Sarah sighed dramatically.“Fine.You cried.You dragged me out of my psych class, made me skip my favorite professor’s lecture, and forced me to drive us all the way back here because you ‘needed your mom.’Then you hugged her for about an hour, ate a ton of cookies, made me sit through a stupid rom-com, and cried some more while inhaling a gallon of ice cream.Happy?”
“Yale?”Ashley echoed.
“Uh, yeah.That’s where we study, genius,” Sarah said, rolling her eyes.
“No,” Ashley said, her voice shaking.“We’re at Harvard.You wanted Yale, but I won rock-paper-scissors.You lost.”
Sarah blinked at her, then threw her head back with a laugh so loud it startled Ashley.“Oh my God, are you seriously trying to rewrite history now?You lost, Ash.Fair and square.That’s why we’re here.Did you hit your head or something?”
Ashley stared at her, her stomach churning.“No.I–” She faltered, her words dying in her throat.
Sarah shook her head, still chuckling as she grabbed her sweatshirt off the chair.“Seriously, you’re acting weird today.Maybe the cookies last night fried your brain.”
Ashley’s knees buckled as realization hit her like a freight train.She wasn’t at Harvard.She wasn’t married.She wasn’t pregnant.
She was in the past.
Ashley sat frozen on the bed, her heart pounding in her chest as Sarah’s footsteps receded down the hall.The sound of the bathroom door closing snapped her out of her daze.She stared at the door for a moment before looking down at the phone in her hand.
Her stomach churned as she turned it over, her fingers trembling.The device was ancient–a clunky, plastic relic from over a decade ago.Her reflection in the dim screen stared back at her, distorted but unmistakably… younger.
With shaking hands, she pressed the home button.No passcode.The screen lit up, displaying a picture of her and Sarah on the last day of school, their arms draped around each other.Ashley blinked at the image.Her hair was shorter, her face softer, and her smile was wide and carefree.She scrolled through the messages, finding nothing from Cole.No “on my way back” text.Nothing from her husband anywhere.
Her heart sank.
She needed more proof.
Sliding off the bed, Ashley darted to the dresser, pulling open the top drawer.Inside were clothes she hadn’t worn in years–worn-out tank tops, oversized sweaters, and jeans that looked impossibly small.She grabbed one, holding it up in disbelief.
“No way,” she muttered.
Her gaze shifted to the full-length mirror on the back of the door.Slowly, as though approaching a wild animal, she stepped in front of it again.
The person staring back at her wasn’t the Ashley she knew.
Her hands moved out of their own accord, searching for the familiar curve of her stomach, the weight, the life that had been growing inside her just hours ago.
The unbidden sense of loss overwhelmed her, and her panic rose, clawing at her chest as she stumbled back toward the desk.She flipped through a stack of papers, her breath catching as her eyes landed on a syllabus:
Psych 201 – Yale University
“Yale,” she whispered, the word barely audible.Her head spun memories of her life flashing before her in fragments–her parents’ house, her wedding to Cole, the first flutter of her baby’s kicks.All of it felt like it had been yanked away, leaving her stranded in a life she didn’t recognize.
The sound of the bathroom door opening startled her, and she quickly shoved the papers back into place.Sarah appeared in the doorway, her hair damp and pulled into a messy ponytail.
“You good?”she asked, tilting her head as she studied Ashley.
“Fine,” Ashley lied, her voice tight.
Sarah raised a brow but didn’t push.“Get dressed.We’re going to be late.”
“For what?”Ashley asked, her voice more forceful than she intended.
Sarah gave her a bewildered look.“For class, obviously.Earth to Ash, we have a final next week, remember?One you were studying for but stopped because you were too busy mourning Charlie and eating your weight in cookies.”
She opened her mouth to respond, but before she could, Sarah left her with some clothes she tossed onto the bed for her.
Ashley successfully buttoned her unbelievably small pair of jeans and heard her mother’s footsteps echo faintly down the hall, a rhythmic sound she hadn’t realized she missed until right that moment.
