Chapter Two
1000 Words
~JANICE~
'Please…Don't let it end like this…'
Light exploded behind my eyes.
My heart was beating so fast, so loud, that it was a wonder I hadn't died of a heart attack.
Wait…
I was actually dead, wasn't I? At least I was supposed to. I could remember it vividly, how it felt to feel the poison racing through my system, killing me. But if I was dead, how did I have a heartbeat?
And why was there light, instead of the cold darkness I had felt myself sinking into?
Carefully, as if I was conducting an experiment, I cracked one eye open. I don't know what I expected to see, but it wasn't anything as normal as this familiar white ceiling that filled my vision. I opened the other eye and sat up slowly, looking around. Yup, no doubt about it. This was my bedroom. But how?
Even if I somehow survived the poison, I should still be back at the hotel suite. Did someone bring me home? Could it be… did Phillip find me?
I put a hand to my chest to calm my pounding heart, taking deep, slow breaths.
"Okay, Janice," I said. "Don't freak out. Just figure out what's going on first."
I leaned back against the headboard, ticking off my observations on my fingers.
'So, I was waiting for Phillip at the hotel. I collapsed due to poison. Some crazy woman who looks like me showed up and said she killed me in order to have Phillip, but I'm somehow not dead…'
None of it made sense. Briefly, I wondered if the part with the hotel and that woman were a dream I was just waking up from, but I knew that wasn't it. I could still feel the terror that had enveloped me as I lay dying, and my memory of the pain was too clear to be anything but real. So how did I survive? How did I get here? Did Phillip really find me and save my life?
But then why would he leave without waiting for me to wake up?
"Only one way to find out," I said with a sigh.
My phone was on my bedside table. I picked it up and turned it on, about to dial Phillip's number. That was when I noticed something strange. The date was wrong.
It was telling me that this was one week ago.
'Okay, so the phone has a calendar malfunction,' I thought. 'No biggie. I can just fix it.'
But it didn't explain the sudden chill that went down my spine. Instinctively, I opened my chat with Phillip, only to see that they stopped exactly one week ago, just when we made the plan to meet at that hotel.
"What is going on?"
A thought struck me, and I quickly Googled today's date. The answer was the same: one week ago.
The phone dropped from my hands. I hurried to the bathroom to stare at myself in the mirror, see if I looked any different. However, it was something else that caught my eye. A bracelet I had accidentally broken last week, a one-of-a-kind heirloom. It had snapped in two, causing me to throw it away. Yet here it sat, perfectly whole, next to my bottles of shampoo. A strangled scream escaped me, and I bent over the sink, gasping for air.
There was only one explanation for this.
It was farfetched and illogical, but it was the only thing that made sense. I had gone back in time, back to a week before I was murdered. I said not to let it end like this, and some force out there granted my wish.
I straightened up as the full implications of this sank in. This was one week before it happened, which means I could stop that woman's plans from succeeding. I had the upper hand now. I just needed to find her, and I could stop her before she even did anything. I could save my life and secure my future with Phillip at the same time.
But how do I find her?
I didn't even know anything about her except that she looked like me and she wanted…
"Phillip," I said, straightening up. "She wants Phillip."
Which meant that she would most likely try to make contact with Phillip even before attempting to kill me. She could be stalking him, for all I know. How else did she know where he was supposed to meet me? So I just needed to find Phillip.
A smile spread on my face at the thought.
I was so terrified that I would never see him again, and now I had another chance.
It was all I could think about as I hurried out to my bedroom.
When was the last time I told him how much I love him? It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how many times I said it, all I know is that I never said it enough. I thought back to all the times I complained when he said he wanted me to dress better, to look prettier. If only I had known how quickly he would be torn away from me…
I felt somewhat ashamed of all the fuss I had made.
But it was alright now.
I didn't lose him. He didn't lose me.
I would wear all the makeup and minis he wanted. I'd wear my hair down as much as he wanted me to. I would never take him for granted again.
This was what I promised myself as I called a Lyft and hurried to Phillip's condo.
I was thrumming with excitement, unable to help the wide grin that split my face as I unlocked the front door with my spare key and stepped inside.
"Phillip! I–"
I froze, the rest of my gleeful words dying on my tongue. Because that was Phillip, my Phillip, arms around another woman as he kissed her passionately.
The woman looked exactly like me.
- Writer
