The Uncanny Repeat

Someone laughed in the coffee shop—

that exact sound,

the one I hadn't heard

in fifteen years,

the one from a different city

and a different life,

the one that stopped me

mid-sip.

I looked up.

Wrong person.

Wrong decade.

Wrong everything

except the laugh.

The window reflected

a silhouette that wasn't quite right,

that was close enough

to trick my body

into believing

I'd been transported.

For three seconds

I was twenty-two again.

For three seconds

the whole timeline shifted.

Then the person turned

and it was someone else entirely—

different face,

different clothes,

different reason

for being in this coffee shop

on this Tuesday.

But my hands

were still shaking.

My coffee

was still warm.

The laugh

was still echoing

in a place

where it couldn't possibly

be echoing.

There are moments

when time folds

and you get to see

what you lost

wearing a stranger's face.

You don't get to keep it.

You just get to feel it

slip away again,

more completely this time,

knowing now

exactly what you missed.