Do you believe in fate?

“Why do you keep looking at the time?” my colleague asked with squinted, suspicious eyes.

I thought about it for a minute before I answered, knowing how bizarre my answer might seem. I continued typing as I pondered my response. “I’m supposed to meet a guy at the park today,” I replied as nonchalantly as possible.

“Oh, really,” she replied, suddenly interested and rolled her chair up to mine. “Do tell.”

“There’s not much to tell. I received a text about ten years ago and it’s stuck with me. The guy thought he was texting someone else. Once he realized I wasn’t the intended recipient, we continued texting with playful banter. It was fun. He was fun, and smart. Also really quick-witted. You know how that hooks me every time. He said we should meet at the park on September 27, 2033. As a joke, of course. But then I started to think about it – and I’ve had ten years to think about it. What if it’s like, some kind of serendipitous experience or cinematic romcom situation?”

She sat there, staring at me blankly. “You’re saying you received a text ten years ago from a guy you don’t know, and you are going to meet him at a park today? Because he said to show up at the park on September 27, 2033? I have questions. What if he’s a stalker? Or a creep? Or 78 years old? Or 17 years old? What if it’s a catfish? And let’s say it’s not: it’s been ten years. Don’t you think he’ll have forgotten your text exchange by now? And since it was said in jest, he’s not going to show up, even if he recalls. Finally, how will you know who this guy is when you see him at the park?”

I shrugged off the first thousand questions. “I won’t,” was my response to the final one.

Her face scrunched. “This is clearly a joke. If you didn’t exchange photos, and haven’t texted since that one mistaken identity thing in 2023, then no, this is not happening. Like, at all.”

I turned back to my screen and continued typing. “I’m going to the park at lunch, sitting on the bench, and I will see if there are any guys loitering around looking at me.”

She ran her hand down her face in a sweeping motion of clearing out the annoyance that was me. I was not dissuaded. “What you are describing is a normal occurrence at the park. Do you know how many random guys loiter around and look at us every day as we walk through?”

I kept typing, keeping my eyes on the screen. ‘Yes, I know, but those are weird guys.”

“What separates this guy from those guys?”

“This guy told me to meet him at the park today.”

She sighed heavily. “I sure hope you have your Suspicious Persons binder up to date before you head out on this bad chick flick adventure of yours, because there are so many ways this can go south. You don’t know who you’re looking for, you don’t know what his intentions are, AND it’s been ten years since this occurred. He may not even show up, and I hope for your sake he doesn’t.”

The sky started taking on a strange darkness as we sat there, our cubicles next to the large window. She kept talking, mostly telling me not to do it, with me mostly thinking about what I could grab for lunch to take to the park. When I defiantly told her I was going, regardless of her lecturing, she waved me off dramatically. “Do what you want, but I’m going to send the police in an hour, and you know I mean it.”

I headed out at around 11:45. I stopped by the sandwich shop at the corner, ordered a croissant – because Paris is always a good idea. I could pretend that this was a Parisian park, and the guy would show up in a raspberry beret, the kind you buy from a secondhand store.

I took off my shoes and walked my way through the soft grass to the bench where I could see everyone in the park. There were kids playing nearby, giggling. There was an older woman sitting on the nearby bench. She smiled and nodded, and I returned her kind acknowledgment. So far, no weird guys had appeared, and no normal guys, either. The sky continued to darken, and I recalled the text exchange from ten years prior. “That’s right, there is a solar eclipse today,” I whispered to myself as a squirrel stared at my croissant, tiny arms pulled up to its chest.

I’d been at the park about fifteen minutes when my phone rang. It was my coworker. “What is happening? Are you insane? Are you safe?” She was bordering on hysteria.

“I’m fine. I’m sitting here talking to a squirrel actually. I’m eating my lunch, and if he doesn’t show up, I’ll just—”

It was at that moment I felt a light tap on my shoulder. “Gotta go,” I said slowly, and ended the call. With a deep breath, I turned slowly toward the direction of the tap. I looked up and I felt a wry smile form. My smile was returned to me tenfold. The sun was blocked out, but not by the eclipse.

The shadow spoke.

“Hey, kiddo.”

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