The physical disorientation from the leap faded quickly, but the mental disorientation would take some time to get over, and God only knew how long that would take. Sam found himself sitting in a restaurant at a table set for two, but he was sitting alone. There was a candle on the table and elevator music playing in the background and the lights were low, but the waitress standing next to him was wearing a uniform, and the table was a booth with benches rather than chairs, so the place was a notch above a pizza joint but not a five-star place. He looked down at himself and discovered that he was wearing a polyester suit. There was no telling the when of where he had leapt.

"Everything's all set, Mr. North," said the waitress.

"Uh...it is?" Sam asked. The waitress had a name tag that said 'Lucy.' If only all the people Sam encountered in his leaps had name tags.

"Yes, sir. Now don't you worry. You just give the signal when you're ready, and I'll take care of the rest."

"Uh, thanks. Lucy."

The waitress left. Sam was left wondering what that exchange had been about. He also wondered who he was, when he was, what he looked like, and what he was here to do, in that order. As for who, he knew from Lucy the waitress that his last name was 'North' and that he was a man, but he didn't have a clue what his first name was. He started to reach for the wallet he hoped was in his back pocket, but just then, a heavyset woman approached and waved at him. He gave a tentative return wave, and the woman slid onto the bench opposite him. She was in her mid-thirties, maybe, with long brown hair pinned into a tight bun. She wore a plain, loose-fitting dress intended to hide her bulk, which made Sam suspect that she had some self-esteem issues that might or might not be connected with the weight problem.

"Hi, Jack," said the woman. "Sorry I'm late."

"Uh...that's okay," Sam said, wondering once again how he was going to fake his way through another awkward first encounter when he had no idea who he was talking to or what his relationship was with her.

The woman smiled. "I guess I better not say that on a plane to Cuba, huh?"

"Say what?" Sam wondered.

"'Hi, Jack.'"

Sam gave a little laugh, going along with the weak joke. "No, I guess you better not."

"You wouldn't believe what happened today," the woman said. "Can you believe that someone actually returned a book they borrowed twenty-three years ago?"

T-twenty-three years? That's a long time," Sam said.

"You should've seen the fine he accumulated."

"The fine?" Sam asked. "Uh, how much was it?" So the woman was probably a librarian. Who was she to the person he'd leapt into? His wife? Mother? Sister? Date? Cousin? Employee?

"Well...actually I didn't figure it out. I told him that the statute of limitations had expired and he was off the hook. But if you like, we can figure out later how much it was, just to see."

So she definitely was a librarian. Whoever she was. "Oh...oh, sure." She was looking at him like it was his turn in the conversation, but he was clueless as to what to say. On the other hand, they were here in the restaurant, and had most likely come here to eat. "Uh...are you hungry?"

"Starving. "

"Well...let's get something to eat, then."

Sam gave a little wave to the waitress, who smiled back at him and picked up a tray she had set nearby and started heading over to them. There was a covered dish on it. That was a little weird. Maybe the guy he leapt into was a control freak.

Or maybe he knew this woman so well that he knew what she would want so he ordered it for her. God, he hoped that wasn't the case. He'd be in big trouble if it were, unless he always ordered the same thing for her every time. But then, why would he only order her meal but not his own? This didn't make any sense.

"Oh, did you order already?" the woman asked.

So apparently it wasn't the usual thing for Jack North to order for her. That was a relief. "Uh, yeah, I guess I took the liberty of---"

The waitress came up and set the covered dish in front of the woman. "Good evening, Miss Woods. I hope you enjoy our special this evening." She turned to Sam with a grin and a wink, then lifted the cover off the woman's dish. There was no food on the plate underneath. What there was, was an open jewelry box with a diamond engagement ring on the center of the plate.

The woman gasped as she saw it, which was a good thing, because it covered up Sam's own gasp of surprise. An engagement ring? Well, that answered the question of what his relationship with the woman was supposed to be, but who the Hell was she?

"Oh, Jack..." the woman said. She started to cry.

Sam knew that something was about to go wrong. Something was about to go very wrong. It always did. He wouldn't have leapt into Jack North if everything was right.

"Oh, boy..." Sam said.