Wallflower Girl

Chapter 25

She sought the mirror again, shifting some plates to get closer. Who are you? She stared into the stranger's eyes, but no, they were not a stranger's eyes. They were her eyes, her plain old hazel eyes. She was looking at herself. It's me! I am you-me! The weirdness of the situation was flawed. There was something deeper, beyond Anne's confusion. She could feel a hazy sense of familiarity. The déjà vu, the warm nostalgic sensation she had experienced driving past the other day, this was not unreal at all.

Anne checked on dinner. She knew she had been cooking dinner when she woke up in the chair. It was her first thought. It was as if she had dropped into this body and taken it over, but not completely. There was still a basic sense of what needed to be done. The chicken and baked potatoes in the oven were ready. She took out the baking dish and set them aside to make the gravy. Cooking was another bridge between the two experiences. Only, in 2013, she only had Graham to cook for, and he didn't care in the slightest, would have been just as happy with freezer pizza. Something, this part of her that belonged to the earlier existence, knew that for the man in the photo, a proper dinner would be appreciated, needed. He worked hard. He was a... what?

There was the sound of a tractor starting up outside and she parted the kitchen curtain to see. She remembered Chug again, only it was newer. It was moving and came into view with a man in the seat. It was the man from the photo. "My husband," she uttered with her hand covering her mouth and that flutter of tingles in her belly rising up again, all the way to heat her face that time.