The Chronos Effect
Chapter Nine: The Decision Point
We ordered pizza at 7:30. Amy wanted pepperoni, I said whatever she wanted, and she threw a couch cushion at me.
"Stop being so agreeable. It's creeping me out."
"I like pepperoni."
"You hate pepperoni. You always pick it off and give it to me."
She was right, of course. She knew me better than I knew myself sometimes.
"Okay, half pepperoni, half mushroom."
"See? Was that so hard?" She dialed the pizza place, phone tucked between her shoulder and ear while she rummaged through our junk drawer. "Hi, I'd like to place an order for delivery... Torres, T-O-R-R-E-S... Yeah, the apartment on Magazine Street..."
I watched her move around our kitchen with the easy familiarity of someone who belonged there. Three years of shared space had worn smooth grooves into our routines. She knew which drawer had the takeout menus. I knew she'd forgotten her wallet was in yesterday's purse. She knew I'd already gotten money from the ATM.
"Forty-five minutes," she said, hanging up. "Want to start a movie?"
Four hours and twelve minutes left.
"Sure."
We settled back onto the couch, Amy curled against my side like she had been all afternoon. But this time I couldn't focus on whatever rom-com she'd chosen. Every few minutes I caught myself memorizing things. The way she laughed at the stupid jokes. The way she absently played with my fingers during the boring parts. The way she smelled like vanilla shampoo and the lavender lotion she put on after showers.
"You're not watching," she said during a commercial break.
"I'm watching."
"What just happened in the last scene?"
I had no idea. "The guy... did something."
"The guy confessed his love to his best friend, who's getting married tomorrow." Amy poked my ribs. "You haven't been paying attention at all."
"Sorry. I'm distracted."
"By what?"
By the fact that in less than four hours, you're going to be dead and I'm going to be holding your body in the rain.
"Work stuff."
"It's eight o'clock on a Friday night. Work stuff can wait."
The pizza arrived during the third act, when the best friend was realizing she was about to marry the wrong guy. I tipped the delivery kid while Amy paused the movie, and we ate straight from the box like college students.
"Remember our first date?" Amy asked, pulling a string of cheese from her slice. "You were so nervous you barely ate anything."
"I ate."
"You ate like three bites and spent the rest of dinner asking me questions about medical school."
"I was interested in your career."
"You were terrified I was too smart for you." She grinned. "Which I am, obviously."
"Obviously."
"But I liked that you were nervous. Most guys try to play it cool on first dates, act like they don't care. You wore your heart on your sleeve."
She reached over and touched my face, her thumb brushing along my cheekbone.
"I knew that night I was going to fall in love with you."
The words hit me like a physical blow. I had to look away.
"Hey." Her voice was softer now, concerned. "What's wrong?"
"Nothing."
"Damian."
"I just... sometimes I can't believe you chose me."
"What do you mean?"
"You could have anyone. You're brilliant and beautiful and kind, and you chose some anxious physics nerd who overthinks everything."
Amy set down her pizza and turned to face me fully. "Is that really what you think?"
"It's the truth."
"No, it's not." She took my hands in both of hers. "You want to know why I chose you?"
I nodded, not trusting my voice.
"Because you see me. Really see me. Not just the doctor or the good daughter or the perfect girlfriend everyone expects me to be. You see all the messy, complicated parts and you love them too."
"Amy—"
"I'm not finished." Her grip tightened on my hands. "You chose me too, remember? And there were plenty of reasons you shouldn't have. I work crazy hours. I'm terrible at communication when I'm stressed. I put hot sauce on everything, including your carefully prepared meals."
That made me smile despite everything. "Your hot sauce addiction is a serious problem."
"See? You even love my flaws." She leaned forward and kissed me softly. "We chose each other, Damian. Every day for three years, we keep choosing each other. That's not accident or luck. That's love."
I wanted to tell her that in some other timeline, some other universe, we'd get to keep choosing each other for the next fifty years. We'd get married and fight about whose turn it was to take out the trash and grow old together in this same apartment.
Instead I said, "I love you too."
"I know you do." She settled back against my side. "Now can we please finish this movie? I need to see if she dumps the boring fiancé for her best friend."
We finished the movie. The girl chose love over security, running through an airport to stop the guy from leaving town. Amy cheered when they kissed in the boarding area.
"See? Happy ending. Sometimes people make the right choice."
9:47 PM. Two hours left.
"Amy?"
"Mm?"
"Do you want to go for a walk?"
She looked at me like I'd suggested we climb Mount Everest. "A walk? It's almost ten o'clock."
"I know. I just... I feel restless. Like I need some air."
"It's probably going to rain. Look at those clouds."
She was right. Through our living room window, I could see storm clouds gathering, the same ones that would be dropping rain on us in two hours when everything went to hell.
"Just a short walk. Around the block."
"Damian, you hate walks. You especially hate walks when it's about to rain."
"Maybe I'm turning over a new leaf."
Amy studied my face for a long moment, and I could see her connecting dots I didn't want her to connect.
"This is about the nightmares, isn't it?"
"What?"
"You're afraid something's going to happen if we go to sleep. So you want to stay awake, keep moving, keep..." She gestured vaguely at the air between us. "Keep this going."
She was more perceptive than I'd given her credit for.
"Maybe."
"Honey, we can't stay awake forever."
"I know."
"And we can't live our lives trying to prevent dreams from coming true."
"I know that too."
"Do you? Because you've been acting like today is our last day on earth."
The accuracy of that statement took my breath away.
"It's not," I said, the lie burning my throat.
"Then prove it."
"How?"
"Go to bed with me. Normal bedtime, normal routine. Show me you're not afraid of what might happen while we're sleeping."
11:47 PM was not a normal bedtime. 11:47 PM was when Amy died in my arms on Highway 61.
But it was also almost 10 PM now, which meant I had less than two hours to make my choice. Thirty percent chance with Dr. Vasquez's plan, or one hundred percent certainty that Amy would die if I did nothing.
"Okay," I said.
"Okay?"
"Let's go to bed."
Amy blinked, clearly not expecting me to agree so easily. "Really?"
"Really."
"Well. Good." She stood up and started clearing our pizza plates. "But I'm brushing my teeth first. I probably taste like garlic and pepperoni."
I helped her clean up, moving through our familiar evening routine on autopilot. Amy loaded the dishwasher while I took out the trash. She turned off the living room lights while I locked the front door. Normal domestic choreography we'd performed hundreds of times.
In the bathroom, we brushed our teeth side by side like an old married couple. Amy made faces at herself in the mirror while she flossed. I watched her reflection, memorizing the way she scrunched her nose when she concentrated.
"You're staring again," she said around her toothbrush.
"Can't help it. You're pretty."
"I'm wearing pajama pants with cartoon tacos on them."
"Especially pretty in the taco pants."
She spit out toothpaste and grinned at me. "You're such a dork."
"Your dork."
"My dork."
In the bedroom, Amy climbed under the covers and patted the space beside her. "Come here."
I looked at our bed—the place where I'd woken up this morning, and yesterday morning, and the morning before that in a different timeline. The place where I might wake up tomorrow if Dr. Vasquez's calculations were wrong and the universe collapsed in on itself.
"Damian?"
I got into bed and pulled Amy close, her back against my chest, my arm around her waist. She fit perfectly in the curve of my body, like we'd been designed to sleep this way.
"Better?" she asked.
"Better."
For a while we just lay there in the dark, listening to the storm building outside. Wind rattled our windows. Thunder rumbled in the distance, still far off but getting closer.
"I used to be afraid of storms when I was little," Amy said quietly.
"Really?"
"Terrified. I'd crawl into my parents' bed every time it thundered."
"What changed?"
"My dad explained how thunder works. The lightning heats the air so fast it expands and creates a sound wave. Once I understood the science, it stopped being scary."
"Knowledge is power."
"Exactly." She turned in my arms to face me. "Maybe that's what you need."
"What do you mean?"
"Maybe if you understood why you're having these nightmares, they'd stop being so terrifying."
I could feel her breath on my face, warm and steady. "What if they're not just nightmares?"
"Then we deal with whatever they are. Together."
"What if I told you something that sounded completely insane?"
"Try me."
I stared at her in the darkness, this woman who knew me better than anyone else in the world. Who'd just promised to face whatever was coming with me. Who had no idea she was going to be dead in ninety-three minutes.
"I can see the future," I said.
"Okay."
"That's it? Okay?"
"Well, what do you want me to say? 'That's impossible, you're crazy'?"
"Most people would say that."
"I'm not most people. I'm the woman who loves you." She traced patterns on my chest with her finger. "So tell me. What do you see?"
"You dying. Tonight. In a car accident at 11:47 PM."
Amy was quiet for so long I thought she'd fallen asleep. Then: "That's very specific."
"I know how it sounds."
"It sounds like you're carrying around something really heavy, and you're scared to put it down."
"What if it's real? What if I really can see what's going to happen?"
"Then I guess we don't go anywhere at 11:47 PM."
The simplicity of her response almost made me laugh. "It's not that easy."
"Why not?"
"Because every time I try to change things, something else goes wrong. Someone else gets hurt."
"So you do nothing?"
"I don't know what to do."
Amy was quiet again, thinking. Outside, the thunder was getting closer.
"Can I tell you something?" she said finally.
"Of course."
"When I was in medical school, I had this professor who used to say that the hardest part of being a doctor isn't making the right diagnosis. It's accepting when there's nothing you can do to fix someone."
"Amy—"
"I'm not finished. He said that sometimes the most compassionate thing you can do is just... be present. Hold someone's hand while they're scared. Make sure they're not alone."
I felt tears burning behind my eyes. "What are you saying?"
"I'm saying that if tonight is really our last night, then I don't want to spend it afraid." She kissed me softly. "I want to spend it like this. With you. Being grateful for what we had instead of mourning what we're going to lose."
"How can you be so calm about this?"
"Because I love you. And if you really can see the future, if this is really happening, then getting hysterical won't change anything. But this—" She gestured between us. "This is real. Right now is real."
"I don't want to lose you."
"I know. But maybe losing someone isn't about them being gone. Maybe it's about forgetting what they meant to you."
I held her closer, breathing in the familiar scent of her hair. "I could never forget."
"Then I'm not really lost, am I?"
11:23 PM.
Twenty-four minutes.
"Amy?"
"Yeah?"
"If you could go back and change anything about tonight, what would it be?"
"Nothing."
"Nothing?"
"This was perfect, Damian. Pizza and bad movies and going to bed early. If this is our last night, I'm glad we spent it being normal. Being us."
Eleven twenty-four.
Twenty-three minutes.
Dr. Vasquez had said thirty percent odds. Thirty percent chance of saving Amy and everyone else. Seventy percent chance of destroying everything by trying.
But Amy was right about one thing. Right now was real. This moment, in our bed, holding each other while the storm built outside—this was happening whether I looped back or not.
"I love you," I whispered.
"I love you too."
Eleven twenty-five.
Twenty-two minutes to make an impossible choice.
Twenty-two minutes to decide whether love meant holding on or letting go.
Twenty-two minutes to figure out what kind of man I wanted to be.
Outside, lightning flashed, and thunder answered almost immediately.
The storm was here.