Jade kept expecting to wake up.
Not in a poetic, "this is all a dream" kind of way.
In a literal, "someone hit CTRL+Z on my life and now my brain's buffering" kind of way.
Every class felt like a rerun.
Same seating chart. Same cheap projector wheezing like it had asthma.
Same snort-laugh from the guy two rows back, which was never funny but always perfectly timed.
Mr. Diaz was rattling off another "fun fact" that was neither fun nor a fact. Something about how wombats poop cubes. Jade didn't even flinch this time. She could quote it word for word.
But no one else noticed.
Not Lexie, who was currently humming and doodling hearts in her notebook like she didn't just throw a donut-and-confetti breakdown of a birthday party for Jade last week.
Not her classmates, who were too busy stress-googling math terms or drooling on their desks.
Not the world.
Just her.
And maybe… that suspicious mid-semester transfer kid.
Noah.
With his moody poetry face and "I know things" eyes.
Jade shook the thought out of her head like it was a spider crawling down her neck.
She needed answers. She needed caffeine. She needed to stop sweating through her hoodie like she was smuggling secrets in her armpits.
Instead, she went to the library.
Not for books. Not for Google.
Just for quiet. Cold air. Something still. Something normal.
The second she stepped in, the lights flickered.
Not full horror movie flickers, just enough to make her skin prickle like she was being watched by the air itself.
Mrs. Hendricks, the librarian who somehow had existed since the dawn of books, didn't look up from her crossword puzzle.
"You again," she mumbled, pen scribbling without pause.
"Me again," Jade replied automatically.
Then she paused.
Wait… what did that mean?
She hadn't been here. Had she?
Jade moved deeper into the shelves. The farther she went, the colder the air got, like stepping into a memory no one wanted to remember.
Back here, everything felt older. Dustier. Quieter.
Then she saw it.
A book. Just one. Sticking out like a crooked tooth on the bottom shelf.
Title: Temporal Logic & Causality
Author: Blackwell.
That name made her stomach twist.
Like her body recognized it before her brain did.
She reached out.
Her fingers brushed the cover.
"Looking for something?"
Jade nearly elbowed her soul out of her body. She whipped around.
Noah.
Right behind her.
No footsteps. No warning. Just... vibes and eyes.
And oh, those eyes.
Storm-grey. Calm. Too calm. Like the world could be on fire and he'd still be quoting Shakespeare in a panic room.
He didn't smile. Didn't blink. Just handed her the book.
"This belongs to you," he said.
Jade took a step back. "Why?"
"You signed it."
She flipped the cover. Inside, in her handwriting, her messy, tilted, looping handwriting...
~Jade Carter, return before the end~.
Her chest turned to static. "I didn't... this isn't mine."
Noah tilted his head slightly, like a robot processing a corrupted file. "It isn't?"
"Okay, what is this? A prank? Did Lexie put you up to this? Why do you know my name? Who told you to say that?"
He stepped forward.
She stepped back.
The lights above buzzed. Flickered.
And then...
The world paused.
No sound. No motion.
Mrs. Hendricks froze mid-sip.
The ticking clock on the wall hiccuped.
Even the dust in the air seemed suspended.
For a breathless moment, time itself held still.
And in that silence, Noah said,
"You're looping again, aren't you?"
Jade's blood turned to ice.
"What… did you say?"
"I've seen that look before," he whispered.
"On your face.
Right before you died."
She couldn't move.
Couldn't breathe.
The library, the book, the day, it all felt like cardboard scenery about to collapse.
CRASH**
A shelf behind them toppled. Books scattered like confetti in an apocalypse.
The world unpaused.
Noise snapped back in.
Mrs. Hendricks cursed like she was born in a biker bar.
Students peeked in, wide-eyed.
But Noah?
Gone.
Just… gone.
Like a ghost with good posture and emotional damage.
Jade stood there, heart thundering, book clutched in shaking hands.
Looping again? Right before I died?
She knew she had to have a conversation with that Noah guy but thinking about talking to him ran shivers down her spine.