The Perfect Choice

It was all perfect. Right?

Evelyn was a 21-year-old girl who had decided that her major would be law. It wasn't that she wasn't good at law; it was that her whole heart wasn't devoted to being a lawyer. Evelyn wasn't necessarily indecisive, but she wasn't 100% sure about her profession choice. She had mulled over her options for many of the weeks leading up to decision day, but law had always seemed like the logical choice. After all, law and writing were her top two choices, and law paid very handsomely. The only way to make a profit out of writing was to hit it big, and that was a one in a hundred chance—a chance Evelyn did not want to take. At night, Evelyn would lie awake in her tiny dorm room bed and wonder—what would her life be like if she had gone into writing? Would she have become famous? Or would she be living in a tiny apartment, barely able to pay the rent because she was broke and without money because she had wasted all her time and resources on writing a book that failed? These kinds of worst-case scenarios that went through her head were what caused Evelyn to take the safer path.

This night was similar to all the others. Evelyn glanced at the alarm on her nightstand. 11:47 pm. Evelyn had always been the kind of person who could just curl up under the covers and be asleep within a few seconds, but tonight felt strange. She had never been an insomniac, but boy, was it beginning to feel like it. With a sigh, she closed her eyes again and drifted off. In her dreams, she saw herself as a famous author, traveling around the world for signings and book talks. She imagined living a life of glamour, her work getting amazing reviews from the toughest critics, her name on the New York Times bestseller list. It was all a dream, sure, but one day, Evelyn hoped that it would be a reality.

The next morning, Evelyn had a free period first, and so she went outside and caught up with her best friend, Mia, who was also a law major. They went out to the great lawn and tossed a ball around. After half an hour, they sat down and took a quick water break. As Evelyn stood up and walked around to stretch, Mia caught her off guard with a high ball, and as soon as Evelyn saw the direction that the ball was flying, she coughed and spit out the water in her mouth. Evelyn dropped her water bottle on the ground and took off running towards the ball. The reason that she was so desperate to catch the ball was that the ball was flying towards a store called Switched and Shuffled Antiques, and weird stuff happened there. Evelyn even knew about two girls who had bought a mirror from there and switched bodies! But that's a story for another time. The woman who typically ran the store, Margaret, was very strange—or…eccentric. However, it was too late. As Evelyn ran desperately, the ball rolled to a stop right in front of the door, and Margaret suddenly appeared from nowhere, opening the door, grabbing the small pink rubber ball, and disappearing back into the store. Oh, jeez. Evelyn thought. With a deep breath, she walked into the store. Margaret looked up at her with a scowl that only fit on her.

"Excuse me? Margaret? Um, I think that's our ball."

"Hmph. Kids these days—throwing their balls all willy-nilly." Margaret responded, muttering words to the ball under her breath. At least, that's what it looked like to Evelyn. She grabbed her ball, and with a quick, 'Thanks!' she dashed out. Evelyn had been too shaken to continue their game, and she had classes anyways, so she said goodbye to Mia and went to her first law class of the day.

Six hours later, after her classes for the day, Evelyn went to her room to study. Drifting in and out of consciousness, she fell asleep, and her head fell onto the desk with a loud 'thunk!'

The next morning, her room looked completely different. 'Ouch!' thought Evelyn, rubbing her head where she had banged it onto her desk. Looking at her desk to check for dents, her eyes drifted upwards toward the wall above her desk. "What the...?" she said to herself, looking at the calendar, which said it was one full year before the current date. With shock, Evelyn realized that this was decision day. It was happening again. Going through the possibilities in her head, she quickly realized that it was Margaret who had brought her back in time. "This stuff never happens without a reason, right?" she asked herself. Going through the rest of the day, Evelyn fought a constant battle in her head—was she going to choose law again? Or was she going to choose writing? Deciding once more to go into law, she made her decision and fell asleep quickly that night.

Waking up with a jolt, Evelyn realized that again, it was decision day. "There is no way that I'm going to keep waking up on this day. There's got to be a reason for this," she thought, and she knew what to do. She chose writing. She attended all the classes and began her own manuscript for a book, called Simply Perfect, about the philosophy of perfectionism. Did it truly exist? She spent months and months on her manuscript, often falling asleep at the desk where she would work on her book.

Four months later, Evelyn's book was finished, and she was glad. Those months had been stuck with sleepless nights, many, many writer's blocks, and far too many naps. Often, she would spend hours just staring at the window, wondering if her book would ever be done. She had already talked to her professors about publishing it, and she decided that the best way was to publish it with a famous brand. She went to three publishers, and only one of them accepted her book. They had told her that it was going to be a few weeks before they could publish it, and she had gladly accepted, every single one of those nights spent dreaming her wildest dreams again, and again, and again. Three weeks later, her book was finally out in the public, and as she walked around streets, many, many people recognized her from her work. Her publisher had told her that he'd sent her book to the New York Times bestseller list, and she had made it on! Several tough critics had reviewed her book, calling it "a pure work of art!" and "marvelous. Simply fantastic!"

Evelyn couldn't be happier, and she wished that her life like that could last forever. She had moved into a mansion and begun another book—then two, then three! She had finally hit it big, as she had dreamed so many times.

It had been nearly two years since her third decision day, and she had begun to think that she was never going to have to go back to her old boring life where she was going into law, sadly. Evelyn sat at her massive dinner table, eating with Mia—her best friend hadn't changed.

"Ev, do you ever wonder what would have happened if you went into law?"

"Never." Evelyn responded, thinking about how she had always wondered what it would have been like to be an author. She fell asleep soon after Mia left, her head conking onto her desk where she was working on her latest book.

Evelyn woke with a start the next morning and, with horror, realized that she was back in her dorm room. Nervously looking at the calendar, Evelyn realized that it was the day after she had encountered Margaret, the day when she had woken up back on her decision day. Frantically looking around, she realized that she was back with law as her major. Her chest beating hard, she dropped the package in her hand onto the floor. 'The package in my hand?' she thought to herself. 'What package?' she asked, tearing the box open. Inside, to her relief, were her manuscripts for both her first and second books. Breathing a sigh of relief, she stood up and left her room, going to find Mia.

"Ev, are you ok?" Mia asked as soon as she saw Evelyn.

"Um, mostly, yeah. Why?" Evelyn responded curiously.

"Because your hair is disheveled, you're wearing the same clothes as yesterday, and there's a strange package in your hand. You look like you haven't eaten in days. Want to go for lunch?" Mia replied, looking up and down at Evelyn.

Evelyn simply laughed and said, "I'm actually pretty good. I'm on my way to visit a publishing office right now, but we can meet later at the coffee shop if you want."

"Sure," Mia said, and Evelyn left.

"What do you mean, it's already been published?" Evelyn asked, desperately.

"I mean, it's already been published by someone. Your manuscript is probably a fake copy of her book." Sam, the publisher, responded.

"Her who?" Evelyn asked.

"Her as in Mia Thompson."

"Mia? A-are you sure?"

"Kid, her name and face is plastered in places from the New York Times bestseller list to random park benches. I'm sure."

Evelyn took a deep breath, trying to calm the rush of emotions. Her mind was racing, trying to piece together how things had gone so wrong. Mia, her best friend, had somehow ended up with her book, the one she’d worked so hard on, and published it under her name.

After a few minutes of pacing back and forth, Evelyn had a plan. The timestamp. Her original manuscript had a clear record of when it was created. She just had to prove it. It wasn’t going to be easy, but she had to try. She quickly grabbed her laptop and headed straight to Mia’s dorm. There was no time to waste. When she arrived, Mia was sitting at her desk, casually flipping through a book. Evelyn didn’t hesitate. She walked in, closed the door behind her, and spoke up. “Mia, we need to talk.”

Mia looked up, surprised by Evelyn’s serious tone. “Uh, sure. What’s going on?”

“Simply Perfect—my book,” Evelyn said, her voice calm but with an edge. “You published it.”

Mia frowned, clearly confused. “What? No, I didn’t—”

“Yes, you did,” Evelyn cut her off. “Under your name.”

Mia blinked, then stood up, her hands going up defensively. “Ev, I don't know what you're talking about. I wrote the entire book on my own. I promise!"

Evelyn raised an eyebrow. "Are you 100% sure?" she said judgmentally.

Mia's face turned from confusion to sadness. “I’m so sorry. I really didn’t know. I swear. I might've gotten a little inspiration from something, but I can tell you that I did not steal your manuscript."

Evelyn took a deep breath, her anger easing a little. “It’s fine. But I need to fix this.”

She turned back to her laptop, opening her storage and searching for the original manuscript. It took a few minutes, but she finally found it buried deep in her files. The timestamp showed the creation date: August 31, 2010. She pointed to the screen. “This. This is when I wrote it. Before you ever saw it.”

Mia stared at the timestamps, wide-eyed. “Oh... wow, that’s... that’s real. I wrote mine around December that year."

Evelyn nodded. “Now I need to go to the publisher and prove that it’s mine.”

Mia bit her lip nervously. “What can I do to help?”

“Just... um, I'll call you if I need help." Evelyn said. "This is one problem I need to figure out on my own."

A few hours later, Evelyn was sitting in Sam's office, showing him her original files, timestamps and all.

"This is the original. August. Not December."

Sam looked through the files suspiciously. "Hmm. I see. Well, I'm definitely going to look into this further."

Evelyn waited nervously as Sam called the manager of the publishing office, and as they reviewed it together. After a few minutes that seemed like hours, Sam and the manager, whose name was Isabella, gave their verdict.

"Alright," said Isabella.

"It's official," added Sam. "You are the rightful author."

Evelyn felt like jumping for joy, but she maintained her composure, staying calm. "So now what?" she asked.

“We'll talk to Mia and get everything sorted out. It'll take a couple of weeks, of course, but I guarantee that by the end of this month, by March 31st, it'll be your face on the benches and critic lists.

Back at the college, Evelyn met Mia at their favorite coffee shop.

When Evelyn saw her face as soon as she walked in, Mia looked genuinely apologetic. “Ev, I’m so sorry. I had no idea. I never meant to take your work.”

Evelyn smiled, shaking her head softly. "It's ok. No harm done. I would use the expression 'no harm, no foul,' but I'm a lawyer-in-training. I can't say that. The ends aren't always justified by the means. But anyways, I just needed to clear things up, and we were all good."

Mia sighed in relief. "Oh, good. I was worried you might still be mad at me."

"Never. You're my best friend." Evelyn responded, smiling.

"Great. So, how about we write another book together? We can have both our faces on all the billboards then." Mia said, making a funny face.

"I'd love that." Evelyn replied.

It was all perfect.