by Alex Moss
The seventh office is the only one with a closed door. The name-plate clearly reads:
Det. Victor Lesko
Stelson knocks, and what follows is the faint murmur of a voice telling him to enter. He opens the door and steps inside the white, clean, and clinical room.
Sitting behind the desk is Victor Lesko. He smiles and gestures Stelson to sit on his couch. Stelson hesitates. Something’s troubling him. A niggle. A memory. He closes his eyes for a second and then opens them again and instead of Victor sitting at the desk, it’s the cosmetically enhanced older version of himself that leaped off the building into the night.
“This time, remember why you are here,” the man says.
Stelson’s eyes blink and Victor is staring at him, expectant.
“Do over!” Stelson hollers.
Victor is about to stand up, hands on the edge of the desk and pushing himself backwards.
“Reset. We can reset and do over.” Stelson is short on breath he’s so excited. He shuffles from one side of the room to the other.
“What the hell are you talking about?” Victor asks, standing up now, ready to calm the young man with a violent burst of force if he has to. He’s unnerved.
“I’ve waited sixty goddamn years for this.”
“For what?”
“The opportunity to change this time in my past, but the past which is now the future.”
“You are still high, son.”
“No. You see, I can save her. I’m here so that I can save your daughter, Anna. You have to listen to me. I need this. I need to do this. This is my chance. Her chance. Don’t ask me how I know, but I know what I know, and she can live. But if you don’t listen to me then she will die. She will die very soon and it will be the worst thing that could happen because her life, your life, will have been wasted. All for nothing. So you have to let me do this. I’ve waited sixty fucking years for this. I’ve made sacrifices. I’ve played the game. I’ve survived. I’ve survived so that she can too. Okay?”
Victor nods. “Okay. I’m listening. But what are we saving her from?”
Stelson pauses and after a moment the answer hits him square between the eyes. “Her Achilles heel.”
Victor is surprised and at the same time comforted by the answer, as though Stelson had confirmed his credibility.
“And you know what that is?” Victor asks.
“Yes. Her heart.” And when he says it, Stelson realizes that he can save her life yet never be at one with her, and that makes him feel ridiculously sad because he’s been thinking about her, with longing, for sixty arduous years.