Page 71 of Kiss Slay Replay

There’s a Medium article that lists “The Top 5 Signs You’re Stuck in a Time Loop.” It’s written by someone I’ve never heard of. Obviously. Not a doctor or scientist. Obviously. Just some guy named Jeff who seems to have a lot of opinions on “temporal paradoxes.” His signs aren’t specific enough to validate anything I’ve experienced, but Jeff isn’t far off. Intense déjà vu. Check. Intuition/Precognition. Sure. Familiar time frame. Yeah, the wedding. Deviating from reality. I’d say homicidal ravens and a supernatural killer in a top hat would fit neatly in that category. And lastly, a recent major life event resulting in trauma and/or emotional distress.

Jeff doesn’t give a whole lot of advice on escaping the loop, except some vague bullshit about breaking patterns of behavior, practicing deep self-reflection, and examining choice.

How did I even get here? What am I reading?

Do I honestly believe I’m stuck in a time loop?

No.

I can’t believe that because then I’d be crazy. Then I’d be Jeff.

I put my socks back on but don’t bother to change out of my pajamas. I grab my phone, my keys, my cigarettes, and my wallet. I check to make sure I have my insurance card, then head to the nearest urgent care.

—

The waiting room is just a giant germ. The woman across from me hacks up a lung, the man beside me continuously sneezes—neither makes any effort to cover their mouths, so, I look forward to coming down with whatever they have. How kind of them to gift me their virus. What a generous infection. A child has a full-on tantrum beside a mother who looks like she’s regretting every choice she’s ever made to bring her to this moment, and I relate to her completely.

I’ve been here for over an hour. I’ve neglected my work—a stupid deck I have due on Monday for an A-lister’s new tequila brand, which I’m pretty sure I’ve already done twice in the past forty-eight hours, not to mention I just had my soul sucked out, so I’m not exactly eager to forfeit it again by helping a multimillionaire make more money.

If this isn’t a medical or psychological issue, if I am somehow stuck in some sort of temporal paradox, maybe the soul-sucking hasn’t happened yet. Or maybe it technically never happened at all. But I experienced it just the same, so the damage is done.

I check my phone. I have a message from Cass asking for my ETA.

I probably shouldn’t hold a grudge for the things she hasn’t said in this timeline or dimension or whatever it is. But again. The damage is done.

I don’t respond to her message. I can’t. I don’t have an ETA. One, because I’m in waiting room purgatory. Two, because I’m terrified of going at all. Because on the off chance I’m not sick, or crazy, if it’s not just in my head, then going to this wedding means dying again. My friends dying again. Would my absence spare their lives? Or would they all die faster without me there to warn them?

These are ridiculous thoughts. I press the heels of my hands into my forehead.

It’s possible it was a Russian doll of a nightmare, and I’m awake now, and it’s over. More than possible. That’s the likely explanation. The logical one.

I should be strategizing what to say to the doctor when they call me in. I want an MRI, a picture of my brain, some kind of medical evidence to rationalize everything, and for whatever it is to not be worse than the Eyeball Man or Top Hat phantom. And to preferably not be committed to a psych ward. Is that too much to ask?

“Willa? Willa Sullivan?” A friendly blonde appears at the door. She wears purple scrubs and a matching scrunchie, her hair in a high ponytail.

I stand up and hurry over, follow her through the door.

“Okay, we’re going to be in this room right here. On your right. Great.” She’s so bubbly, and I’m not sure I can handle it. It’s stressing me out. “You can have a seat right here.”

She gestures to the examination table. What’s worse than an examination table? Sitting on that paper, the crinkling noise it makes the soundtrack to being sick and vulnerable.

“My name is Belle. I’m a nurse practitioner,” she says. “What brings you in today?”

“I…I’ve been having these intense, prolonged stints of déjà vu. Um, and vivid dreams. Not just dreams. Nightmares. Visceral nightmares. And…” I’m realizing none of these things sound medical. What did I put on my form? “Headaches.”

“What do these headaches feel like?” she asks, still disturbingly sunny. I regret not caffeinating.

“Um…yesterday it was sharp. Concentrated here,” I say, pointing between my eyes. To where I was stabbed. “Then today just a general throbbing. Whole head. And I’m exhausted. Two days in a row, I’ve woken up just exhausted. It’s like I haven’t slept at all.”

“Have you had nightmares before?” she asks.

“I’ve had bad dreams but never anything like this.”

“In what way?” Her smile is so bright as she flutters her eyelash extensions at me, as she taps her manicured nails on the keyboard, making her notes about what’s wrong with me. I don’t like this power dynamic. I hate going to the doctor.

Ravi used to get on my case about it. I tried to explain how my parents never took me when I got sick as a kid, how I taught myself to soldier through. I told him about the bitch nurse back in the seventh grade who thought I was lying about being nauseous and sent me back to class, where I threw up on myself in front of everyone. My classmates never let me live it down. I was the girl who barfed. I might as well have been radioactive until middle school graduation.

You’re an adult now, he’d say. You have to go.