Page 6 of Before the Summer He Found Her

Fear lodges in my throat.

Think of something else.

Now.

“Gladiators,” I whisper in a panic, because I’m clearly not thinking straight.

My body lunges through the scene before me and moves into another time and place. Landing in the colosseum, I shrink back, butted against two burly men in chilton tunics. We’re somewhere high up in the stands, full of hundreds of thousands of people who cheer loudly. The two cleanshaven men, each with a set of boney cheeks, stare at me, their eyes full of disgust. They begin to speak Latin, and my heart races out of sheer panic and confusion all at once. And all I think of is how I’m here because I wanted to convey to Channah that her manager practices what he preaches.

The scene shifts again.

I arrive in a bathroom stall. The air is warm, but the air feels chill and heavy. As if something has gone gravely wrong. Swallowing, I notice a young woman, on her haunches and hunched over. She’s crying. Shaking. Brown hair falling in loose curls. Her head slowly lifts, tears streaking down her face. And—

“Channah?” I breathe, voice hardly more than a whisper.

She blinks, confusion wrapped across her features. I’ve never seen her in person before. Her lips appear fuller than any video conference. Her hair shinier, more golden than brown, glowing beneath the light. Her body curvy in a way I never would’ve imagined. Despite the melancholy in her eyes, they’re deep and full of so much soul.

And I feel for this person, this woman I only know through work, seeing her so upset.

“Who… who…” She chokes, wiping the back of her hand across her face. “Who are you?”

My brows crinkle. “What? Channah, it’sme.”

I open my mouth to inquire further, but it’s then that I feel thepull.

My intestines seem as if they’re ripped up and through me as the scene fades.

* * *

I yankthe headset off my head, gasping loudly. It takes me a second, but I realize I’m back in the basement on the medical spa chair—that I’ve never left.

That my insides are, in fact, still intact.

Sasha’s gazing down at me with interest.

“What the fuck was that?” I ask.

Sasha’s mouth hangs open wide. “Welcome back, Traveler.”

“Traveler?” I look around, searching for Jeff. He’s standing on the other side of me, grinning. Pointing to the headset, I add, “What is this? Whathappenedto me?”

“Something extraordinary,” Sasha says in awe, tapping the tablet. “I built a machine meant for viewing time. Congratulations. You’re now one of us.”

“One of us! One of us!” Jeff chants teasingly. I shot a quick warning glance at him, and he stops.

I turn back to Sasha. “Viewing time? No. That makes no sense. Can’t be. That doesn’t exist, no matter how real that just felt. What sort of VR have you created here?”

“You were gone for thirty seconds,” Sasha says, ignoring my disbelief. “I usually run tests for five minutes on up, but I only wanted to give you a brief glimpse. This wasn’t a planned test, after all, and you’re not one of my typical subjects.”

“A… brief glimpse?” I ask. “That certainly didn’t feel like only thirty seconds. Sasha, this VR—”

“That term VR gets thrown around a lot,” she says. “Also, to your point about it not feeling like thirty seconds, time feels like it’s moving differently for the subject than actual time here.”

My nose scrunches. I run a hand through my hair, half to ensure I’m truly back here, and half to reorientate my sense of self. I’d seenChannahin there. And she was in pain. It had to have been fake somehow.

Except it felt real…

“No,” I say. “No, no, no…”

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