Except to Feel Remorse (Yuzuvier)

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Javier knew something was wrong the moment he woke up and felt a soft, small body cradled between his shoulder and neck. He reached up and patted it to make sure it was real, which earned him a soft hiss of displeasure at being disturbed. It prompted him to pull away completely and sit up.

"Effie...?" he whispered, his eyes filling with tears as he watched the cat get up, turn in a circle, and then settle down again. It had been two years since he had seen Effie, since she had passed. He couldn't believe it was her, yet he knew it was. He would know her anywhere. "Princess, what on earth is going on?" he whispered.

He was broken out of his wonder when his alarm started going off. He grabbed his phone to turn it off, and then paled when he saw the date.

"No. There's no way," he mumbled to himself.

And yet... Effie was here, and looking around, this was certainly the bedroom of his old apartment in Toronto. The phone itself was an old model that he barely remembered owning all those years ago.

Somehow, he must have travelled back in time. He was twenty one again, and judging by the year and month, he was willing to bet that it was Yuzu's first day at the Cricket Club-for what other reason was there for him to come back to May 2012, specifically?

Javier was not sure how to deal with it. He gripped his phone tighter, staring dumbly at the date on the screen. A second alarm went off and he swiped it away, realizing he needed to do something, but feeling unable to so much as think. After another half hour of sitting in bed and cuddling with Effie, he realized that in 2012 he still had to go to training and even if he got up and ready right away, he would still be dreadfully late. With a sigh, he navigated to his text messages, grateful that twenty one year old Javier was too stupid to set a pass code on his phone, and pulled up his message history with Brian.

Javi:
hey, sorry brian but i'm sick today and can't make it

Brian:
Please tell me you aren't hungover. If you are, I don't care if you're late, I expect you here. Yuzuru is coming today.

Javi:
i'm not hungover, i swear. i'm really sorry, i promise i'll be there tomorrow to greet the new kid.

Brian:
You better be. I swear to god Javi, if you're lying to me...

Javi:
have a little faith in me. if it was just a hangover i would be there

Brian:
In that case I hope you feel better soon.

Javi:
thanks.

His initial reaction was to feel insulted that Brian thought he was skipping training because he was hungover, but upon further consideration had to admit that it wasn't totally off base. It wasn't something he did enough to be classified as a regular occurrence, but it wasn't unheard of for him to skip a practice early in the off season because he was more than a tad hungover. It wasn't unheard of for him to show up to practice late and hungover, either. He had been kind of stupid in his early twenties.

He wasn't sure if Brian really believed him, but decided it didn't matter. He had just woken up seventeen years in the past. Not only did he need to figure out what the hell he was going to do, but he felt that such an event more than merited a mental health day.

Having bought himself a day before needing to face the world, he got out of bed and navigated his way to the kitchen. It had been so long that he had completely forgotten where he kept everything and had to open all of the cabinets before he located Effie's food, a box of cereal, and a clean bowl. He checked the fridge to make sure he had milk, and was relieved to find he did. Apparently he had recently gone grocery shopping.