Chapter 5: 2025, Not 2027?

‘ You ruined me, you looked me in the eye, watched me rock her to sleep, watched me kiss her scraped knees, sing to her, call her ours, and you said nothing. You let me grieve a lie while smiling in my face, and when I caught you with her, you didn't even flinch. It was all lies, the lies you happily fed me, the lies you made me build my world on. You knew all along, she knew all along, that the baby wasn't mine, you let me mourn the baby I never got to hold while raising someone else's. But it's all over now, there's nothing left for me, I lost my child, my family, and now, I've lost the life I thought I had.’

Her body hit the ground heavily, blood streams out beneath her head, her face became pale with parted lips as if whispering her last words in pain. Her eyes fluttered, looking at her grandfather's watch getting soaked in her blood beside her, pain coursed through her body, but was nothing to the one from her chest. Her eyes became blurry, tears streamed down the corners of her eyes, and she could hear screams from bystanders, someone shouting for an ambulance.

‘ I'm tired, there's nothing left, there's nothing left for me to hold on to.’ With that, her vision became black, and Eloise took her last breath.

The moment Eloise died, her grandfather's wristwatch stopped working immediately, and then suddenly the clock hands started racing back anti-clockwise for seconds and stopped at 12:00 pm.

……..

“ Eloise! Honey!” Mason's deep voice called out.

Eloise's ear came alive, and the first voice she heard caused a hard, painful stab against her chest; it was the voice of the person who despises her with every bone in her body.

“ Even if this is the afterlife, isn't he supposed to be screaming from hell, and not me hearing that bastard’s voice calling me?” she yelled in her mind, intense anger brewing inside of her while feeling the soft surface beneath her skin.

“ Hey baby,” the voice is closer now to her ear, causing her heart to burn with aches, sinking deep into her hollow.

She clenched her fist against a sheet and frowned deeply. Just then, she felt his rough palm shake her body slightly, and that's when she knew it wasn't a dream.

She flung her eyes open and screamed, startling Mason as she jumped up and out of the bed.

“ What are you doing here?!!” she yelled, looking around the familiar room. The wedding picture hanging over the wall and other photos from the photo shoot, everywhere, looked exactly as it was a few months after their wedding.

“ Hey, baby! Are you okay?” Mason asked worriedly and took a step closer, but her fierce yell halted him.

“ Don't you dare! If you take one more step, I swear on my life I'll kill you mercilessly,” she threatened, pointing at him and glaring murderously.

His presence stirred up pain in her chest and anger that demanded his blood.

Mason has never been this confused in his life, She looked like she meant every word she said.

“ Are you angry because I woke you up?” he asked innocently. Guilt was masked on his face.

Eloise ignored him and looked around vigorously, wearing confusion and anger on her face. Everything looked normal; she peeped outside and didn't see singing birds, people in white, or angels; rather, she saw people moving up and down and going about their daily life. She turned sharply back at him,

“ Are you dead?”

Mason looked shocked, pinched himself, and shook his head, “No, I'm not.”

“ Get out!”

“ Huh?”

“ Get out!” she shouted and grabbed the table lamp and threw it at him.

“ Ouch! Shit!,” he grunted in pain as it hit his shoulder, now realizing she's extremely pissed at him and now looking for another weapon to grab, he quickly ran out of the room for his dear life. He heard the door slammed shut as he run outside, “ what the fuck is wrong with her?.”

“ Babe, I'm sorry,” he shouted from outside, but heard no response. He stood outside the door for a few seconds, unsure of what was going on.

‘Is this some kind of hormone?’ he asked himself, cluelessly, but then an idea came to his mind. Maybe he just needed to display some affection, maybe that's what she wanted.

‘ I have to make her happy, today can't go wrong,’ he smiled as he said in his mind before walking away, knowing exactly what to do to put her in a good mood.

Eloise turned back from the door, her chest felt suffocating, and her eyes brimmed with tears as she looked around in confusion while rubbing her chest with her palm, hoping to soothe the pain.

She glanced around with a wrinkled brow; she had no idea if she was currently alive or dead.

She pinched herself and winced.

“ This is not a dream,” she shook her head, tears streaming down her cheeks, the aches from her chest, the pain stabbing her soul mercilessly, they felt too real to be a dream.

“ What's going on?” Her voice shook, fear, confusion, and pain accompanied every word.

She remembered clearly running into a car, and the pain all over her body.

She touched her whole body, up to her ankle, but felt no pain.

“What's happening to me? Were all those really a dream?” She walked towards the bed and sank onto it. “There's no way it is,” she remembered being pregnant, the unforgettable pain during delivery, the death of her grandfather, her child, the betrayal, the suicide; they were all real, that she knows for sure.

The sudden ring of her phone jolted her a little. It was an old, ringing tone playing, one she changed a long time ago. She grabbed it to see it wasn't a call, but a reminder ringtone.

“ A reminder? To what?” She swiped up.

The tone stopped playing, and her eyes fell on the reminder messages.

(Reminder 1- Visiting grandfather at the hospital at 1:00pm )

(Reminder 2- Introducing Mason to the Archeon circle at 6:00 pm)

Eloise furrowed her brow, this reminder is something that has happened before, she remembered this was the app she do use to set reminder for her schedules and she set this particularly after handing over her company to Mason, and then introduce him to the Archeon circle, a discreet group of CEOs and financiers who collaborate on off-the-record mergers, political influence, and global wealth strategy.

“ Why is this coming up again?” she asked, knowing she had done that, yeah, a lifetime mistake, something she's still regretting with every hair on her.

“ Wait, what!?” she exclaimed as her eyes fell on the date. Her fingers frantically slid up, and her eyes widened, not believing her eyes. She looked for the calendar, and her jaw fell to the ground.

The date wasn't showing October 27th, 2027. The day she died, rather, the date is May 17th, 2025.

With her widened eyes, her head slowly raised from the calendar and the phone, with confusion, her head trying to wrap around what was going on, but the only explanation and the only sentence that her head could make out of everything was that.

It's either everything that happened was a dream, which can’t be, her two years of married life can't be a dream.

Or.

She went back in time to a month after her marriage to Mason.