I realize the venom in her voice brought tears to my eyes. Rita walked away from the both of us, allowing for our privacy.
“I really believed you Cas. I really thought we were doing great. And this whole time, you were cheating on me. Either you’re a great actor, or I’m the oblivious wife who thought all that love you suddenly showed for me the last three months was mine and the result of our emotional labor. I’m happy you found someone you love more than me. If love to you is comparable like that, then you are not the person I thought you were. Or who I wanted to explore more with. My favorite part about all of this is she has enough self-respect to hate you now. But because I still love you, at least in some way, I hope you learn from this. I know how much you love learning from your mistakes.” and with that, she left my life too.
I do think I’ve learned my lesson. I bit off more than I could chew, a bit too close to the sun. I was put in a time loop by a Time God for who knows how long. I still jump a little bit when I see twisty branches around a shadowed alleyway. Ticking clocks are a constant reminder of how I had it so good, and could’ve had it continue to be good- no. Enough with the self-pity. I’m not proud of how I got there, but I am proud I faced it head-on. Chronikitimoria saved my life, honestly in the worst way possible, but I’m still alive. And I will get over this heartbreak eventually. I don’t even know if warning people is a good idea. The chances of this happening to anyone else is so low, and I’m ashamed of the circumstances surrounding this situation. But the world is a lot safer than it was 3 million years ago, so maybe someone else will benefit from a warning. Be careful making your bad decisions, do things that you would be proud of reliving, and I hope your instincts never fail you. The chances of finding yourself in a death-defying time loop are very very very low, but not impossible.