Preheating

Charlotte—no, Simone—spoke to me in the living room. “In my notes it says ’It was a dark and stormy night’, but that means you changed the past. The question is, how?”

“What do you mean?”

“Either you’re speaking about the night Tisha met Yohani,” she reasoned, “or about Madir’s proclamation. I suggest the latter, it’s way more esoteric and edge-case.”

I understood her reasoning, but corrected: “I said It is a dark and stormy night. I surely changed the tense in my head.”

“How sure?” she asked. “What’s the chance you take care to fix the tense, and I wouldn’t notice?”

I was much less sure. “That would be unusual. Though, you did have a lot to track. You and Selene were going at it.”

“Let’s wait and see if it comes up,” she said, jotting on her palm in pen. “Miss Perfect Memory will know for sure. Also, you’re lucky she’s in the washroom. Remember, outside the game it’s Diana.”