“Really, Nick? Oh, that’s so sad! I thought you two were the most solid couple here!”
“We were. We were. But it’s all over, man. I’ll be with someone else New Year’s Eve. Don’t know who, but it won’t be Yvonne.”
Hambleton looked solemn. “That’s so sad, Nick.”
“No. Not for me and not for you.” Mikkelsen smiled and nudged Hambleton amiably. “Look, Tommy, it’s no secret to me that you’ve had your eye on Yvonne for months. She knows it too. I just wanted to let you know that I’m stepping out of the picture, I’m very gracefully withdrawing, no hard feelings at all. And if she asks my advice, I’ll tell her that you’re absolutely the best man she could find. I mean it, Tommy.”
“That’s very decent of you, old fellow. That’s extraordinary!”
“I want her to be happy,” Mikkelsen said.
Yvonne showed up just as night was falling. Mikkelsen had not seen her for years, and he was startled at how uninteresting she seemed, how bland, how unformed, almost adolescent. Of course, she was very pretty, close-cropped blonde hair, merry greenish-blue eyes, pert little nose, but she seemed girlish and alien to him, and he wondered how he could ever have become so involved with her. But of course all that was before Janine. Mikkelsen’s unscheduled return from Palm Beach surprised her, but not very much, and when he took her down to the beach to tell her that he had come to realize that she was really in love with Hambleton and he was not going to make a fuss about it, she blinked and said sweetly, “In love with Tommy? Well, I suppose I could be—though I never actually saw it like that. But I could give it a try, couldn’t I? That is, if you truly are tired of me, Nick.” She didn’t seem offended. She didn’t seem heartbroken. She didn’t seem to care much at all.
He left the club soon afterward and got an express-fax message off to his younger self in Palm Beach: Yvonne has fallen for Tommy Hambleton. However upset you are, for God’s sake get over it fast, and if you happen to meet a young woman named Janine Carter, give her a close look. You won’t regret it, believe me. I’m in a position to know.
He signed it A Friend, but added a little squiggle in the corner that had always been his own special signature-glyph. He didn’t dare go further than that. He hoped young Nick would be smart enough to figure out the score.
Not a bad hour’s work, he decided. He drove back to the jaunt-shop in downtown San Diego and hopped back to his proper point in time.
There was the taste of cotton in his mouth when he emerged. So it feels that way even when you phase yourself, he thought. He wondered what changes he had brought about by his jaunt. As he remembered it, he had made the hop in order to phase himself back into a marriage with a woman named Janine, who apparently he had loved quite considerably until she had been snatched away from him in a phasing. Evidently the unphasing had not happened, because he knew he was still unmarried, with three or four regular companions—Cindy, Melanie, Elena and someone else—and none of them was named Janine. Paula, yes, that was the other one. Yet he was carrying a note, already starting to fade, that said: You won’t remember any of this, but you were married in 2016 or 17 to the former Janine Carter, Tommy Hambleton’s ex-wife, and however much you may like your present life, you were a lot better off when you were with her. Maybe so, Mikkelsen thought. God knows he was getting weary of the bachelor life, and now that Gus and Donna were making it legal, he was the only singleton left in the whole crowd. That was a little awkward. But he hadn’t ever met anyone he genuinely wanted to spend the rest of his life with, or even as much as a year with. So he had been married, had he, before the phasing? Janine? How strange, how unlike him.
He was home before dark. Showered, shaved, dressed, headed over to the Top of the Marina. Tommy Hambleton and Yvonne were in town, and he had agreed to meet them for drinks. Hadn’t seen them for years, not since Tommy had taken over his brother’s villa on the Riviera. Good old Tommy, Mikkelsen thought. Great to see him again. And Yvonne. He recalled her clearly, little snub-nosed blonde, good game of tennis, trim compact body. He’d been pretty hot for her himself, eleven or twelve years ago, back before Adrienne, before Charlene, before Georgiana, before Nedra, before Cindy, Melanie, Elena, Paula. Good to see them both again. He stepped into the skylift and went shooting blithely up the long swivel-stalk to the gilded little cupola high above the lagoon. Hambleton and Yvonne were already there.
Tommy hadn’t changed much—same old smooth slickly dressed little guy—but Mikkelsen was astonished at how time and money had altered Yvonne. She was poised, chic, sinuous, all that baby-fat burned away, and when she spoke there was the smallest hint of a French accent in her voice. Mikkelsen embraced them both and let himself be swept off to the bar.
“So glad I was able to find you,” Hambleton said. “It’s been years! Years, Nick!”
“Practically forever.”
“Still going great with the women, are you?”
“More or less,” Mikkelsen said. “And you? Still running back in time to wipe your nose three days ago, Tommy?”
Hambleton chuckled. “Oh, I don’t do much of that any more. Yvonne and I were to the Fall of Troy last winter, but the short-hop stuff doesn’t interest me these days. I—oh. How amazing?”
“What is it?” Mikkelsen asked, seeing Hambleton’s gaze go past him into the darker corners of the room.
“An old friend,” Hambleton said. “I’m sure it’s she! Someone I once knew—briefly, glancingly—” He looked toward Yvonne and said, “I met her a few months after you and I began seeing each other, love. Of course, there was nothing to it, but there could have been—there could have been—” A distant wistful look swiftly crossed Hambleton’s features and was gone. His smile returned. He said, “You should meet her, Nick. If it’s really she, I know she’ll be just your type. How amazing! After all these years! Come with me, man!”
He seized Mikkelsen by the wrist and drew him, astounded, across the room.
“Janine?” Hambleton cried. “Janine Carter?”
She was a dark-haired woman, elegant, perhaps a year or two younger than Mikkelsen, with cool perceptive eyes. She looked up, surprised. “Tommy? Is that you?”
“Of course, of course. That’s my wife, Yvonne, over there. And this—this is one of my oldest and dearest friends, Nick Mikkelsen. Nick—Janine—”
She stared up at him. “This sounds absurd,” she said, “but don’t I know you from somewhere?”
Mikkelsen felt a warm flood of mysterious energy surging through him as their eyes met. “It’s a long story,” he said. “Let’s have a drink and I’ll tell you all about it.”