Chapter Three
MAY 15, 2002! It had to be! She had picked up her cap and gown the day before graduation and had obviously only worn it that day.
Suddenly, option two felt like the only thing that made sense. Heaven couldn’t be some sort of Groundhog Day thing that made her relive this day over and over. It had been a good day, but her high school graduation wouldn’t have cracked the top five for the best in her life. In fact, it had been kind of ordinary, up until the end.
So ordinary, in fact, that she realized she typically couldn’t remember what she had done until the evening. Or, at least, her grown-up self couldn’t remember, which she knew because the kids had asked her for details dozens of times over the years.
Think, Joey! she commanded. Now she was in possession of her teenage brain, the memories of that day started to materialize.
It was hot, because it was Phoenix in May, but not terrible. She remembered the weather because her whole family had gone for a walk that morning. Wow—how long had it been since she’d remembered that? It was such an eventful day, but that walk had been the last one they’d taken, just the four of them, and Joey was thrilled at the thought of reliving this day in particular. She made a mental note to put one point in the heaven column.
Dad had suggested a family walk because it was Joey’s big day and he thought it would be nice to spend time together. He’d seemed a little emotional, but Dad always got emotional on big occasions, and Joey’s mind had been so focused on her speech that she hadn’t taken the time to really think about what that walk meant until, well, now. Dad must have known what was coming that night but didn’t want to spoil the surprise.
And so, they had gone on a walk, with Betty rambling about her plans for the summer. They were both going back to NAU Summer Music Camp, Betty as a camper and Joey as a counselor. Betty was overly chatty, and Joey wondered if her little sister hadn’t also been sad that she was graduating and moving out soon, with excessive chattiness as her way of hiding her emotions.
Then there was Mom. Mom had walked a few steps behind her girls, taking it all in with her usual “how did this all go so fast?” energy. She’d suggested they sing a few songs along the way; Joey and Betty had obliged.
Before the walk, Joey had suggested they stop next door to see if Dan wanted to go, but Mom said he wasn’t home. They all could have seen his car wasn’t in the driveway, and Joey never questioned how Mom somehow knew that before they’d gone out, but now it all seemed so clear.
Dan was picking up Joey’s engagement ring. Her mom and dad both knew, maybe Betty did too.
She began to wonder why none of them told her. Sure, it was obvious where they were heading, but Joey had been a little blindsided that he’d decided to propose the night she graduated from high school. Didn’t anyone think they were too young? But when she looked around and saw both of their families surrounding them, eyes aglow with happy tears, everything seemed so predestined that she’d said yes without really even thinking.
Everything that came after felt the same way. If they were engaged, why not move in together? And since they were both going to ASU, why not get a little place near campus? And why drag out an engagement, when a wedding is such a fun event, and who knows how much longer some of our older relatives might be here?
She’d always looked back on this date as monumental because it was the day she’d gotten engaged, but suddenly it felt like the most cosmically important date in her entire life. No wonder Madam Fate had sent her back here.
Wait, was she really already believing that? Madam Fate was just a woman named Mary with a silly accent in a silly tent. Fortune telling isn’t real, and neither is this kind of magic.
And yet, here she was. In her old room with her old body on a day where just a few things going differently could change the entire course of her life. She knew exactly how things would play out if she followed the course. She knew happiness awaited her down the path she’d originally chosen. Sure, pain was coming in about twenty years, but she and Dan had built something amazing. She remembered how much Mary’s words about marrying the wrong person had hurt.
But what was it Mary had said about that valentine? As much as her logical brain wanted to dismiss everything else, Joey couldn’t shake the feeling that everything she was experiencing hinged on that one point.
On Valentine’s Day twenty-one years ago…or, she guessed, last year, if she was really back in 2002, she’d received her usual assortment of valentines. Student council organized a Valentine-gram program every year where students could send each other a little card and gift as part of a fundraiser. As junior class treasurer, she helped organize it every year, then helped deliver the grams during third period. Dan usually asked Betty or someone to buy one for her, and she always exchanged them with a few other friends too.
When she got back to English class after delivering the ones assigned to her, she found her desk covered with red and pink construction paper cards, heart-shaped suckers, and a teddy bear holding a jewelry box. Dan had sent her music note earrings with the bear, and the candy ones had come from the usual suspects, but one was left unsigned.
Dear Joey, I’ve had a crush on you for years and have been too shy to tell you in person. I think you’re amazing. I’ll be under the big tree behind the gym after school if you want to say hi.
Joey had blushed, then immediately shoved the valentine in her backpack. Everyone knew she had a boyfriend. Even if Dan didn’t go to Conquistador, he was around at school functions enough to make it clear to the rest of the boys in her school that she was off-limits. She preferred it that way. While other girls in her class primped and stressed over how they looked at school, being Dan’s girlfriend had afforded her a certain status that helped her feel like she could just focus on her studies. She’d had her sights set on valedictorian, and who needed all that drama?
As the day went on, though, she couldn’t help but wonder who would be so bold as to send her such a note. That was pretty mature writing for most boys her age.
The thought made her grab the card back out of her bag. She smoothed it out and studied it, hoping no one in her chemistry class would notice. The handwriting was loopy and romantic, with little hearts over each letter I. Not only was it too mature for boys her age to have written, the penmanship was like none she’d ever seen from the guys at her school.
Her logical brain made the only conclusion it could: her secret admirer was a girl.