Try Again

Clattering windows rattled Alan awake. He managed a long exhale and five heartbeats before his sour alarm wailed an irritating bweoop. Hand bouncing blindly for the cheap plastic clock, he patted at it until the radio flicked on.

Battery backup’s dying.

“Try again,” he muttered aloud, over the sound of wind screaming through the cracks in the pane of glass. He shut his eyes and woke abruptly, having not gone far enough back to avoid the rattling. “Try again,” he groaned, and again woke. This time, well over a minute before the alarm and the wind tried to ruin his Saturday morning. As he stared at the popcorn ceiling he couldn’t help but think of nothing. Even though he wanted something.

Try again.

Try again…

He unplugged the clock from the useless outlet, rolling out of bed and strolling to the bathroom. The morning, gloomy as it loomed, was no longer an unpleasant surprise. Alan flicked the light on and with a hissing pop, it went right back out again.

Try again.

He changed course from the bathroom before turning on the light this time, grabbing a fresh bulb and climbing up on the countertop with a screwdriver. Once he finished, he snapped the light back on and nodded to himself. To anyone on the outside of his mind, he’d woken up before his alarm, remembered to change the bathroom bulb first thing in the morning, didn’t drip toothpaste on his shirt, and hadn’t even let his spoon clank painfully on the kitchen tile floor. He never messed anything up. Never made a mistake. Not for anyone to see.

Drearily, with half-opened eyes, Alan drove his reliable gray 2019 Corolla to meet his carefully selected friends for a day’s hike. A red car blazed through the stop sign after his foot left the brake. He slammed down on it again. He sighed loudly, tried again, and this time waited for the reckless driver to fly through, enduring a honk from the impatient driver behind him. Alan flipped him off out the window and watched the beater truck switch into park and the driver open their door. “I’ll try that again,” he said, sighing one more time.

The gravel crackled under Alan’s tires as he pulled up to the overgrown trail marker. All the other cars were already there. It was easier to show up late. Less things to go wrong.

“Alan! My man, there you are!”

Florence talked to him like one of the guys but flirted harder than any other girl. He hated it. He couldn’t tell if she liked him, liked him, or just thought he was alright. After several failed attempts to ignite the spark; four first kisses, three different dates, and two nearly-spicy nights, it took one evening for him to settle on letting it go. He made sure she had no idea, of course. No bad experiences in the friend group that way. She wasn’t part of the original, hand-picked group of friends but she tagged along with the others often enough and frequently brought everyone a good laugh.

The more he tried to get everything right with women, the quicker he figured things out. If a kiss six times in a row felt like work on the seventh, then why waste their time?

“This is my cousin, Claire, she’s moving here soon.”

Claire heard her name and turned toward them, giving a small wave with her hand. Alan smiled mindlessly without meaning to and stared without blinking. Claire had a kind of beauty that made time look twice. Florence teased him and a few of the guys acted foolish, joining her as she poked fun, but he didn’t care. This was a savoring moment; one to replay enough times until he could pull off being cool again. They couldn’t see him like that.

Florence told him repeatedly that she was “shy and kinda boring, but so nice”, and he wished he could have one of the iterations without her talking over it. The fifth and final time he replayed the moment, Claire glared at him, turning around more abruptly than she had before. Alan’s heart struck too hard against his chest. He didn’t dare go back again.

“You alright, bro?” Florence asked.

“Uh, yeah. Hey we’re all ready, right? Let’s go then. Before it rains.”

Throughout the hike, Alan stole glances of Claire but tried not to catch her gaze again. Had she really seen him or had he not noticed her irritation the first four times? Not that anyone knew, but he was having an off day. He could have missed it.

Turning down on the self-gaslighting dial and up on his showmanship, he kept ankles from turning, phones from plummeting, and wild animals from fleeing too soon with expert skill. Kurt, Derrick, Anna, Mikey, Paul, and especially Florence; all of them rife with compliments and astonishment throughout the hike. A par for the course, run of the mill, nothing to write home about kind of day, really. All but Claire. She would smile quietly, look at him with that Mona Lisa smirk, and keep hiking with her cousin. No matter how many times he “tried again”, no matter how right he got it; but she couldn’t know. No one can see time. No one can bend it either…

“We’re finally back!” Florence moaned, flinging her finger out toward an olde-fashioned ice cream shop. “Ice cream?”

The childish chanting, puns, and forward momentum ensued, but Alan lingered when he noticed Claire watching him. She stood at the street corner. He stood near her until the illuminated walking man turned into a red palm. The people queuing up for the next light left them plenty of space.

“You’re not gonna fix that?”

His heart pounded and he looked down at her sweet, piercing face. “…What?”

“We missed the light,” she said, shrugging.

“How do you know?” Alan breathed the question out, feeling sweat building up under his skin, ready to pop out along with his panic. A white and tan patchwork car sputtered by. Then, instinctively, feeling himself losing control, he tried the moment again. A white and tan car sputtered passed them. Two more times. A third.

“I can help you,” she said, watching the same white car cross the intersection yet again.

“With what?” Alan said, finding his voice.

“We can switch for a day. You wanna trade?” He knew what she meant, but how could she mean it? “Alan, am I really that surprising?”

“…Sure.” Alan looked at her, a coy look settling on her face. “We can switch, I mean.”

“Alright, I’m you now,” she said, chuckling.

“That’s it?”

Claire shrugged and the crosswalk lights ended their conversation.

The ice cream shop smell hit like a bomb of cold sugar when they walked through the doors. Florence bounced over to them and scooped Claire’s arm with her own, leading her to the various flavors. Paul called him over, taking his card back from the cashier.

“Alan, hey, sorry man, I thought you weren’t coming. Where were you?”

“I was, back there, I stayed. Er, I missed the, okay, try again.” Nothing happened. “Oh, right, missed the light. The walking, the light for walking. No, try again, uh.”

“Alright, well, I’m glad you’re not stroking out on us or anything,” he chuckled, brows raised. “Want something? You saved my brand new phone, least I can do.”

“Sure, uh, thanks. Single’s fine,” Alan muttered, glancing over at Claire. She was trying a bright blue ice cream with marshmallows in it before shaking her head. Nope.

“Want something? You saved my brand new phone, least I can do.”

Alan stared at Paul, narrowed his eyes, and thoroughly unsettled his friend before everything snapped back and Paul reset, asked him the same question a third time. Claire was on her next flavored ice cream. She said nope a couple more times before leaving Alan to answer Paul yet again. As Claire passed him, Alan called to her.

“How’s the cookie dough?”

“She doesn’t have cookie dough, man, obviously. Unless they make pink cookie dough, which they don’t,” said Florence, rolling her eyes.

“It’s the second best one,” said Claire. After they sat at their table, Florence whispered as quietly to Claire as she could. Which is to say, everyone heard.

“Dude, girl, how is he flirting with you already? When did you guys even talk, out there at the light? Teach me your ways, man.”

Claire’s giggling chimed in his reddening ears and he paused for the time skipping, holding the servers gaze a few moments too long. Clearing his throat, the confused teen striped in black pointed his scoop toward several different flavors. Alan chose strawberry, immediately regretting it, but too lost in his new world to stop the guy from plopping it onto the cone and handing it over the counter. Pink and strawberry and the same thing Claire got. He braced himself for unskippable ridicule.

“Alan, let’s sit here,” said Paul.

“Least covered in a sticky mystery goo,” said Kurt. “Don’t…don’t even say it, Mikey.”

Loudly dragging chairs over to a table meant for two, the guys crammed together and the three girls, Anna, Florence, and Claire, chitchatted nearby. And the distant rumble of thunder made the strawberry flavor all the more bitterly tart to his taste.

Driving home in the rain was like pushing himself slowly through a stoner’s house after they’d replaced all the doors with beaded curtains. Every car burst through the noise and he was secondhand bad-tripping from the finality of whatever would happen on this drive. White-knuckling and barely remembering to breathe, Alan scooched his way into the drive and put his car in park. He panted, both hands still fused to the damp leather wheel. “I don’t like this,” he finally said, his voice ripping the monotone blanket of rain. He sounded like a stranger to himself. So much so, that he hummed and cleared his throat and shouted a couple of times, knowing no one else could hear him.

Taking a deep breath, he flung the car door open and ran up to his narrow townhouse, fumbling for the keys and dropping them before finally getting it right. Slamming the door behind himself, he grunted, flinging his arms out, soaking wet. Not being able to try again was starting to feel like walking with a pair of phantom limbs.

His phone rang and he jolted in the dim, rain-muffled home. Inconsequentially wet on one side, he swiped the icon up and answered the strange number.

“Alan? It’s Claire, Florence gave me your number, I hope that’s alright.”

“Claire, hi.”

“What am I saying,” she chuckled, “Of course it’s alright, that was silly. We’re a little bit passed that I guess. Right?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you alright? On your drive I mean,” said Claire, though he could hear Florence in the background gasping and teasing her. He could also hear Claire shooing her to another room. “It was, really cruel of me to let you drive home like that. I was driving and thought, this is way less stressful, I can just go back in time…are you alright?”

“Yes.”

“Listen, I know you’re probably trying to deal with all this right now, so I’m gonna leave you to it. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“No, wait,” said Alan, but she’d already hung up. He tried calling back, but she just kept ending the call. There was so much more he wanted to ask, to figure out, to mess up on and he just froze up hearing her voice. He cursed and threw his phone into the couch.

The rest of that evening felt worse than the drive home. Slipping against the slick slate floor, he wasn’t able to redo the moment and immediately remedy the frustration with himself, so he had to keep going. Rattled, Alan plucked a narrow cup out of the dishwasher, caught the prong, and dropped his glass on the mat, cracking but not shattering it.

“What’s wrong with me,” he muttered and cursed to himself, “I wouldn’t have done that even if I could try again.”

He tried to toast bread for his turkey sandwich, but he’d never set the toaster to the correct amount of time for anything; all the way to max every time. It took six pop-up retries for him to have toast that went beyond warm bread. As he walked through to the couch with his sandwich, reaching for the controller with his free hand, he found himself disoriented and reaching for nothing back in the kitchen. A plate with a turkey sandwich sitting on the counter behind him. Slowly, he walked over to pick it up and made it back to where he was last time and then it happened again. More used to repetition than most, he powered through until finally he made it to the couch with his sandwich. Hesitantly he turned on the television, grumbling and flipping through the channels. How irritating.

She was using his powers.

This must be what she’s gone through her entire life.

His mouth sagged agape as he thought about this. How annoying, frustrating…how could she live like that? Constantly having to redo moments that she doesn’t choose. All because of him. Does she hate him? She must.

The doorbell rang.

Alan muted the television and set his untouched sandwich down on the nearby tray. He fought off thoughts of chaos awaiting him on the other side of the door and opened it abruptly. Standing there, wide-eyed with her purple-striped umbrella, was Claire.

“Can I come in?”

“Of course,” said Alan. After he closed the door, he took a deep breath. “You’ve got to give it back, I can’t…”

Claire stood up on her tiptoes and pressed a sweet, perfect kiss to his lips. For a moment, time was spinning. Then, she pulled away from him and smiled.

“That’s the only one you’re getting, today. You can’t replay it.”

“About that…” Alan said, trying to be funny but still stunned.

“I wasn’t sure if you’d have anything in just one day worth savoring. So there it is. Uh, that was, that was okay, right?”

“Yeah,” laughed Alan, then he abruptly stopped. “Are you leaving already?”

“I’ve got to get back to Florence, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Claire tried in vain to suppress a wide grin as she slipped back out into the gentle sprinkle of rain and dove into her car. Alan watched her drive away and forgot about his problem. He sat down, ate his sandwich, and didn’t realize that he’d been cruising right through uninterrupted time. All he could think about was Claire.

A distant jingle playfully tickled Alan’s ears. He opened his eyes, staring as his warm sienna popcorn ceiling. Glancing over at his unplugged clock, he lurched forward and realized it was still unplugged from yesterday morning. The jingle grew louder.

Where’s my phone?

Diving into the couch cushions, Alan finally found it and swiped up before it could end. His voice was still waking up.

“You’re going to be late, slowpoke,” said Claire before hanging up.

Alan looked at the time on his phone. It was about ten minutes later than when he normally wakes up. He must’ve already missed showing up on time once. Chuckling to himself, he rushed through the morning and grabbed a granola bar for the drive. Sunday morning traffic was lighter just after the church rush and with minimal concern for his life, he made it to the hiking spot earlier than everyone else. As he took in the surroundings the never noticed before, a dragonfly landed on his water bottle right in front of him. Slowly pointing toward it for a poke, he heard Anna from behind him.

“Careful, I think they can bite you.”

“They don’t bite,” said her brother Paul. “Man, you’re here early. We always gotta wait for you.”

“Well I’m glad he is, I wanted to thank him for being so nice to Claire. She’s really shy but she’s such a great person. Whatever you guys talked about yesterday really lit a fire under her.”

“That’s not how you use that phrase,” said her brother. “So anyway, is she, you know?” Paul moved his hand in a circular motion and Alan felt his heart sink. He could screw everything up, right there. Anna was definitely analyzing him and Paul would probably make a move as soon as the hike started, but was Claire really into him or was she getting him back for a lifetime of unintentional torture?

A couple of cars pulled up. The others were arriving. Alan’s palms dampened and a numbness prickled his throat. Just as he seized up, hating this moment and his inability to fix the outcome, he thought about how he saw her for the first time. She knew. She saw him in his rawest state and still…

“Yeah, I’m gonna talk to her today,” said Alan, his voice firm and steady as a strongman on the tightrope. Anna lit up like a bonfire and Paul shrugged.

Claire and her cousin popped out of Florence’s rented, black-striped, blue Camaro. Alan was already halfway to her when the others starting their suspenseful build-up of cheering him on. He stopped in front of the car and Claire strolled around to meet him, tracing her fingers along the hood on the way over.

“You wanna try again?” She joked.

Alan leaned down and kissed her, in front of everyone, without thought for all of the things that could go horribly wrong. Because they didn’t. And it was just as real as it had been the night before.

“If you two are ready,” said an amused Paul, “there’s a cliff down this trail we can probably jump off, if we’re all up for it?”

Alan looked at Claire one more time and knew, no matter what happened next, he was ready to live it.