Time After Time || Chris Cornell

7. I'm Entering Without A Sound

Seattle Washington, July 29 1980

(Andi is 18, Chris is 16)

CHRIS: "I'm sorry if the shirt's a little big..." I say as Andi comes out of the bathroom, her gorgeous dark curls falling down around her shoulders as she adjusts the Black Sabbath Master Of Reality shirt - her favorite Sabbath album by the way - that I was able to find for her in a thrift store downtown.

"That's ok, I like the leggings though," She says so cutely as she looks down at the black distressed leggings I picked out at the same store with a pair of old Doc Marten's.

" - and the boots are a little scuffed up but - "

"No, it's perfect, I love them," She says glancing back at me with those beautiful brown eyes, flipping her curls out of her face.

In the months since I met her - well really since she randomly just showed up in my bathroom - Andi and I have become really close. Incredibly close in fact. When she first got here she ended up staying here in this time for a couple of weeks and obviously since she didn't have a place to stay, I asked her to stay in the basement with me. Not to you know, like, do anything of course - even though I imagine it all the fucking time- but since there was a spare room at the back with just a box spring and a mattress, I made a makeshift little bed for her grabbing blankets and anything I could find in the house. When I went to go and make sure that it was alright with my mom, Andi stopped me and told me not to.

For a little while, it felt like I was hiding her in the basement since she pretty much refused to go with me anywhere, like when I had band practice or when I had to work. Obviously she wouldn't be able to come to work with me but, you know what I mean. She was so afraid that she would 'mess up' things in this time if she interacted with people aside from me. Even though she already met my mom once really quickly, Andi insisted that I can't tell my mom because of the whole 'messing up things' in this time.

It was confusing at first but I understood, and I really loved having Andi here with me. We pretty much bonded over music, laying on the floor of my basement in front of my stereo, talking about our favorite bands and listening to hours and hours of The Beatles, Black Sabbath and Pink Floyd. She told me more about the bands from her time like Guns N Roses, Metallica and Slayer. She explained that Slayer was like an even more demonic version of Venom, but even faster, bridging on speed metal - whatever that is. She told me she's been trying to work on playing Slash's solo part in 'Sweet Child O' Mine' from Guns N Roses, but she can't seem to get the tone right.

'There's just something about the way he plays it' she said. 'I just can't get it quite right'

I just love the way she talks about her music. The way her eyes light up when she explains how it makes her feel, it's the exact same feeling I get. She just knows... she gets me. Every time she says she wishes she could just play it for me, once again, she's afraid it will affect the time line - or something - and probably because I don't have a guitar here for her to show me. Maybe I'll fix that soon...

I told her more about my band - The Jones Street Band - a cover band obviously named after the next street over where we practice. We play everything from AC/DC to Rush to even punk shit like the Ramones. I really love it when we get into covering some Police tunes, since being a drummer, I can really just go all out y'know?

When I saw her leave the first time, it was like nothing I had ever seen before. She was obviously worried about how I would react but it wasn't anything that scared me. It was actually really amazing and sad to see her disappear. Sad in the sense that I had no idea when she would show up again or if she would show up again but amazing in the sense that there are some things in this world you can't explain. Magical moments that can change your life forever. She warned me before it happened, taking my hand and thanking me for letting her stay and just as she touched me, her clothes fell to the floor and she was gone.