It’s really hard to change the timeline
The 13th of January, 2016. Naomi Herne was right on time. Rosie led her down to the basement and Jon waited in his office to meet her soon as she entered the building. Soon as she entered the office, her breath was caught in her throat.
“You, Don’t I know you?” She mumbled out in confusion after a moment. “You seem so familiar?”
Jon smiled. “This is our first meeting I believe. I believe Martin went over all the paperwork with you about leaving statements?” Jon made a gesture to the chair for her.
“Hmm weird. Maybe your face is just one of those types of faces....” Naomi sat and was immediately greeted by the archival kitten, who was not as small as she’d been when first joining. Naomi pet the little host.
“Um...Thanks?” Jon snickered a little.
“Oh Oh I didn’t mean it like- You have a lovely face. Just saying maybe you look like someone else I’ve seen around? Or you know. I’m not here to talk about your face. Sorry.”
“Nothing to worry about. I know what you mean.”
“Yeah, right, right. So how's this work? Do I wait for you to get your laptop out or something? Honestly, this feels rather silly now that I’m here. I’m not even sure if I should be.”
“Oh, the recorder is all ready for recording on. We transcribe them after the fact. It’s easier to do it that way.”
“On that old piece of junk? Wouldn’t a- I dunno, anything'd be better than an old recorder?”
“You’d think. The system we’ve got in place works better with recorders. Harder to misplace than a usb drive and easier to label. Nothing for you to worry about”
“If you say so. It’s no wonder your lot aren’t taken seriously.”
“Right. Well if you wouldn’t mind stating your name, the date, and what your statement is regarding for the record.”
“My name is Naomi Herne, and I’m making a statement about the events following the funeral of my fiancé, Evan Lukas. The date is the 13th of January, 2016. Gosh, I don’t even know where to begin with this.”
“No worries, take your time. Would it be easier if I wasn’t in the room?” Jon remembered how this went last time. She’d asked him to stay, so he did. He didn’t need to be here this time since he already knew how it went. But maybe him leaving would help her. Compelling her seemed rude, and quite frankly, redundant.
“No, um, I would rather not be alone right now, if that isn’t a problem?” There it was.
“Not at all. Whenever you are ready, why not start from the beginning?” Jon eased a small amount of compulsion in that time to help her out.
And it worked. The statement went almost verbatim to how it had gone the first time after he asked. Almost like he was feeding her the script rather than her telling her tale. The only thing that ended up being different was at the end, when it turns out she wasn’t hit by a car, which took Jon by surprise.
“That's when I saw the headlights and the driver swerved. I was too nervous to say anything to them. Just told them my car had ended up in a field because of fog, and I got lost. They gave me a ride into town, but I ended up waking up in a hospital before we’d made it all the way there. I woke up in the hospital, cause I became unresponsive in his car.”
Jon nodded as he glanced to the recorder expecting it to turn off, but it didn’t.
“The weirdest part.” Naomi continued. “I’d started to have nightmares about that fog. Like maybe that’s not odd, to have something traumatic happen then to have nightmares, but these, they feel different. Like I’m less alone in them than I had been in when I experienced it.”
“That is interesting. I’m afraid I’m not able to help out with the nightmares not being as unsettling as the event itself, but we would be happy to look into the graveyard for you.”
“Thanks. So, um what now?”
“We look into it and get back to you with what we find?”
“That’s it? Like no advice or anything?”
“No...um, maybe get a cat or two? Hard to feel lonely with two critters demanding meals and affection. Case and point?” Jon points to the Marshall who is demanding attention from Naomi.
“She is very loving. That why you have her around?”
“Mmhmm, a friend decided I needed a little critter to babysit me. Quite helpful.”
“I’ll have to see how it would go then.”
Jon handed her a note with a number. “This might be terribly unprofessional of me, but if you get cats, I collect cat pictures, and have a lot of cat care references.”
“That is terribly unprofessional. I hope this is strictly cat business, and not something more?”
“More?...oh Oh! No no, not at all. I’m not- Sorry if it came off that way. I’ve got a boyfriend so it’s strictly cat-related, unless you need a hand with anything unsettling. I can help with that too.”
She laughed and handed Marshall over to Jon. “Your boyfriend is lucky then.” She takes the note. “I’ll keep it in mind. Um. Thanks.”
Jon nodded as they said their goodbyes and Sasha showed Naomi out.
Martin came in with tea to check on Jon. “How’d it go?”
“Almost identical to last time. Few things different, me being in her dreams unnoticed seemed to push out the Lonely bits.”
“That’s good. Suppose we should expect a text from her tomorrow morning asking about why you were in her dreams?”
Jon buried his face into Marshall. “I forgot to warn her…”
“You did.” Martin Knew Jon had forgotten to really warn Naomi like they’d planned.
“Well, guess we will find out how it goes.”
“Mmhmm. In other news, the realtor is ready to close on the place we were looking at.”
Jon’s eyes lit up, literally while he took a look for himself. “That didn’t even take long. They were really happy to sell it just like that.”
“Yupp. Probably helps that they wanted to move on from the place and never look back.”
Jon nodded. “I never thought Nikola would have so many bases around the city. I feel bad for my old landlord now for letting her take over my lease.”
“She wants mine to now.”
Jon groaned at the thought. “Why does Nikki want to have so many flats…”