It’s Not Every Day You Get a Phone Call From Yourself

“It’s not every day you get a phone call from yourself.”

Through blurry vision, I can barely read my own name on my phone’s screen, and still half in my dreams, I fancy that I had mumbled something profound. When I answer the call, I’m confronted with a voice that is unmistakably my own.

“Eight, six, seven…” Loud static fills the speakers, cutting off the words right before the call drops.

Is this some kind of prank? One of those deepfake things? It’s possible to clone someone’s voice these days, but I can’t think of why anyone would want to do that to me. Besides, if this is a prank, I can’t identify the punchline.

As I’m pondering this weird call, I reach over to place my phone back and hit my wrist on the nightstand hard enough to make me yelp out loud. Why the heck is the nightstand so tall? Did someone switch it out? Is this part of the prank?

I rub my eyes with the back of my hand and take a closer look at my phone, only it’s not my phone. It’s the same model, but the front is teal instead of black, and it’s wrapped in a cover with some cutesy mascot on it.

“What the–” My voice catches in my throat as I notice my surroundings for the first time. I’m not in my own room, either. Somehow, for some reason, I’m next door in Liana’s room. Last thing I remember, I came over to work on our group project and then… Oh shit, did I fall asleep in her room?

Bolting out of bed, I open the door and nearly bump into Liana. My childhood friend is carrying a slice of toast in her mouth like some kind of shoujo protagonist, and the shock of my sudden appearance causes her to drop it. With a motion that makes me look smoother than I actually am, I catch it out of the air and hand it to her.

She accepts it without thanks and takes a bite. “Hurry up,” she says with a mouth full of toast. “We’re going to be late for class.” She pushes past me into the room, retrieves her phone, and nearly runs me over on her way back out. After recovering my balance, I follow her down the hall, but before we can leave, her mother steps out in front of us.

“My, my. What’s all the excitement so early in the morning?” Ms. Ellison asks. “I thought you’d be all tired out after keeping Evan in your room all night.”

“Moooom, you know I don’t like him like that. I slept on the sofa.”

A thin smiles spread across Ms. Ellison’s lips. “What a shame. I was looking forward to having such a well-mannered son-in-law.” She claps her hands and leans forward so her face is inches from mine. “I know! If you don’t want him, why not give him to me? You don’t mind if he becomes your new papa, do you?”

Feeling the heat rush to my face, I turn away to hide my embarrassment. “M—M—Ms. Ellison,” I manage to stammer, “I—I—I—”

“Evan, honey, call me Melanie.”

Before I can say more, Liana elbows me hard enough to knock the wind out of me. “Cut it out, Mom. We’re late enough as is.”

“And where do you think you’re going with your hair looking like that?” Ms. Ellison asks with a derisive snort. “You’re weeks away from graduating from high school. Don’t you think you’re a little old for twintails?”

“Don’t tell me what to do,” Liana shoots back. “At least with these, no one mistakes me for you,” she adds under her breath. I hadn’t realized it until now, but Liana’s been looking more like her mother with each passing year.

Ms. Ellison shrugs. “Fair enough. You are your own person.” For some reason, this causes Liana to give her a dirty look. As we pass by Ms. Ellison on the way out, I bow politely, still blushing from earlier.

We don’t make it to the sidewalk before my stomach starts growling. I haven’t eaten breakfast, but I don’t have time to cook anything. I’m thinking about stopping at a convenience store on the way when my phone starts buzzing in my pocket. My real phone this time.

I’m greeted by Mila’s voice when I pick up. “Hey Evan. Are you home?”

“Yeah,” I lie. If I tell her I stayed over at Liana’s place, she’ll tease me even worse than Ms. Ellison. “Did you stay at the lab all night again?”

“We’re on the cusp of a huge breakthrough,” she replies without a hint of guilt in her voice. “Anyway, I think I left one of my notebooks on the counter. Can you bring it to me on your way to school? Oh, and maybe one of the bentos from the fridge. Help yourself to one, by the way.”

It’s hardly the first time she’s asked me to bring something to her lab, and getting paid with a bento is a sweet deal, given my current predicament. “Sure. I got you.”

“Oh, what do you got?” she asks.

“I got your number.”

“Eight six seven five three oh nine,” we both sing into our phones.

Liana just rolls her eyes. She’s heard this same exchange hundreds of times over the years. At some point, it just became something Mila and I did. It’s not like we like that ancient song or anything, but our parents used to sing it together, and I guess it became a way for Mila and I to remember them.

⁂

The guards wave us through without checking our IDs. I’ve been coming here every few days. They know me by sight at this point. Liana’s a new face to them, but I suppose they let her pass because she’s with me. Some security.

“You didn’t have to come with me,” I tell Liana.

“I know, but I’ve never seen Mila’s lab before. How could I pass up the chance?”

“Just don’t get mad at me when we’re late to class because of this.”

“No promises.”

Mila’s workbench is in a giant lab room down the hall. Dozens of tables litter the room as if orbiting around a towering computer in the center, but Mila’s the only one here at this hour.

I drop her notebook and a bento on the table in front of her. “Delivery.”

“Thanks.” She doesn’t look up from the pages scattered all over. “I think I’ve almost—”

A loud, electric buzz fills the room, followed by a flash of light that completely blinds me for a moment. When my vision recovers, I see a man kneeling next to the computer, looking at me with an expression of pure shock on his face.

I’m sure my expression mirrors his perfectly. After all, he is me. By the way his hairline has just begun to recede, I figure he’s maybe five years older.

As he reaches out toward Mila, there’s another blinding flash, and Ms. Ellison appears next to him and tackles him to the floor. A moment later, with another flash, they’re gone.

I look to Mila for answers, only to find that there are now two Milas. One’s sitting at her desk scribbling equations, and the other’s frantically typing into her laptop, looking between the screen and the computer in the center of the room.

Liana’s standing over that Mila’s shoulder. “Where is he?” she demands.

“He’s been pulled half an hour into the past. Or maybe not. The readings show he’s existing in three different times simultaneously. This is bad. We need to shut the process down soon or he’ll be trapped forever.”

“How do we do that?” Liana asks.

Mila points to a panel on the side of the large computer. “We need to enter the shutdown code, but it’s too dangerous to get close with chronoenergy swirling around the mainframe.”

There doesn’t seem to be anything near the computer from my point of view, so I walk up to the panel. “I’ll do it,” I tell them, but none of them react.

“Tell me the code,” Liana demands.

“No, that’s suicide,” Mila says.

“Look, the energy’s getting smaller. I can jump over it. I know I can.”

Mila bites her lower lip but then nods. “Eight, siix, seeeeev…” Her words slow as she speaks until she stops completely. None of the others move, as if they were stuck in time. It’s up to me. Luckily, those three numbers are enough. I confidently punch the code into the terminal.

8675309

The computer buzzes menacingly, shattering my feeling of triumph. Apparently, that’s not the correct code.

“…ven, six,” I hear Mila finish. The code’s 8676? What a dumb code. Doesn’t matter. I push the 8 button on the panel, but it buzzes, and a message appears on its display.

INCORRECT CODE ENTERED. ACCESS RESTRICTED.

“Damn!” I shout.

“Evan, what are you doing here?” The calm Mila looks up from her papers with surprise on her face. “I was going to call you in a few minutes…”

That’s it! If I’ve been sent to the past, the call I got this morning was from me. Not the older me, the me who had just made this mistake. He must have been trying to tell me the code, but he didn’t have enough time before something happened.

I whip out my phone and speed-dial Liana. As soon as I hear the call pick up, I start talking. “Wait. Listen—”