Everything happened in a fleeting instant—a brief flash reflected in the rearview mirror, as if that figure had vanished in the blink of an eye.
14ymedio, Milton Chanes, Berlin, 3 August 2025
Three more years had gone by.
Three years since that fateful afternoon of November 12—twelve years ago now—when it was his own scream that had sealed Ana’s fate. Now, after months of meticulous adjustments, frantic calculations, and tireless rehearsals, he had finally managed to extend the temporal jump to fifteen seconds.
Fifteen fleeting seconds—but enough, perhaps, to alter what had once seemed irrevocably written.
This time, he would not make the same mistake. He had prepared obsessively, analyzing every possible outcome, every minimal variation in the cruel script of time. He knew exactly where to appear: right in the center of the avenue’s flowerbed. There, hidden among the shrubs and the shadows cast by the rainy dusk, he would avoid being seen by his former self.
He initiated the jump.
The sensation was the same as always: that fleeting vertigo as he crossed the invisible curtain between present and past.
When he opened his eyes, he felt the damp grass beneath his feet, soaked by the insistent rain. He looked around quickly.
The avenue stretched out before him, exactly as he remembered it: the steady rain, blurred reflections, shimmering puddles, the fine mist kicked up by tires, and the ceaseless murmur of vehicles gliding over the wet asphalt.
Then he saw her—Ana—walking with determination, as beautiful as ever, in those impossible heels no one should wear on such a slippery street.
A few meters behind her, he saw himself—his self from three years earlier—approaching, still unaware of the horror about to unfold.
There was no time to lose. An elderly man, rushing to cross the avenue in a futile attempt to escape the downpour, slipped and crashed to the ground. The impact echoed sharply, followed by a faint groan.
He couldn’t stop to help—every second was crucial. He turned his attention to the approaching vehicles, immediately recognizing the old seafoam-green Bel Air, rusted, driven by Usnavy, struggling through the torrential rain and a fogged-up windshield. He ran toward it, waving his arm frantically, trying to catch the driver’s attention, silently begging him to change his fatal course.
Blinded by the storm and with nearly zero visibility, Usnavy barely perceived a silhouette emerging suddenly from the left. In a reflexive, panic-stricken move, he jerked the steering wheel to the right. The Bel Air skidded clumsily across the slick road, losing speed as the gearbox groaned with a metallic screech.
At that moment, a heart-wrenching scream pierced through the sound of the rain:
—Noooo!
Everything happened in a fleeting instant—a brief flash reflected in the rearview mirror, as if that figure had vanished in the blink of an eye. Almost at the same time, another voice cried out from the sidewalk:
—Ana!
It had happened again.
Then he opened his eyes. He was back in the present. He hadn’t been able to do anything. Worse still—had he, once again, triggered the tragedy himself? Every action he took seemed to lead inevitably to the same ending, over and over. What was the solution—if there even was one? He had tried everything, absolutely everything, and still, fate insisted on finding new paths to fulfill its cruel decree.
He understood then, with heartbreaking clarity, that it wasn’t about the place, the precise moment, the car or the driver.
He understood then, with heartbreaking clarity, that it wasn’t about the place, the precise moment, the car or the driver. The tragedy was woven deeper, embedded in the very fabric of time.
He slowly stood up. From the lab’s window, he watched as the rain began to fall once more, linking past and present in some kind of cosmic bond. But perhaps the key was not to avoid the inevitable, but to understand that each attempt to change the past created multiple timelines—unpredictable parallel worlds, vibrating in a chaotic, invisible dance. Like a quantum butterfly effect, every small gesture could resonate infinitely across universes he would never even know existed.
The question, then, was no longer how to save Ana, but whether by trying, he might be unleashing even darker realities—fates more terrifying still.
And there, beneath the unrelenting rain, staring out the window, he had yet to understand that uncertainty was the only certainty.
Translated by the author.
The series:
Twelve Seconds, Twelve Years Ago
Fifteen Seconds, Fifteen Years Ago
Witness of the Rain
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