The Gap Year

2014

Laura was more than a little unnerved the first time it happened. What would anyone expect, to be visited by a decidedly thirtyish woman claiming to be her future self? But there were certain things the woman knew…and those all-familiar eyes. So Laura decided to trust her – well, at least to hear her out.

“I’m here to tell you not to take that gap year,” the woman said as they sat together in Laura’s bedroom. Yes, the woman had known exactly where the spare key was hidden and had let herself into the house.

Laura wondered at her future fashion sense, as the woman sitting in front of her wore faded jeans and the ugliest green sweater she’d ever seen.

“I don’t have much time,” older Laura explained in low tones. “But if you believe anything I’ve told you, please just trust me on this.”

“Why? What happens if I take the gap year?” Laura asked, glancing nervously at the bedroom door.

“It’s really more about what doesn’t happen. You’ll find yourself behind where you want to be, always fighting to catch up. You’ll be envious of your more successful friends and always wishing you’d put more of your money toward your education, toward going to a better school.”

“Where do I end up going?” Laura asked her older self.

“You go to the state school,” older Laura said with the grim face of someone reading a death sentence. “Traveling around Southeast Asia for six months won’t be cheap.”

Laura paused, her heart sinking. Southeast Asia had been her dream for two years.

“Well…I mean, I’ll have to think about it.”

“Yes, definitely think about it,” older Laura said. “I guess that’s all I can ask. But remember, I wouldn’t steer you wrong.” She smiled imploringly. “Now, I should get going.”

She hurried down the hall, down the stairs, and then out the back door, just as a car was pulling into the driveway.

Laura was left sitting on her bed, struggling with whether to believe what had just happened. Had her future self actually just delivered a prophetic message that she should sacrifice her travel plans for a better school experience?

It was something she would wrestle with for a long time.

​2018

​It had been four years since the last time Laura had been visited by someone claiming to be her older self. She must have believed the woman, because she’d done what she had suggested and had given up her dream of traveling before college.

It was probably just as well, she thought, as she stood under the May sun in her graduation gown. Her schooling was over, and she had a boyfriend and a job lined up. Everything was in place.

She stood among the sea of mortarboards, waiting for her name to be called – if only it didn’t begin with a W. One-by-one the young men and women walked, trotted, or danced across the stage, gave the obligatory handshake to the university president and a shout to the crowd, and walked off, diploma in hand.

“Laura Washburn.” Finally! She went up, got her diploma, and posed for the photo on the way down. Her dad was always taking pictures. Now that this hot, sweaty event was over, they could finally split and get something to eat.

At the restaurant an hour later, her mom and dad, boyfriend Gary, and sister Tina waited at the table while she went to wash up in the restroom. As she looked up into the mirror after splashing cold water on her face, she was startled by the woman who stood just behind her.

She spun around. “What do you want?” she asked nervously.

“I guess you already know who I am,” the woman said. “But there’s no need to be scared. I’m just here to give you a little more advice.”

The woman looked exactly as she had four years prior; she even wore the same clothes – faded jeans and an ugly green sweater.

“Everyone’s waiting for me,” Laura said impatiently.

“I know,” older Laura said. “I wanted to tell you a couple of things – one, that you should stay with Gary, and two, that you shouldn’t take the job at Benning. It turns out to be really too much to handle.”

“What are you talking about? What makes you think I wouldn’t stay with Gary?” Laura asked.

“Don’t forget, I know your future,” older Laura said. “And I know what you’ve been thinking. Don’t deny it. If you break up with Gary, you’re in for some lonely times.”

“And what about the job? It’s all been set up.”

“There are other jobs. And besides, Gary ends up making a lot of money – just saying.”

2024

The third time older Laura appeared to her younger self, it was a lonely, rainy day in October. Gary was away, and Laura was home alone. She heard the tea kettle whistle and went into the kitchen to find a woman waiting for her – a woman wearing faded jeans and an ugly green sweater.

“You again,” Laura said as she turned the stove off. “It’s been, what, five or six years?”

“Yes, me again, and you’re welcome. I have some very important info to give you.”

She pulled a folded piece of paper from her pocket. “It’s the name and address of someone you’re supposed to meet, a science professor.”

Laura took the paper and looked at it: Dr. Barbara Li, 1331 South Ocean Lane.

“Why do I need to meet her?”

“She’s the reason I’m able to be here, to give you this advice from the future. If you don’t meet her, then your older self – meaning me – can’t come back and tell you these things.”

“What does she have, like a DeLorean time machine?” Laura asked in an attempt at levity.

“Something like that.”

Laura stared at the paper for a few moments, then looked up at the woman. “But, hold on – if you’ve met this scientist person, then why would you need to make sure I meet her?”

“Well, it’s complicated. You’ve already changed your life some with the decisions you’ve made, so I’m not sure if you’d still meet her the way I did. We can’t leave anything to chance.”

“So, how do I meet her? Do I just go knock on her door? Will she even know who I am?”

“Well, I originally met her at the state school.”

“The one I didn’t go to.”

“Right. Anyway, I met her again at a gathering sponsored by Benning Corp. She was giving a talk on general relativity versus quantum mechanics. But I can’t remember exactly when that was. So just go to her house and talk to her, and the rest will fall into place…I hope. Anyway, I should get going. Just don’t lose that paper.”

“Okay, umm, sure,” Laura said, stifling further questions. And she watched as older Laura left out the front door, into the rain. A moment later, there was a knock on the door. Laura opened it.

“I can’t believe I forgot,” older Laura said, heedless of the water dripping into her eyes. “Don’t get into it with Gary on why he’s away so much.”

“Why? What do you mean?”

“Just trust me on this,” older Laura said, before turning and walking back toward the street.

2026

Despite the unbelievability of it all, Laura had done what had been asked of her and had gone to visit Barbara Li at her home. The woman had seemed intrigued at the idea of Laura’s description of events. She hadn’t denied any of it was plausible. And while she had stopped short of inviting Laura in, she had extended an invitation to the lecture she was giving.

Laura had attended the lecture, understood little of it, and had continued her conversation with Dr. Li afterward. While many had lined up to speak with the professor, Laura couldn’t help but notice the special attention she was getting.

That was two years ago. Since then, they’d met numerous times at a local coffee shop to discuss life and regret and the passing of time, among other more trivial matters. Somehow the conversation had always gotten steered back to Laura’s life specifically – and whether she would be willing to help the professor test her experimental time machine.

Now it was a cool Saturday morning. Laura threw on her favorite faded jeans and a green sweater and stood apprehensively with her car keys in her hand. So this was the day, she realized. This was when she would make those journeys back to visit her younger self.

It wasn’t quite what she thought it would be. For one thing, she wasn’t feeling excited about it. The older Laura she had met those few times seemed so determined to impart her truth regarding their shared life. But now, as Laura made the drive to Dr. Li’s home, she had to remind herself just what she was going to go back and tell herself.

First, it was to decline to take the gap year. Of course, she hadn’t taken the gap year since she had already received that message from the older Laura. This was the same with her decision to stay with Gary, as well passing on the job at Benning Corp.

It had all transpired differently from how it would have, since she had already told herself to change course. Maybe that’s why she wasn’t feeling very determined. She was, after all, going to tell herself to do – or not do – things she had already done or not done.

Dr. Li had explained all this to her already, of course. Even though she had already made the decisions suggested to her by her older self, she still needed to go through with it. She still needed to deliver these messages to her younger self. If she didn’t, then she would find she had never made the changes after all.

Just thinking about it made her head hurt. But soon, the time for thinking was over, as she found herself parked in Dr. Li’s driveway.

The time machine itself was not what Laura had expected. There were no Tesla coils, no Frankenstein-style arcs of lightning, no flashing lights. And it certainly wasn’t a DeLorean.

“Well, what do you think?” Dr. Li asked as she gestured toward an exercise treadmill. The face of its digital dashboard had been removed, and several wires and cables were connected between it and a bank of computers that sat on a metal utility shelf.

“That’s the time machine?” Laura asked.

“That’s it,” Dr. Li answered. “That is, if you’re still willing to give it a try. It means nothing without a test subject.”

“Wait, you mean it hasn’t even been tried yet?”

“We’ve been over this, I thought, Laura. You will be the first person to use the machine. We’ll send you back to key times in your life, and you’ll correct some mistakes. In fact, from what you’ve said, I’ve been operating under the impression that this really does work.”

“Well, yes. I mean, I was visited by my future self three times.”

“Exactly. And that future is now. So, when you’re feeling ready, if you’ll step over here, I’ll show you exactly what you need to do.”

Laura was frozen. She tried to take a step forward, but nothing happened; her legs wouldn’t move.

“I…I don’t think I want to,” she admitted.

“You don’t want to? But you already know how it turns out. You already know exactly what you’ll say to your younger self because you’ve already heard it said to you. Everything will be fine.” Dr. Li gave a saccharine smile.

Laura thought through what exactly it was she was feeling, the reason for her hesitancy.

“But…I don’t think I’m that person anymore,” she said.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, what I mean is…that Laura had certain experiences, and she told me to change my path because of it.”

“Exactly,” Dr. Li cut in. “And you’ve been spared the mistakes of the past. But you still need to go back and let your younger self know the truth, or it will never have worked out the right way.”

The truth? The right way?

“What will happen if I don’t go through with it?” Laura asked.

“If you don’t go through with it? Well, then everything you’ve told me that changed will be back the other way. All the things you’ve told me about – your schooling, Gary, your job. It all goes back to the way it was. Is that what you want?”

At this moment, Laura felt as confused as she ever had. She could hardly remember what was right, which timeline, or which life she wanted. The future Laura had seemed so sure. But now here she was – she was the future Laura now – and she couldn’t make herself take a step toward the machine if she’d wanted to.

And there it was – she didn’t want to. For whatever reason, she had absolutely no desire to go back and tell herself what to do. In fact, she despised the thought of it.

“I’m sorry,” she said finally. “I can’t be your test person. You’ll have find someone else.”

Dr. Li sighed heavily. “No,” she said as though resigned. “Don’t be sorry.”

2014

It was a long flight, but the reward was the view out the window as the plane dipped below the clouds. Laura’s breath was taken away at the sight of sunlight shining on the azure waters of the Bay of Bangkok and the glistening city sitting just beyond. In just a short while the plane would be landing on the east side of the city, and Laura would be trying to hail a cab as a foreigner who hardly spoke the language.

She was nervous about this adventure, which was really the adventure of a lifetime. What would happen? What would come next? She would have to wait and see.