The Last Call from Yesterday

“Hello? Operator, can you connect me to Săpânța, please? Yes, that’s the village in Maramureș. I’ll wait.”

(Hiss… click… another click.)

“Adrian? Are you there?”

I tightened my grip on the rotary phone. My grandmother’s dim hallway smelled of old wool and menthol salve. The year was 1990, at least according to the frayed calendar by the door.

A breath crackled over the line. Then a voice—my voice, only older—said, “Don’t hang up. Listen closely.”

I swallowed hard. “Who is this?”

“It’s you, calling from 2025. Don’t bother asking how. Just check your left jeans pocket.”

My heart hammered. A slip of paper was wedged there: 7-15-22-31-44. Do not play.

“That’s… tonight’s lottery,” I murmured, reading the numbers.

“Yes,” the older me said. “If you play them, you’ll win. But you’ll vanish just like the others.”

I squinted at the phone’s cord, coiling around my fingers. “Why are you calling? What do you want from me?”

“Ceaușescu,” came the curt reply. “He’s not dead.”

I nearly dropped the receiver. “That’s impossible. I’ve seen the footage.”

“They staged it,” the voice replied. “He’s underground, shifting identities. If he remains hidden, thousands suffer in silence. You must visit the old radio factory in Satu Mare tonight. Look in the basement. And don’t go alone.”

Static buzzed loud enough to make me wince, then the call cut off.

My mind refused to settle. Should I believe a phantom voice claiming to be me from thirty-five years in the future? No time to debate. The phone clanged again, and I jerked the receiver to my ear.

“Bucharest lines are down,” the operator said. “No outgoing calls permitted. Strange, no official notice.”

“Thanks,” I replied, my voice trembling. “I’ll try later.”

Three hours later, I was driving my father’s old Dacia toward Satu Mare. Twilight painted the sky bruised purple. In my pocket, that cursed paper felt heavier with every kilometer. At a roadside kiosk, a TV blared the lottery preview. In my mind, the forbidden numbers pulsed like a warning beacon.

Then, I saw the factory’s silhouette: a cold, blocky structure with shattered windows.

I parked, heart pounding. A single bulb flickered over the basement entrance. I stepped onto the gravel, glancing around nervously. A toppled phone booth lay near the fence. The wind carried the smell of metal and dust.

Suddenly, two figures emerged from the shadows—plainclothes men whose stance screamed Securitate.

“State your business,” one barked, gripping my arm.

My mouth went dry. “I’m—just looking for a friend.”

“A friend?” The second man snorted. “We intercepted a call from 2025. Recognize this?” He held up a phone receiver tricked out with strange wiring.

I had no chance to answer. A blow to my temple dropped me into darkness.

I awoke in a gray cell, the floor freezing beneath me. The only light flickered from a naked bulb overhead. Through iron bars, a guard lounged at a desk, cigarette smoke spiraling toward the ceiling. A small TV there showed last night’s lottery results.

The announcer’s voice crackled: “Numbers drawn: 7, 15, 22, 31, 44.”

Exactly the ones I’d been warned not to play.

The guard must have noticed my grim stare. He gestured at the TV. “Anyone who wins those numbers mysteriously disappears,” he said in a low voice. “All hush-hush. I’d stay clear of them if I were you.”

I swallowed. “Why?”

He stubbed out his cigarette. “Because if Ceaușescu’s alive, he needs financing. Every big winner gets… persuaded to contribute.”

Just then, the phone on his desk rang. A tinny rattle echoed off concrete walls. He lifted the receiver, then his eyes darted to me. “Strange. This call’s for you.”

Stepping close, he pressed it through the bars. I held it to my ear, shaking.

“Adrian,” said my own voice, older still. “Told you not to go alone. Now look under your mattress.”

I slid my hand under the straw mat. Taped there was a ring of keys and a blurry newspaper clipping dated December 1989: Ceaușescu’s so-called execution. I stared at the photo, spotting a man in the background clutching a device that looked suspiciously like a smartphone. He wore my face, only older, half-hidden in the crowd.

“Time isn’t a straight line; it’s a switchboard,” Future-me said over the phone. “We route events, creating illusions. The official footage? A ruse. Ceaușescu needed a controlled exit. We orchestrated it. The lottery fiasco is part of funding his hidden network.”

Anger coiled in my stomach. “You’re telling me we’re helping that monster survive?”

“I am,” Future-me replied softly. “You will, too. Every call you make or receive ensures the cycle continues.”

“Why warn me at all?” I demanded. “I’d never willingly assist him!”

“You say that now,” Future-me said. “But you’ll learn the cost of breaking this loop is far worse. It’s a bitter truth. We don’t save him out of loyalty; we do it to prevent chaos.”

The guard’s footsteps echoed as he moved to unlock my cell. He looked uneasy, as though someone else had commanded him through the phone line. He said, “They’re letting you go.”

Moments later, I stumbled into the morning sun, keys in hand, mind racing. In my pocket, the slip of paper with lottery numbers had vanished, replaced by a phone bill dated 2025. The amount owed made me lightheaded; the currency was something I’d never seen before.

I drove back to Săpânța in a daze, replaying the guard’s cryptic words and the older me’s confessions. That night, at exactly 3 AM, my grandmother’s rotary phone rang, shrill and insistent. I nearly tumbled out of bed answering it.

“Adrian,” the voice said. “We need to schedule your next call.”

I exhaled. “Who is this?”

But I knew. It was me again—somewhere beyond 2025, from the sound of it.

“There’s no point resisting,” Future-me continued. “Ceaușescu’s men watch the lines. They know the truth now. Every time you pick up, you seal another link in the chain. And if you try to break free, you’ll only start the cycle sooner.”

I clenched the receiver. “So I’m a pawn in my own scheme?”

“A pawn and a king,” Future-me said, voice hoarse with regret. “This is bigger than either of us.”

Days passed, and I began noticing subtle shifts. Money appeared in my bank account. My father’s Dacia was replaced by a newer model overnight, with no explanation. I discovered calls in the ledger that I never remembered placing—some to the radio factory, others to overseas lines.

Late one evening, the phone rang again. This time, the connection was crystal clear.

“Adrian?” a man asked in Romanian, tone urgent. “I was told to call this number. They said you could… help.”

I recognized the voice from archival footage. It was Ceaușescu himself. My blood turned to ice. “Yes,” I found myself saying, unsure why. “You need the new coordinates. And the next set of numbers…”

I read from a paper I couldn’t recall writing.

When the call ended, my knees buckled. I sank to the floor, heart drumming in my ears. I was making it happen, the very atrocity I swore to prevent. Everything Future-me had predicted was coming true.

That night, I tried destroying the phone, ripping the cord from the wall. But the next morning, it was intact, buzzing with static. A note lay beneath it: Warning is Catalyst.

In desperation, I studied telecommunications at the local institute, scouring textbooks on wave theory, quantum entanglement, any clue to break the cycle. Yet the more I learned, the clearer it became: every possible attempt to alter fate only braided the timeline tighter. My future self’s phone calls fed on those attempts, turning them into steps toward the same loop.

Years blurred. Each time the phone rang, I answered, sometimes speaking to younger versions of myself, sometimes older. I became complicit, orchestrating safe houses, rigging lotteries, ensuring the infamous dictator floated ghostlike through history. A monstrous marionette dancing on my phone lines.

But I couldn’t look away. I was shackled to the dial tone of inevitability.

Now, in 2025, I stand by a modern phone, ironically designed to look vintage, my voice deepened by time’s burden. I dial that scratchy line back to 1990, telling my younger self exactly what to do. I hear the fear in his voice, the reluctance, the fatal curiosity. Soon, he will do everything I did.

Sometimes, I ask if it’s worth it. Will sparing the world one cataclysm cause another, bigger one? The calls answer themselves. The loop closes. History remains twisted but intact.

My grandmother’s phone still sits in the hallway, stained by time. Every ring is a hinge in history. By picking it up, I guarantee Ceaușescu’s legacy endures. If I ignore it, the timeline snaps, and worse horrors emerge.

So I keep calling. I keep answering. I do it all again, forging a chain of phone calls that binds past, present, and future into a single, inescapable line. And every conversation is a reminder: I am both the hero and the villain of my own story.

(Click. Dial tone. Fade to static…)