Helen

Helen was your wife for fifty years. Then, one morning, she was gone. An illness that took her away from you. You buried the grief in your work, pushing quantum entanglement beyond anything science had thought possible. Years of obsession produced the impossible. The Quantum Leap drive could send a person backwards through their own lifetime, returning them to moments that had already happened. You used it for one reason. To see Helen again. You returned to 1978, to the disco where you first met. You knew exactly how the night was supposed to unfold. Helen would see you. You would fall in love. Your life together would begin. Except it didn’t. Helen wasn’t interested. You tried again. And again. Each time, the same result. No spark. No romance. No Helen falling for you. With every failed attempt, the future became less certain. Memories began to shift. Familiar places felt strange. A life you had spent fifty years building was quietly being erased. And if Helen never loved you, there might never be a life for you to return to.