Chapter Two
Elizabeth stared at the cursor as it blinked away in the text box of the What If…? app, prompting her to enter her first question.
(Could she call it an app?
Surely, that wasn't the correct metaphysical term.
Yet, an app was the only thing she could compare it to, and that sure as hell sounded a lot more sane than 'window to alternate universes', so app would have to do.)
Of course, the whole thing could be a prank. But if so, it was an elaborate one. The time and effort, not to mention the expertise, it would take to make the tablet and develop the app, and then find a way to sneak the tablet past security into the White House, into the Oval Office, into her desk… And to what end? To see what questions she would type? To prove she was gullible—nay, desperate—enough to try it?
Such lengths were unnecessary: she was a woman, and as such gullibility and desperation were an assumption.
So, maybe it was real.
She'd read enough science fiction (thanks to Kat) and enough popular physics (thanks to Jareth) to be familiar with the Many Worlds theory, and although she didn't believe in it the way she did something she could readily see—such as the room around her—she couldn't dismiss the possibility either.
Then again, maybe something really was up with the chicory coffee (besides its lack of caffeine). But she didn't feel the way she did that time she inadvertently ingested psilocybin when helping herself to a square of Alison's chocolate, not realising the 'magical' claims on the wrapper were nothing to do with the bar's great taste.
(Thank God Henry had found her, stroking the bathroom wall, mesmerised by the way that the tiles breathed, and had covered for her at State. Food poisoning, he'd claimed.)
Which brought her back to the prospect of the tablet and the app and the promise of it revealing the lives she could have had (if only x, y, z…) being real.
And if it was real, if it could show her all the other lives she might have led (had led, in other worlds), then couldn't she use it to prove that she and Henry weren't meant to be? that they were, in fact, not soulmates but just two people who, in this world, happened to meet? And if it did show her their relationship was nothing more than a roll of the cosmic dice, just one outcome in infinity, then surely there was no reason for her to pay heed to the niggling doubt that had her wondering if, in ending their marriage now, she was making a mistake. After all, when faced with proof that she'd already lived infinity (minus one) lives without him, what further reassurance re her spending the rest of this life without him would she need?
She glanced at the grandfather clock that stood by the door: Four-and-a-half hours until she had to leave for the court hearing.
Maybe she was crazy. Maybe she was gullible or desperate or tripping. But if there was a chance the app was real, if there was chance it could give her the reassurance she wanted—needed—she had to try it, didn't she? Either that or risk spending the rest of her life wondering:
What if…?
She leant forward in her seat and pressed the intercom. "Blake… I need you to clear my schedule for this morning."
oOoOo
Elizabeth held the tablet in both hands, her thumbs rubbing up and down along its glass edges as she stared at the screen.
The night sky stared back at her, 'What If…?' picked out in the stars, the text box below waiting.
There were so, so many ways to go with What if…?, but one question immediately came to mind, a question that had loomed over nearly all of her life:
What if her parents hadn't died in the crash?
It felt like their deaths had defined her life, setting her on course to where she found herself today. Without that first domino falling she and Henry never would have met, proof their relationship was no more than chance, that they weren't soulmates or meant to be.
She tapped the text box—hesitantly, as if expecting it to bite—then, using the keyboard that opened beneath, she typed:
'What if my parents didn't die?'
Her breath stilled. Her finger hovered over the Enter key.
One second more, then she pressed it.
BOINK.
The app made a sound like a Windows operating system circa the early 2000s, and a grey dialogue box popped up.
'Logic Error: Everybody Dies.'
Her jaw tensed. Of course the app would be a total pedant. God forbid it make this easy.
She jabbed the OK button at the bottom of the dialogue box, causing the box to disappear, then amended her question so instead it read:
'What if my parents didn't die on September 24, 1983?'
She pressed Enter.
A new dialogue box appeared, without the error sound.
'No matches.'
She frowned.
Seriously? Still not specific enough for you?
She amended the question again:
'What if my parents didn't die in a car crash on their way to get milkshakes on September 24, 1983?'
There. If that didn't work, the tablet/app was definitely a prank. (And Mike thought her court appearance would be the most embarrassing thing he had to deal with that day…)
She pressed Enter.
This time both the text box holding her question and the starry 'What If…?' vanished and a wait cursor—a neon rainbow travelling around a Möbius strip—appeared. A few seconds later, the wait cursor vanished too and row upon row of tiles unfurled across the screen, each one akin to a YouTube thumbnail, showing what she guessed was a preview clip of the universe it represented. When the tiles reached the bottom, the last square of screen space filled, a right-facing arrow pulsed beneath the rows; it instructed her to 'swipe for more universes'.
"Holy crap," she muttered.
It had actually worked!
The app, her question…it had actually worked!
All these universes where her parents hadn't died in the car crash, all these universes that could prove her doubts about the divorce were for nothing: She and Henry weren't meant to be.
Not knowing which world to pick—Was there really any method to this?—she pressed one at random.
The edges of the selected tile glowed, a strobing square of yellow-white light; the light grew brighter and brighter as the thumbnail grew bigger and bigger, expanding slowly till its sides fused with the sides of the screen. Rewind, Pause and Fast Forward buttons appeared in a semi-transparent panel at the bottom, as if she were streaming a movie.
oOoOo
Universe ID: vymksmkL2MV
September 24, 1983
The door to Elizabeth's bedroom swung open with a clatter, and Will burst inside. "Elizabeth, are you in or out?"
Elizabeth was lying on her stomach on the bed, knees bent, ankles crossed, shins propped against the pillows; her notes and textbooks fanned in an arc in front of her. At the intrusion, she glanced up from her schoolwork and glared at her brother. "Are you insane, Will? Knock."
Will sighed, turned to the open door and knocked, a brisk rap-tap-tap—though, it was pointless now.
"Are you in or out?" he said again.
"Of what?" she asked.
"Milkshakes at MG's."
"I have to study," she said with a whine to her voice, and carried on writing. US History wasn't going to learn itself.
"Come on, Euclid." Their dad appeared in the doorway, and rested one arm against the jamb. "It's fifteen minutes."
"Come on"—their mom appeared too, inserting herself between their dad and Will—"you could use the break."
"Yeah, your head is actually starting to take the shape of an egg," Will said, earning himself a swat from their mom.
"Will!"
Elizabeth resisted the urge to pull a face at her brother, and instead shot back, "At least there's a brain inside."
Their father groaned at their arguing, turned and strode away. "Family time. Let's go, Elizabeth. Last chance!"
She was about to tell her mom to bring her something back—strawberry—but all that writing while lying down had left her shoulders aching, and (though she would never admit it, would never wittingly hand Will such ammunition) her brain was starting to feel foggy, oversaturated with facts.
She let out a heavy sigh, like it was huge inconvenience, like she really didn't want to go, like she was only coming to appease them. "Fine," she said. "Give me a minute."
Their mom smiled warmly. "We'll be in the car." With a hand on Will's shoulder, she steered him out of the room.
oOoOo
It was closer to twenty minutes later by the time Elizabeth had been to the bathroom, gotten sidetracked with examining her chin in the mirror for zits (or for so much as a hint of redness), fixed her hair, found the burgundy pumps that matched her skirt, and made her way out to the car.
When she popped open the backdoor and slid onto the cool leather of the seat, Will threw both hands up. "Finally! We could've walked there and back by now."
Elizabeth rolled her eyes. "Shut up, Will."
He was such a drama queen.
"Seriously?" He sniggered. "That's your best comeback? I thought you were supposed to be smart."
She pulled the belt across her lap and clicked it into the buckle. "I'm just trying to keep it at your level."
"Hey." Their dad threw a look over his shoulder. "We'll have less of that, thank you." He eyed them a long moment, as if waiting to see whether or not they would continue; then, when they didn't but instead sank into a somewhat sullen silence, he returned to facing forward and started the engine.
oOoOo
The truce didn't last long.
Fifteen minutes later they were on their way back home, trees rushing by in a blur of golden-green, David Bowie's Let's Dance jiving through the stereo, competing with Will slurping on his chocolate milkshake, while Elizabeth gazed out the window and sipped silently from her strawberry.
Then, the slurping fell silent.
Before Elizabeth realised what was happening, let alone had a chance to take evasive action, Will had leant across the backseat and burped in her face. Loud and smelly.
"Will! That's gross!" She scowled and shoved him away.
"Hey! Don't shove!" Will shoved her in return.
At the jolt her grip on the plastic cup—already slick with condensation—slipped, and the milkshake fell from her hand, hit her lap, and exploded all over her favourite skirt and sweater.
With hands frozen mid-air, she stared at her front, while the thick pink liquid seeped in, heavy and cold on her thighs.
Will snorted, barely stifling a laugh.
Elizabeth turned on him. Fury licked through her veins, faster than the spread of a forest fire. "I'm going to kill you!"
"Hey!" Their dad's voice came from the front. "Both of you, cut it out!"
Elizabeth ignored him; she picked up her cup with what was left of her drink and lobbed it at Will. Milkshake spattered everywhere: his face, his bangs, the car door, the window, the seat—a Jackson Pollock: A Study in Pink—and its syrupy scent thickened the air.
"Elizabeth!" Their father twisted to her with a glower. "I told you to cut it out!"
"He started it!" She glared back.
It was so unfair! They were always siding with Will!
"She shoved me first!" Will yelled.
"I don't care who—" their father began.
Tyres screeched, their mother screamed, the car careered and Elizabeth's shoulder slammed into the door; down was up, up was down, they were rolling, rolling, rolling; metal crunched, glass smashed; until finally they bounced to a stop.
Elizabeth's heart pounded, her breaths coming rapid. Her whole body tingled, like a star had shattered and was pelting her with icy shards.
She turned her head towards Will.
He was staring straight ahead, blinking. The pale pink milkshake mingled with rivulets of dark red.
No sound nor movement came from the front.
oOoOo
In the Oval Office, Elizabeth hit Pause and the footage of her alternate past froze.
That wasn't supposed to happen.
Her parents were supposed to survive.
She'd asked the app—
The thought halted. It dissolved into a wordless fluid of logic that rushed through her mind.
As it reformed, solidified, became something she could grasp, a sickly feeling crept over her.
She'd asked the app, What if my parents didn't die in a car crash on their way to get milkshakes on September 24, 1983?, and it had found multiple worlds which matched that scenario, but when she'd asked, What if my parents didn't die on September 24, 1983?, it had found none. She'd thought the app was being pedantic, prompting her to be more specific with the wording of her question, but what if instead it was merely pointing her to the truth—a truth so unpalatable, so unthinkable, that she'd failed to consider it?
Her parents didn't always die in a car crash on their way to get milkshakes, but they did always die that day.
There was one way she could confirm her theory:
View the other worlds.
But she didn't want to.
Didn't want to risk watching her parents die a hundred times. Didn't want to risk learning there was nothing she could have done to save them. It wouldn't lessen the guilt she'd carried with her since that day, only double, triple, infinitize her grief to know there was no world in existence in which they survived, no world in which they saw her graduate high school or college, in which they watched her blossom into adulthood or walk down the aisle, in which they witnessed the birth of their first grandchild.
She was supposed to be using the app to prove she and Henry weren't soulmates, not to crush herself with a loss so great that one universe wasn't vast enough to contain it.
With her heart heavy, floundering beneath a weight too big for her to fathom, she returned to the footage and skipped forward in time. Maybe the crash happening on the way back from MG's, with her in the car too, was enough of a change in her life path to alter her trajectory, to stop her from meeting Henry; once she'd proven that she could get rid of the tablet and do her utmost to forget what she'd seen.
oOoOo
Universe ID: vymksmkL2MV
October 17, 1986
"Come on!" Becky said. "Please! I'm literally begging you."
Elizabeth sighed. She knew she should have gone to the library, but instead she'd decided to work at the small desk at the foot of her bed. Unfortunately, her roommate had taken it as an opportunity to try to convince her to go with her to the party—another party—though the only reason Becky wanted Elizabeth there was so she wouldn't have to walk in alone.
Elizabeth shook her head, and jotted down another note. "I really need to write this paper."
Becky leant against the desk, practically sitting on top of Elizabeth's work; her fingers curled around the lip of wood.
"I'll owe you," she said.
Elizabeth huffed. "You already owe me."
"For what?"
"Uh"—Elizabeth's eyebrows arched—"Phi Kappa Psi, that math worksheet I let you copy, that other math sheet I let you copy, the incident with Dr Barton, the incident with the other Dr Barton, seven coffees, five Reubens, three banana nut muffins, two—"
Becky held up both hands, a surrender, a signal to stop. "Okay, okay." A moment later, her face crumpled and she clasped her hands together in front of her chest. "Please. Just come for half an hour, and if you hate it, you can leave."
Elizabeth stared up at her roommate—at her imploring expression—while she considered it. She really did need to write the paper, and she really didn't want to go to the party, but Becky was the only friend she'd made in the seven or so weeks since she'd started at UVA, and as annoying as her roommate could be, she didn't want to lose the one person on campus who actually talked to her (who actually tolerated her). After the past three years she'd had enough silence to last her a lifetime already.
"Fine," she said, the word as heavy as a sigh. "But I'm not being your wingman, not again, not after last time."
Becky's face lit up. "You're the best! Now, hurry up and get changed." She shooed Elizabeth towards the closet.
oOoOo
An hour later, Elizabeth found herself standing at the edge of a living room, stuck between a ceiling-high bookcase and the end of a couch, clutching a plastic cup of what she hoped was Pepsi, while she stared at the gyrating throng in front of her, searching for a way out that didn't involve being absorbed into the sweltering mass or choking to death on cheap cologne; what might have been Run-D.M.C.'s Walk This Way blasted from the stereo, but the speakers weren't designed to handle such a high level of decibels, and it left both the music and the lyrics sounding fuzzy.
God… she really should have stayed to write that paper.
"You look like you could use rescuing," someone at her ten o'clock yelled over the music.
She turned to see the guy—dark hair, chiselled features, kind of a Clark Kent vibe—whose eye she'd caught through the crowd squeezing along the bookcase towards her.
He didn't seem threatening, but parties like this one had a way of attracting a certain type, some of whom used the non-threatening thing as a play, and the only thing worse than being stuck at the edge of a room between a ceiling-high bookcase and the end of a couch was being stuck at the edge of a room between a ceiling-high bookcase, the end of a couch and a guy who didn't understand the word 'no'.
If she'd had hackles, they would have raised.
"What makes you say that?" she said (shouted).
He stopped near the end of the bookcase, rather than standing directly in front of her and so trapping her—which perhaps showed some awareness, but didn't mean it wasn't an act, and she of course couldn't rule out it being an accident.
He shrugged. "The expression you're wearing."
"Oh? And what expression's that?"
"Kinda like you're standing next to a snake pit, hoping that if you stay still enough they won't strike."
She had to admit, that was how she felt.
But she didn't need to tell him so.
And she was certainly no damsel in distress.
She held his gaze, gave him the look Becky had dubbed 'the ball shriveller'. "I fight my own battles," she said.
The guy smiled, his eyes warm with amusement. "Great. Then perhaps you can help me, because I feel like I'm standing next to a snake pit, hoping that if I stay still enough they won't strike, and I could sure use rescuing."
Despite the wariness of a moment before, a smile tugged at her cheeks and she had to bite it back. It was such an awful line, but it was witty in a way, or at least it took thought and effort and a willingness to look foolish—and apparently she had a thing for the good-looking but goofy type.
In response to her barely-suppressed smile the guy's own smile widened and he held out his hand. "I'm Henry."
She swapped her plastic cup to the opposite side and shook his hand; his grip was firm—secure, not overpowering.
"Elizabeth," she said.
Tucking his hand into his jeans pocket, Henry tilted his head to the party going on around them. "This really isn't my scene, but I got dragged here by a friend. What about you?"
"Same. She said she was going to get us drinks, but she never came back. I found her twenty minutes later, wedged between a wall and a football player."
She turned and nodded to the wall next to the alcove window at the front of the house, where Becky and her new acquaintance were rapidly progressing through the bases.
"Well, now I know where David went," Henry said.
Elizabeth's eyebrows arched. "You're kidding?"
What were the odds the-reason-she-was-at-that-party was hooking up with the-reason-he-was-at-that-party?
Henry maintained his poker face for all of two seconds, before he broke into another smile. "Yeah, I'm kidding. I'm too much of a nerd to be friends with a football player."
Elizabeth smiled again, too.
Seriously? What was going on with her? Was the goofy, self-deprecating thing her kryptonite?
"Do you want to head out back?" he said. "The ratio of oxygen to cologne is more favourable for survival."
Her smile grew. "Sure. Lead the way."
oOoOo
In the Oval Office, Elizabeth tapped pause again, then pressed the 'x' in the corner to close the window to that alternate world and return to the main 'What If…?' screen.
She didn't need to watch the rest to know that from there she and Henry would make their way to the backyard, where they'd stand under a tree strung with string lights and talk for hours and hours, until eventually Henry would glance at his watch and tell her he didn't want to abandon her but his shift was about to start at an all-night diner and he had to leave.
…Perhaps you'd like to join me?
"It's usually quiet at this time," he would add. "And I'll make you the best grilled cheese you've ever had."
To which she would reply through a smile, "That's quite an assertion."
And when he countered, staring straight into her eyes, "It's a promise," with a flutter in her belly, she would agree.
She knew because she'd already lived it: The world the app showed differed in small ways from her own, but not in the fact that she and Henry met—nor in how they met.
If she was going to prove they weren't soulmates or meant to be, she would need to ask a different question, one that would ensure she never met Henry.