Time Shift

Time Shift Part 2

The week dragged through to Friday. Jason waited impatiently till ten in the evening when he put on his best shirt and trousers and walked from his unit to the hotel where he had met Tracy and her friends the previous week. There was no sign of them. He bought a beer and sat down near the dance floor watching the dancers. An hour and three drinks later he still could not see Tracy. Finally he walked around to the table he had sat at the previous week. It was empty. He sat down and sipped slowly at his beer. Bored with waiting, his mind went back to his problems. He pulled a pen out of his pocket and wrote some dates on the back of a coaster. These were important dates, key dates to his dilemma.  

Five minutes later as he focussed on what he had written he was aware of someone sliding into the seat in front of him. He quickly looked up.

"Hi, stranger," she smiled at him.

This time Tracy looked a lot more casual in jeans and a black jacket. Her long hair cascaded over her shoulders.

"Tracy, hi. I was beginning to think you weren't coming."

"Well I'm here now. I got us some drinks." She pushed a beer in front of Jason, while having a drink from her own glass.

Jason took a sip. "How did you know I drink Cascade?" he asked in surprise.

"Lucky guess," Tracy answered with a seductive smile.

"Are Angela and Dave with you?"

"Not tonight, so you have me all to yourself."

They went to the dance floor and danced for ten minutes, then sat down again and talked.
After half an hour Jason was feeling a little fuzzy from the beers, but he noticed that although he and Tracy had been talking for some time, he had done most of the talking while Tracy had sat opposite him listening, and whenever he fell silent, prompted him with a quick question to continue. Before he knew it, he had told her all about himself, where he grew up, where he went to University, and some of what he was doing at his job. He almost told her the truth, but managed to generalise about his work without going into too much detail.

"So when did you start at your new job?" she asked.

Jason paused to think carefully for the answer which would make sense. "About three weeks ago, I think it was the 27th.

Tracy then glanced down at the coaster Jason had been writing on when she had arrived.
"You've written it on this coaster," she remarked, "and two other dates, the 14th of April and the 28th of April. Do you have plans for these dates?"

Jason paused again. He couldn't tell her what would happen on these dates. The 14th was when he had originally started the job, except that was still over a month away which didn't make any sense, and the 28th was 'D' day! "I'm thinking of having a few days off on either of those two dates to fly back home to see my parents," he said, hoping he sounded convincing.

Tracy stared into his eyes for several seconds and Jason had an uncomfortable feeling she knew he was lying. She looked again at the coaster, and although she didn't say anything, he knew she must be wondering why he had drawn an arrow from the 14th of April to the 28th of April, then a longer arrow curving back from the 28th of April to the 27th of February.

After a silence, he thought he had better change the subject. "Um, Tracy I was wondering if we could have dinner tomorrow night?"

Tracy looked up and smiled at him. "All right. How about at the restaurant here in this hotel. Their food is very good."