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Cassie waited while her grandpa studied the scar. Then his eyes flicked to hers. He nodded once and Cassie slipped her arm back into her coat.
“One cheeseburger, home fries,” the server announced, placing the food down. “You want anything, honey?”
“No thanks,” Cassie said, without breaking eye contact with her grandpa. The server left them again and after a moment her grandpa seemed to remember where he was. He turned his eyes down to the food in front of him. He reached for his coffee and held it but didn’t drink it.
“You should be camping with Jessica and her parents,” he said.
“I am,” Cassie said. “The me in this time. The younger me.”
Her grandpa absorbed her answer, then sipped his coffee, frowning. “What is going on?”
“I don’t know how to explain without sounding crazy,” Cassie said, wrestling now with all the impossible and important things she had to say. Her grandfather was staring at her, as if he couldn’t see her enough, as if there was not enough space in his eyes for all the seeing he needed to do.
“Just tell me,” he said.
In those three words he reminded Cassie of everything he was and everything she loved. He was a man who listened and absorbed, a man who never made a quick judgment.
“I am from the future,” Cassie said, feeling slightly embarrassed to even use those words. “It doesn’t matter how or why, but I came back here to see you.”
“I see,” he said, watching her.
“Don’t you want to eat your burger?”
“No,” he said. “Not right now.”
“Okay.”
They sat in silence for a moment, looking at each other as the diners clattered and chatted around them.
“Do you believe me?” she asked. “About what I said?”
“I believe you are my granddaughter,” he said, speaking slowly, considering his words. “And I believe you are older than the Cassie I said goodbye to yesterday morning. You are a woman. I can see that.”
Cassie nodded. Her emotions were a waterfall within her, a vast and thundering waterfall that drowned out everything else, but her face revealed nothing.
“So?” Cassie said.
“What you say is as good an explanation as any,” he said. “I can’t think of anything better. Unless I am hallucinating. Unless you are not real.”
Cassie reached out and put a hand on his. “Can you feel me?”
He nodded.
“I’m here.”
She felt herself crumple in the center like she was made of paper. She felt herself falling into her core, all of the walls and defenses she had built up over the decade collapsing around her because he was here, and he was alive. Tears welled in her eyes no matter how much she willed them away.
“What is it, Cassidy?” her grandfather asked.
“Cassidy,” she said, sniffing. “Nobody calls me that.”
He was looking at her strangely now, the slight narrowing of his eyes like when he was doing calculations for some complex piece of woodwork.
“Why are you here?” he asked. “I can’t imagine it was easy for you to get here, so why did you come here? Are burgers banned in the future or something?”
She laughed, a single, joyous bark, and then wiped her eyes on her sleeve, all the while conscious of how he was watching her.
“No,” she said. “You can still get burgers. I just... I just wanted to see you, Gramps.”
