Startled, he takes a step back, an involuntary shiver bolting through his spine. He nearly loses his balance as he struggles to make sense of what she just said, hoping somehow that he had simply misheard.
"Do you want to do this again? Because this is where it starts, RJ." Her voice is fearful, her breathing as ragged as his.
"How...how do you know my name?"
"The same way you know mine," she replies quietly.
Her words plunge into his stomach, knocking the wind off him. There is no sound. The walls around him close in on them. Everything is deliriously surreal.
"I made a mistake," she confesses. "Hindi ko dapat binalik ang libro. I knew I shouldn't have done it, but I did...and I don't know why. I'm sorry, RJ. Kalimutan na natin ito. I have to go."
"Wala ka kanina sa plane," he insists, his tone frustrated. "Hindi kita katabi."
"I chose to sit somewhere else."
"Hinanap kita," he shoots back.
"I waited for you to leave the tube. I was also at the parking lot when I decided to return the book."
"So bakit mo nga binalik?" He inches closer to her, his tone growing more frustrated by the second. "Bakit mo ako kilala?"
She falls quiet and looks away, avoiding his penetrating gaze. Nearly a full minute of silence passes as when it suddenly dawns on him.
"Maine, you weren't just returning the book. You were looking for me."
She looks up at him and her eyes confirm everything.
"Kaya pala kilala mo rin ako, Maine. Nakita mo rin. The dreams, the flashbacks, or whatever the hell they are, you had them too. That's why you know who I am. That's why you found me. You knew I would be here, too."
After what seems like an eternity, she slowly nods, her eyes filling with tears.
"What did you see, Maine?"
"I saw enough to make me never want to begin."
"But why? In those dreams...in those times, we were together. You loved me."
A tear runs down her cheek. "I did love you," she whispers. "That's why I have to do this, RJ."
"Do what?"
"I have to walk away," she begs, her eyes desperate. "I didn't know you'd recognize me, too. It was a mistake to return the book."
His heart begins to tear itself into fractals at the grim thought of losing her again.
"But you said...you said this is where it starts."
"Or this is where it ends. It has to. Can't you see, RJ? In all those dreams, in all those times, in all those universes...don't you remember how it ends for us? How it hurt so much for you?" Her chest now heaves as her tears flow freely. "RJ, there shouldn't even be an us in the first place."
"I don't care about those other times, Maine. I only care about this one. I care about whether we can make it right this time. I know we can." He reaches his hands out to caress her face, his eyes silently pleading.
Find me and choose me again.
"Please just let me walk away," she pleads once more. "I know it doesn't make sense but please trust my love. Trust that I love you so much to spare you from it all. Don't you see, RJ? For some strange reason, we get to choose now."
"And what do you choose?"
"I choose not to start."
He pulls her fiercely into his arms as if to protect her from the cruel joke played on them by this universe. He leans into her ear, and despite all that he's seen, he whispers the only truth he knows.
It is the only truth he's known in all versions, timelines, and universes.
"I choose to do it all over again."
She shakes her head vigorously, her gaze terrified beneath her tears. "Please don't. Let me spare you from a lifetime of pain," she pleads between hitched breaths.
"I don't want to be spared from anything, Maine. Nakita ko ang lahat. Gusto ko pa rin ang lahat."
"You don't know what you're asking for, RJ."
"I do know what I am asking for, hon. I've also seen how it ends. But I also know it can be different this time. I can make it right. I can make more time for you. More time for us...if you would give me this chance to love you all over again."
"I'm scared."
"Ako rin, Maine. I don't know many things but I know I don't want to exist in any universe without you in it." He cups her face as he gazes straight into her unsure eyes. "I will always choose you. I will always choose us. Eleven times over."
He gently lays a kiss on her forehead, calming her. Moments pass as she leans closer to his chest, feeling his heart throb in sync with hers. "But what if...what if it still turns out the way we saw it?" she asks, a trace of fear still in her voice.
"Hon," he murmurs into her hair. "What if it doesn't?"
All the possibilities of the other universes that they still haven't seen. All the consequences that are yet to be and the adventures that they cannot possibly foresee.
She looks up at him, her eyes now dry, finally revealing a faint glimmer of hope. He grins as he watches her face slowly light up, her lips finally forming the familiar smile he loves.
You kept asking me out for coffee and you never stopped.
"Let me do this properly." He steps back and extends his hand. "Ako nga pala si Richard. Friends call me RJ."
"Nicomaine. Friends call me Maine," she chuckles as they shake hands.
"Hi, Maine. Would you be interested in being with me in this universe?"
She grins, her eyes twinkling. "Only if you are."
"So...Coffee?"
"Tara."
He smiles as his hand laces into hers, finding its home, as it has a thousand times before.
"This number 16?"
"The day I met you."
"Itong moon?"
"It's where I fell in love with you."
His watch suddenly springs to life. In ten minutes, it will be midnight, the 16th of July. As the two make their way to the Luna Café, the universe unfreezes -- revealing fragments of dreams, parts of memories, and fractions of worlds -- before it ever so slowly, so tenderly, starts to hum.
And the loop begins again.
