Mike Spelling’s New Year’s party. The place to be tonight. Not everyone gets invited. Actually, most people don’t. It’s a pretty small gathering of close friends. Usually only fifty-or-so people show up, so nothing remarkable. I got in because Mike is my best friend, but it’s no big deal.
Mike’s apartment wasn’t the most spacious venue for a party, but we made do. Plus he has great speakers throughout the place, so who can complain, really?
It was strange to see everyone again in one spot like this. After high school connections tend to be lost, whether intentional or not. New college friends take the place of the buddies you made throughout the past years and people just don’t care about remaining friends with anyone they knew in grade school. I guess first semesters in college can do that.
But not me and Mike. We went to different colleges but remained best friends. He stayed in California and I went to Arizona, and yet we still managed to speak frequently. Now that everyone had some time off Mike saw fit to host another one of his parties before people got too wrapped up in their own lives to accept the invite. So many people showed up it felt like high school again.
Someone bumped into me. I thought I felt a hand slide into my pocket, but I couldn’t be sure. “Hey!” I called after the possible thief. But he had disappeared.
“Hey Guy!” said a voice from somewhere behind me. I forgot about finding the pickpocket and turned around, coming face to face with someone I absolutely could not remember ever having seen before, and yet he seemed to know me. Let the awkwardness begin. “How’s it goin?”
“Uh, pretty good man… you uh, enjoying yourself?” I could tell that he was indeed enjoying himself; he waved around a small red cup and liquid sloshed forth from the brim with every gesture he made.
“Yeah it’s been great, man! Life, ya know? Life. Man.”
“Right,” I would do anything to make him go away. I tried to think of something clever to stump him and make my escape. Something came to mind I had recently read somewhere. “Life. It’s what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.”
“I know man, I knooow!” Well that didn’t work. His breath smelled like roses. “Hey listen, we should jam again, lemme put my number in your phone and I’ll give you a call next week or whatever!”
Who was this guy? “I actually go back to school next week, sorry,” I said.
“That’s alright man! Gimme your number anyway and I’ll hit you up over spring break!”
I saw no way out of this. “Ah-alright. Here.” I handed over my phone and he pecked away at the keys. I looked around at the rest of the party. People were packed into Mike’s apartment like rodents. There wasn’t much room for maneuverability. I saw a lot of people I recognized, but no one I really wanted to talk to. I wondered where Mike was.
“There ya go, man!” I took my phone back and shoved it down my pocket. “Thanks. Well I’ll see you around!” I turned my back before he could object.
I barely had time to take two steps before I was accosted by another “old friend” shouting my name from about five feet away.
“Guy! Hey Guy!” It was a girl this time, and I recognized her immediately.
“Hey Lisa,” I said. “Been a while.” This was my ex-girlfriend. We broke up when I left for college, and things didn’t end on the best of terms. I was actually quite shocked at how easily she approached me.
“A while?” She said. “If you mean two days, then yeah I guess!” She laughed and I tried to force a smile. What was she talking about? I hadn’t spoken to this girl for five months.
As if intentionally saving me from another awkward moment, the countdown to midnight begun.
“Ten! Nine! Eight!” shouted the room. A T.V. mounted on the wall displayed Times Square. I counted along with everyone, forgetting Lisa for the moment.
“Seven! Six!” I had the feeling that she was looking at me, though, and I tried my best to focus on the countdown.
“Five! Four!” Last time I had been here I was dating her. Everyone still looked the same; it was as if we were all back in high school and nothing had changed.
“Three! Two!” And yet so much had happened over these last few months. And as unchanged as everyone seemed, I knew that we would all leave here tonight eager to get back to our own lives. 2011 would most certainly be quite different from 2010.
“One! Happy new year!” Everyone shouted at once. “Happy 2010!”
I looked around. Everyone was jumping up and down and knocking together cups and making noise however they could. Had I just hallucinated? Had they all said what I thought I heard?
Then Lisa kissed me. Really kissed me.
“Whoa!” I said. “What are you doing?”
“W-what?” She said, looking taken aback. “What are you talking about?”
“We don’t – we don’t do that anymore. It’s over; it’s been over for five months. You can’t just-”
“Guy,” she said. “What’s over?”
“What’s over?” I said loudly over the noise. “Us, Lisa! We are over! We’ve been over!” I thought we had established this last summer.
She buried her face in her hands and ran away through the hooting and hollering partygoers. What was going on?
The crowd simmered down a minute later. I scanned for Mike, eager to tell him what had just happened.
I felt a tap on the shoulder.”Happy new year, Guy!” said Stacy Whats-her-name.
“Oh hey Stacy,” I tried to sound normal and nonchalant. “Happy 2011!”
“That’s hilarious!” she said after a short chuckle. “You should go around saying that to people.”
Before I could question why this was so funny, someone else grabbed my attention. “Guy!” It was Sidney Wallace. He was on the varsity football team with me my senior year. “I never got a chance to talk to you after the game! You just kinda ran off.”
My head spun. Was everyone here going crazy? I hadn’t played football since senior year, nor seen or even talked to Sidney. I didn’t know what to say.
“Anyway,” he continued, seeing my perplexed look. “Don’t sweat it. Really. No one expected you to make that kick; it was nearly impossible! And no one blames you.” He said this so convincingly I felt like I was actually back in high school and it was right after our last game of the season. I had missed the field goal that would have won the game and left without speaking to anyone soon after it was over.
“That was so long ago,” I said. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”
“Long ago? Two weeks is a long time for you?”
I felt like I had entered the Twilight Zone.
“Dude,” I said sternly; as sternly as I could say the word ‘dude’. “It’s been over a year.”
“Maaan!” he said, laughing. “How drunk are you?”
I walked away from him hurriedly, a little shaken. Could this all be a coincidence? That guy I had talked to earlier had said something about getting together over spring break. He wouldn’t have said that if we were all still in high school together.
I pulled out my phone, intending to see what name he had put in with his number. I glanced at the date.
Jan 1st 2010
I suddenly felt sick. My whole body began to tingle. I felt like I was anchored in place as people swarmed around the room, passing me by like I was in some sort of limbo.
This was stupid. I could remember the entire last year. I remembered my roommate in Arizona and my classes and the water balloon fight with the girls in the other dorm…
I needed to find Mike. I pushed through the crowd as fast as I could go without bowling people over, heading for Mike’s room.
Voices echoed all around me. I forced myself to believe I was imagining them.
“Guy, I hear you’re going to Arizona next year!”
“Hey I just saw Lisa run off crying, are you two okay?”
“Happy new year, Guy! I’m so checked out of High School, how about you?”
This wasn’t happening. I knew what year it was. How could I remember what hadn’t happened yet?
I threw open the door to Mike’s room. A couple people sat on his bed, talking animatedly and motioning for me to join them. I ignored their requests and looked up at the ladder that lead from Mike’s room to the roof of the apartment; a favorite spot of his.
I climbed. The rungs couldn’t go by fast enough.
But the roof was empty. My feet scraped against the ground as I jogged around, looking for him.
And then the solution hit me. My car! I had parked just across the street and would be able to see it from here. My parents had given me a brand new pick-up truck to haul my stuff to Arizona. Senior year I drove an old, beat up pastel green beetle. This would solve things.
I walked to the edge of the roof, calming down some. This was all stupid. I must have been crazy to think something as ridiculous as that; how in the known universe was it possible to go back a year? It was funny, really. I would have to tell Mike…
I felt light headed. My vision swam before me as I looked down upon the road, the orange lights of the streetlamps turning the pastel green paint of my bug a funny color.
I was going insane.
I shuffled backward from the roof, repulsed by what I had seen.
“Guy!” a voice shouted from the ladder. “What are you doing up here? 2010’s a new year, buddy, get back in here!” It was Mike. He had said ‘2010’. I was losing my mind. My grip on reality wavered.
“No!” I shouted. “You tell me what’s going on! Why is my old car parked in the street?” I heard my own voice like it came from someone else. It was shaky.
Mike paused. “Your old car? Guy, you’ve never owned another car.”
“Yes I have! What the hell is going on, Mike?! What is this?” I was desperate now. I didn’t know what was real.
A few more people came out onto the roof along with Mike. The group of them moved towards me cautiously. “Hey man, come back from the edge, you’re a little close there.”
“No!” I shouted again. “Tell me what the hell is going on!”
“Calm down man,” Mike said. “You’re freaking me out.”
“I’ll jump!” I said, stepping up onto the ledge bordering the roof. “I swear I’ll jump!”
“Guy!” Mike yelled. “Why in the world would you jump?”
“I know what year it is! I remember Arizona! I remember everything!”
Someone whispered in Mike’s ear and he nodded several times in agreement.
“Alright Guy, we’re done. Come down now.”
“W-what?”
“I said we are done! You could really hurt yourself man. It was just a joke.”
“I…I don’t…”
“That’s Dan’s bug down there. We painted it green like yours and moved your truck around the corner.”
I felt in my pocket for my keys. They were gone.
“What about Lisa?” I said.
Mike turned to Lisa, who I now realized was standing amongst the group on the roof. He handed her a twenty and she waved it at me, smiled, and climbed back down the ladder.
“And…” I started, timidly. “Everyone else?”
“Was in on it. Ask ‘em. Shane changed the date on your phone, in case you haven’t noticed.”
“I… I don’t under… stand…”
Mike laughed. Everyone else did, too. “Happy new year, Guy!” he said.
I like this one a lot. Very believable and something anyone could witness.
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