It takes me another year to be able to face them again.

  I get back in contact with my fiancé first; She's the biggest reason I had to run, and she deserves to choose first if she wants me back in her life. She doesn't seem to have even blocked my number yet, despite the year long ghosting - she messaged me st on vaccine day, saying I'd be welcome there, whatever the reason I left.

  I don't deserve her.

  'Hey Kathy. It's me. I'm sorry. I'm gonna be at the old bar near our uni every night this week, if you still want to see me. Look for the red scarf you gave me for christmas.'

  She still looks about the same when she comes by, looking a bit haggard. I've been in our old haunt a few nights by now, and I'm almost gd she didn't come the first night, because whether she had pns or just needed time, it's given me time to calm my heart.

  Not that it's any easier now. I can see her scanning the bar, phone in hand. She seems to be alone, thank goodness, I'm not quite ready to talk to everyone else yet. But she hasn't quite recognized me.

  I didn't expect her to, but it's still pretty affirming.

  I raise the edge of my scarf in her direction and wave it a little from the corner booth I'm reading at. I don't see the moment her eyes widen. Maybe she puts a hand over her mouth. Maybe she drops her bag.

  I wouldn't know. I'm not looking. It's too much.

  She approaches at a slow walk, I can hear her boots struggling to pick up from the sticky beer-stained floor with every step towards me. I'm still not looking at her.

  "Hey," I say, as I see her walk past me to the other empty chair, finally entering my vision. "I'm sorry I left. I'm sorry I ghosted you. I just... I needed time. We can talk, if you want. Or I can leave your life after you give me what I deserve."

  Her face is a bit stony through all that, a grimace that mixes hurt and confusion. I can see her responding to my voice, though. It's a bit off from what she's used to. She's turning her head a little bit to the side, furrowing her eyebrows, trying to recall if I always sounded like that.

  Or maybe it's the skirt and turtleneck sweater combo that she can finally see clearly. Or the hair, though in a year it hasn't grown that much. Possibly the eyeliner.

  She finally opens her mouth to respond. Closes it. Opens again. "I don't know what to say. I'd like to talk, at least." Her hand brushes the back of her head. "I'm getting the feeling I shouldn't use your old name, should I."

  I mirror her action bashfully, looking down at the table. "Yeah. Laura, now."

  Look, I'm under no illusions, of course she recognizes me. I don't think Kathy suddenly sees someone different, under the clothes and mild makeup. I'm not even on hormones yet. Some hair removal, nicer clothes, a padded bra, that's all that's really changed. I look more right than I ever have, but I'm still recognizably me.

  I swear to myself I'll work harder on voice training, but I've never been a singer or an actor, it's a process. I've had a lot on my mind.

  Kathy looks down at my hands, on the book I've been reading. "You're still wearing the ring."

  I nod. "It's a reminder that I have to tell you, first. You deserve it, even if I don't deserve to wear it."

  "Okay, no more of that self deprecation, okay? You ass, you've been in your own head since you remembered everything. We all wanted to give you time to process. If that time meant going away for a while... Well, I hoped you'd tell someone, at least, but you're safe, you're healthy, you're obviously working to find your happiness." she puts her hand on mine. She's still wearing the ring I gave her, too. "C'mon babe. You wanted to tell me first. So talk to me. Is this... Is this something from another life?"

  I chuckle at that. "I asked myself that, too, after a month in therapy. I don't think it is, but who knows, at this point." I look around the bar for a moment. "Hey, do you remember the bar fight during the hallmark movie pub quiz night?"

  Kathy just looks at me funny.

  "No, I didn't think that was this life either, but I had to check. It's harder to be sure who I was, without all of you there to ground me. I don't suppose you remember the one where you tossed the engagement ring into the river, that's definitely not this one. Hell of a sp, though, you've always had that."

  Now she's looking at me with concern. "You.... You never wanted to talk about your other lives. Especially my other selves."

  "No, I really didn't."

  "So... therapy. Is this one of the things you talk about, there? Your other memories?"

  "Oh, yeah, for sure. It took a while to actually trust her enough to tell her, though."

  She's rubbing my knuckles, now. "What else did you talk about?" God, I really never deserved her.

  "We talked a lot about grounding methods. Finding things about this me, that my other selves never were. Never wanted. Finding hobbies, finding friends." my hand clenches. "Though that st one.... Yeah, I didn't want to inflict myself on other people too much this year. There's a small queer group I frequent, we go out to eat occasionally."

  "So, is this..." she waves her other hand at me.

  "I was asking myself that question for a good half a year, you know? I don't actually have an answer, yet. But I feel happier like this. I feel like... like a single person. Not a conga line of lives. And I really like being Laura. That part, I'm certain about."

  "Okay." she nods. Smiles. "Okay, Laura. I'm still a little hurt. I've been so worried, we've all been. But I can forgive you for it. I can't imagine what being in your head must be like. I can't imagine remembering life through a prism."

  Kathy orders some cheap beers and fries from the bar. Our usual order. This was a hangout spot, not a cocktail bar.

  "I'd still like to be part of your life, Laura. But I don't want to hurt you. I don't want to be a reminder of... of everything else you remember, if you're trying to just be you. If I'm getting this right and that's what's been keeping you away?"

  I look into her eyes, properly. I've been hoping she'd say that, but it wasn't right to ask. "I do want that. But... I don't want to come back to what we were, right away. It's not right. I want to have something with you, as Laura, if you'd have me. And you didn't ask Laura for her hand in marriage. Even if I'm her." Taking a slow sip, I continue, "I want to have a history with you that we both remember."

  "So, is this our first date?"

  There's a tinkle in her eyes that I've desperately been missing. "Hardly. But I'd like there to be one. I'm not asking to.... to start fresh, I know that's not possible. But I want to feel like I'm living through getting to know you."

  "You didn't, before?"

  "When I first met you, it happened very te in life. We somehow found each other during grad school. You were kind, but sharp, and you knew what you wanted, which was very empathically not me. I think there might have been a girlfriend on your end? Honestly, I was not in the headspace for romance, either way. You helped me work on the machine. We kind of did it together."

  She's nodding, but I can see she doesn't understand what I'm actually telling her.

  "That's the only time I've lived through getting to know you. Every other time.... It's not that I don't have a serial episodic memory. I just wake up one day, a bit after we made the original machine, usually after a couple weeks in the hospital as my body processes whatever the hell the machine actually did to me. And suddenly, there's another life lived inside me. You'd think that the st me - the one in this time - would be the one I remember living as the most, but it actually feels like the me who made that machine with you is the only one who's lived for nearly 30 years. All the others are just... other lives that I remember living, but I don't remember living through them. Disconnected but wrapped tightly together all the same." I shake my head. I've never been good at expining this whole thing.

  "Okay, so, what you're saying is that to you, I'm the sapphic grad student you saved the world with? That doesn't sound that bad."

  "You're being charitable. I'm saying that I remember that you, better than the you that got on your knees and proposed to me. I'm saying I remember this bar because this is where we sat when we had to clear our head, not because this is where we had our first kiss. I'm saying... I'm saying that I remember falling in love with you about as well as hating you. I remember most of our dates at least three different times." I'm realizing that I've gotten a bit loud. Damn. I don't really know how to shout en femme yet. "I'm saying that you've only known one me. I know so many more yous. It's not fair. It's not equal. It's not right, to continue a retionship of some guy who was me, but not me. Who's life I remember like some deeply immersive VR." I'm tweaking my ear with my finger, now. Nervous habits from all my lives are manifesting.

  Kathy's looking at me deeply, now. "I think I understand. You've known me for so much longer than I've known you." She removes her ring and examines it in the low lights. "This is a symbol of love for someone who's only partially you, from someone who, from your perspective, is only partially me."

  She puts it back on. "I don't think I can stop loving you, Laura, not that easily. I mean, you obviously still feel some kind of way towards me, or you wouldn't ask for a date, yeah?"

  I nod. "Absolutely. I don't want you to think I'm completely dissociated from our life. It was still me. It's still you. But there's so much more... memory baggage. When I tried to think what I could say to you when we actually get married... I think that's the moment I knew I had to run away."

  We spend a little while just sitting there. Kathy has that faraway look on her face, like she's processing. Recontextualizing. She's only know me once, and she's only known herself once, after all. The fries slowly get consumed, the beers lose their fizz as we drink them zily.

  I like this feeling. I wouldn't have been able to expin it, before, and now that Kathy knows, I feel so much lighter.

  "Do you want me to tell everyone else anything?" She finally asks.

  I shook my head. "I kind of came into this assuming you have. But if they don't know yet... Give me a little while to get settled into being, well, here again. I've not lived here for a while."

  We trade contact info. I'm living in a small pce and working remotely, nowadays. We'd rented a nice apartment together, back before I ran, but I'm really not feeling like U-Hauling is the smartest decision before our first date. She chuckles when I say that, but she nods. We both need some time.

  Time to figure out how to date a woman I've known for longer than she's been alive.