What if we slam the brakes and say the end here? Fade to black.

In the writers’ room of my pink beach, my co-writers beside me in the sand below where Junior rests on her rock—a coconut, a dried fern frond, and a granola bar wrapper—don’t look so convinced. They’ve been working with me on this film treatment as the sun slowly soft-boils my brains. Ending here is perfect. Hayes and Yusuf are still together and happy, and we even set them up for a potential sequel, a whole goddamned franchise, of their universe-hopping adventures. Coconut is unconvinced with his hairy eyes. Yes, but did Hayes actually earn that ending? Fern Frond has been undermining me all day, so she won’t be any help. Granola Bar Wrapper just wants to go on his union smoke break.

Fine. I’ll keep going.

I joined Yusuf on the bedroom patio, and together, we leaned on the railing. I had to hold my breath, with the constellation of city lights behind him, and try to burn this moment into my head. The diamond lines of car headlights in the streets, the glowing necklace of white on the Longfellow Bridge over the Charles. Yusuf building us a future with his words—one that I wanted so much but knew would never happen. At least not here and not like this.

32

FLASHBACKS

Yusuf swore he saw Kaori and Figueiredo in a crowd by Downtown Crossing, close to the time we’d have to leave this universe because our alternate selves would be back from their honeymoon. He’d skipped out of the condo that morning like he had the past few days, leaving me to sleep in. He’d come back with coffees or soup dumplings or some other surprise, just like our first days at the Compound when he’d drop by my little temporary house on the green concrete with a few T-shirts or snacks from the cafeteria and some excuse for us to hang out.

He wasn’t sure if it was them. He only saw the backs of their heads, but the doubt was enough to smash the fantasy we’d been honeymooning through.

That was the same morning my mother called this Hayes and left a message on the machine. She was alive in this universe and I had to see her before we left. As much as Yusuf begged, you can’t. She’ll know something is different and won’t understand. I settled for borrowing our doppelgängers’ car and parking outside of the hospital she worked at to watch her leave her nursing shift in her pink scrubs and orthopedic sneakers, turning her jacket collar up against the cool breeze.