“You know, I had the weirdest dream,” Jas said to her husband, Beng, as she stirred her coffee. The morning light streamed through the kitchen window, casting a warm glow across their breakfast nook.
“Oh?” Beng mumbled, not looking up from his newspaper. “What was it about?”
Jas took a sip, lost in thought. “It’s hard to explain. It felt so real. Like I was back in high school, but everything was off. The hallways were longer, and my locker… it had a different combination.”
Beng finally folded the newspaper, giving Jas his full attention. “Well, you did have that reunion to plan last night,” he said with a smirk. Jas rolled her eyes.
“Yeah, I know. But it wasn’t just about the reunion. It was like I was actually living it again. The smell of the cafeteria, the sound of the bell ringing, the awkwardness of being fifteen. And there was this…this feeling, Beng. Like I could change something if I just remembered what it was.”
The room grew quiet as Jas’s gaze drifted to the fridge, where a photo of her high school prom held a spot next to the calendar. She had been so happy in that picture, her cheeks flushed with youth and hope.
Jas couldn’t shake the vividness of her dream throughout the day. At her job as an accountant, numbers danced in her head, but so did the faces of her long-forgotten classmates and the echo of their laughter. It was as if she had been teleported back in time, and her mind was stuck playing the same haunting melody on repeat.
As the day waned, Jas found herself driving down the familiar streets of her hometown, passing the very school that had been the stage of her dream. She parked the car and stared at the imposing red brick building. A sense of longing filled her chest, tinged with a strange sadness.
In the quiet of her office, Jas pulled out her old yearbook and flipped through the pages. Each photo was a gateway to a memory, a time when the future stretched out like a blank canvas, unblemished by the strokes of regret. Her fingers traced the images of friends lost to the tides of time, her heart swelling with a bittersweet nostalgia.
The bell chimed five times, jolting Jas from her reverie. The school was closing. She sighed, placing the yearbook back in her bag, and headed home. But the echo of that bell followed her, a persistent reminder that she couldn’t outrun the past forever.
That night, Jas barely slept. Her mind raced with thoughts of the people she’d been in her dream: her first love, her closest friend, the teacher who had believed in her. The dream had stirred something deep within her, a yearning to reconnect with a part of herself she’d left behind.
The next day, Jas decided to take action. She reached out to her old friend, Emma, and arranged to meet at the local coffee shop. It had been years since they’d last seen each other, but Jas hoped that talking to someone who knew her back then might unravel the mystery of her recurring dream.
When Jas saw Emma walk through the door, she was struck by the warmth of their reunion. Time had painted lines around Emma’s eyes and grayed her hair, but the spark in her smile was as vibrant as ever. They embraced, and for a moment, Jas felt the weight of the years slip away.
Their conversation flowed easily, as if no time had passed at all. Jas shared her dream, and Emma listened, her eyes reflecting understanding and curiosity. “Maybe it’s not about changing the past,” Emma said, stirring her cappuccino. “Maybe it’s about finding peace with it, or learning something new about ourselves.”
Jas considered this, her gaze drifting to the steaming cup in her hand. The scent of the coffee was comforting, grounding her in the present. “What could I possibly learn from something that happened so long ago?” she wondered aloud.
Emma leaned in, her voice soft. “Sometimes, Jas, we hold onto our past so tightly that we miss what’s happening right in front of us.” Jas felt a pang in her chest. Was she so focused on what could have been that she’d overlooked what was?
The two friends talked late into the night, sharing stories of their lives, their joys, and their heartaches. Jas found herself laughing, crying, and even discovering new sides to people she thought she knew so well. As they said their goodbyes, Jas felt lighter, as if a burden she didn’t know she carried had been lifted.
Over the next few weeks, Jas continued to meet with Emma, and they grew closer than ever. Jas also reached out to others from her past, attending her high school reunion with a newfound excitement. She listened to their stories, and in doing so, she realized that everyone had their own unresolved moments, their own ‘what ifs’.
One evening, as Jas lay in bed, she had another dream. This time, the hallways were shorter, the locker combination just right. She was still fifteen, but she walked with the confidence of the woman she had become. Jas knew that she couldn’t change the past, but she could learn from it, grow from it, and most importantly, embrace the future it had shaped.
With a new sense of purpose, Jas approached each day with renewed vigor. She started a new hobby, took risks in her career, and even began to mend fences with her estranged brother. The dreams of high school grew less frequent, and when they did come, Jas faced them with a knowing smile.
The past was a tapestry of moments, some bright and others shadowed by regret. But Jas had learned that by weaving these threads together, she could create a new picture of herself, one that was beautifully complex and rich with experience.
One sunny afternoon, Jas sat on her porch, her eyes closed, feeling the warmth of the sun on her face. The sound of children playing in the street brought a smile to her lips. The past was a part of her, but it no longer held her captive. She had found the balance between nostalgia and living in the present. Jas knew that she could never go back, but she could carry the lessons of her youth into the future, allowing them to shape her into the person she was always meant to be.
