Ten seconds.
It’s been enough in the past. But not this time.
When I was younger it just felt like weird deja-vu, like imagining how things might have gone if I’d chosen differently. It was only in my 20s, when I started focusing on it, taking it seriously, that I realized it was something I could control.
Ten seconds. A chance to undo/redo something. Not big things like a failed marriage or a dead-end job, but enough to change that thing I shouldn’t have said, that thing I shouldn’t have just put in my mouth, that thing I shouldn’t have placed on the already-too-big pile.
Good for casinos, if you’re careful. Great at blackjack. Sometimes good for craps and roulette. Occasionally worked for baccarat. Nice for simpler slot machines that don’t have five-minute video clips like modern ones do.
And it might have been enough for falling off a cliff. If I hadn’t been pushed.
It was the shock of the betrayal. The feeling of the hand at my back. The attempt to comprehend what had happened and why. I thought he was my friend. What was he after? My money? My wife? Both?
I guess I spent nine seconds thinking about that. Wasn’t exactly counting. All I know is that when I rewound I found myself at the edge of the cliff, but not soon enough to rebalance. Not soon enough to save myself.
Just soon enough to spin around and grab his arm.
So now we’re both falling. And I still don’t know why. I’ve tried getting an answer from him, but he’s locked into his own shock and panic. In a ten-second rewind I couldn’t come up with a way to cut through that and get an answer. All he did was uselessly flail and struggle as we fell.
So instead I’m making do by more purposefully flailing and struggling. Reading his moves. Pulling him around. Getting him under me.
So at least he’ll hit the ground deja vu