Short story: The Border of the Red Choice

I’ve decided to take part in some writing prompts. Many of them are available on the Reedsy website. This short story is based on the prompt: Start a story with someone receiving a message from their past self, warning them of the consequences of their actions.

The old wooden rocking chair in the corner of the room looked so cosy, almost inviting her to sit down, and she couldn’t resist. She took her favourite book, already halfway through a story that had captivated her with its gripping narrative. She settled in and looked ahead. Through the window, she saw the true essence of autumn. It was the perfect time to read in warmth, with a view of nature’s variety. Outside, colourful leaves fluttered in the air, mingling with the raindrops. She got comfortable and opened the book, eager to continue. Line after line, she let herself be drawn deeper into the story. Images passed before her eyes as though she were slowly becoming part of the tale.

For a moment, she tore her gaze away to once again admire the autumn charm, and that’s when she saw her again. The girl with the red umbrella stood in the rain, staring directly at her. The resemblance was uncanny. It was as though she were looking at a younger version of herself. Something stirred within her. She had seen this girl before. But this time, something was different – the girl didn’t stop watching her.

She put the book down on the chair and stood up. Each movement was slow and cautious. Curiosity mingled with unease. She slowly approached the window, her gaze fixed on the girl. “Who is she? And why is she watching me?” she whispered to herself, her breathing quickening. The desire to uncover the truth turned into a pressing need. She had to speak to her; she had to meet her. Her yearning for knowledge was stronger than her fear. She opened the door, quickly ran down the stairs, and slipped into her tall black boots, reaching for the umbrella, hoping the girl would still be there. She ran outside, her heart pounding faster and faster, and with an inner thirst to find out who this girl was, she dashed through the cold air towards the spot where the girl had stood.

There was nothing wrong with this, so why did she feel as if she were about to make a terrible mistake? As she ran, she opened the umbrella, while a few drops of rain fell on her body. She didn’t even feel the cold. When she finally reached the spot where the mysterious girl had been standing, there was no trace of her. “Where did you go?” she gasped, breathless. She felt foolish. Chasing after a stranger in the rain… What did it mean? She looked around, confused, but nothing. She wanted to spot her, to know which way she had gone, but the girl had vanished like a ghost, as if she had dissolved into thin air. Mia felt uneasy. Every day, many people walked past her house, but never before had she felt compelled to run after any of them. What made her act differently this time?

She felt foolish. She smiled at herself for what she had just done, and not understanding her actions, she decided to go back inside with a smile. “That was absurd,” she muttered to herself as she hung the umbrella back on the coat stand.

Slowly, she made her way back upstairs, her thoughts circling around what had just happened with each step. Something was gnawing at her. Something told her that what she had seen wasn’t a coincidence. The girl with the red umbrella had disappeared from her sight but not from her mind. Her thoughts drifted back to her book, and she looked forward to getting lost in it again, hoping that this whole incident would soon become nothing more than a distant memory.

The door to her room was wide open. That was strange – she was sure she had closed it. Wet footprints on the wooden floor hinted at the presence of someone else. Fear gripped her, her breath catching with every step as she approached the open door. She heard nothing. She was afraid, but in the back of her mind, she hoped the girl would be there. She had so many questions and was desperate for answers. 

With trembling hands and an overwhelming sense of fear, she stepped into the room. She looked around but saw no one. “You’re starting to get paranoid, Mia,” she told herself, forcing a smile to hide her fear and anxiety. She shook her hands to rid herself of the tremor and, smiling, made her way to the chair to return to her book. “What the…?” she thought.

A chill ran down her spine when she saw an envelope lying on the book. “Someone was here!” she whispered into the silence. She reached for the white envelope, which bore a few drops of rainwater. She picked it up, nervously looking around. Through the window, she saw her again. The girl with the red umbrella was standing outside, staring intently at her as if urging her to open the envelope.

Mia glanced at the envelope, opened it, and slowly pulled out the piece of paper, her eyes never leaving the mysterious girl. She slowly unfolded the letter inside. She would recognise her own handwriting anywhere, and a chill crept through her. Her eyes fell on the few small words: “Mia, your time is running out; don’t make a mistake. Your next step will change our fate. You know who I am; you’ve read about this.”

Her gaze moved from the letter back to the window, but the girl was no longer there. “Where is she?” A wave of heat washed over her as she pressed herself against the window, searching for the stranger with her eyes. There was no sign of her. As if she had only been there to make sure Mia read the letter. “This is an absurd game,” she muttered sceptically, placing the letter and envelope on the table. She shook her head and, determined to forget this event, returned to her chair. She picked up the book, eager to continue, but she couldn’t concentrate. She read the lines but didn’t absorb them. Her mind raced with thoughts of the mysterious girl. In her head, she kept repeating the words from the letter: “You’ve read about this…”

“What does that even mean? Who speaks in riddles? Couldn’t she have written a letter that explained everything?” she sighed aloud. Her mind spun, thoughts tangled like a ball of yarn until suddenly she remembered. “Of course!” she exclaimed, jumping to her feet and rushing to the old wooden chest lying on the floor. She opened the lid and began rummaging through all the magazines and newspaper clippings stored inside. Her eyes lit up—she’d found it. She knelt on the floor, clutching an old issue of a scientific periodical. The idea wasn’t entirely foreign to her. She had read about this before. “Einstein—yes,” she exhaled excitedly.

Somewhere in that old scientific journal, there had been mention of his theories regarding time and space. She flipped through the pages quickly, eager to refresh her memory of the article. But there was something more that had caught her attention back then. It had discussed the hypothetical possibility of a mirror universe, where time flowed in the opposite direction. When she had read it before, she had thought it was nonsense.

She immersed herself again in the lines that discussed how, according to Einstein’s general theory of relativity, time wasn’t fixed but could change depending on speed and gravity. The author speculated on what would happen if a universe existed where time ran in reverse compared to ours. In that universe, people wouldn’t live from birth to death but rather from death to birth.

It had been just a theory, but suddenly, it seemed terrifyingly real. Could the girl she had seen outside her window really be from another universe? Even if she was, what did she want from Mia? Her heart pounded so fast that her head began to spin. Fear and excitement coursed through her body, making her breathing heavy and her hands tremble.

“Why is she warning me? What does she mean by saying my time is running out?” Mia wondered, her gaze wandering around the room. “What mistake am I not supposed to make?” Thoughts raced through her mind as if she were trying to piece together a puzzle that kept slipping from her grasp.

She took a deep breath and sat back in the chair. Absentmindedly, she placed the book on her lap, but now it felt foreign as if it had lost its power to pull her into another world. “What could be my next step? What will I change?”

Suddenly, a memory flashed through her mind of a decision she had made recently. It was so simple, yet so important. “Maybe it’s connected to my work. Or someone in my life?” She cringed as she recalled her last encounter with someone she no longer wanted to see. “But why is she warning me now? Am I supposed to do something differently?”

Her fingers nervously traced the edge of the book. “If this is real if she truly is warning me—my other self from another world… what am I supposed to change? And why now?”

Each thought she replayed in her mind only added to the confusion, as if everything depended on one single choice. But which one? Thoughts swirled in her head. She searched for some kind of clue, anything that could guide her. “What does it mean? Why now?” She glanced back at the envelope, then to the spot where the girl had been standing just moments before. “I have to find the answers.”

She began pacing the room, a sense of restlessness gradually overwhelming her. The tension inside her grew with every thought that flitted through her mind. “I can’t wait,” she whispered to herself. “I have to figure out what I missed.”

Memories of the last few days flooded over her as though suddenly everything had become significant. Every decision and every event seemed key. She paced the room more and more quickly, her eyes darting over the furniture as if she expected something to jump out at her with an answer.

Suddenly, she stopped. A memory hit her like lightning. That job offer that came a few days ago, which she had declined. “Is that the mistake?” she whispered aloud. “Or was it something else?” She stared into space, thinking through all the possibilities that had rushed through her mind.

“What if I make the wrong decision? What if this is the choice that changes everything?” She felt the weight of the unknown pressing on her. Suddenly, everything felt like one big riddle she had to solve before it was too late.

Her gaze fell back on the book she had been unable to read earlier. “Everything could turn upside down,” she whispered again, this time with a strange certainty that what was happening wasn’t a coincidence. “If I take the wrong step… there will be no going back.”

Mia sat down again, feeling restless. She leaned her head back against the chair, closed her eyes, and tried to calm her uneasy breath. Her thoughts were like a raging river, jumping from one idea to the next without finding peace. She opened her eyes again, staring at the ceiling, but no answers came—they seemed too far away.

She knew she couldn’t remain passive. She got up from the chair, slowly walked over to the window, and stared outside, hoping to see the girl with the red umbrella once again. Inside her, uncertainty was growing, but so was her determination to uncover the truth.

She began pacing the room, her steps slow, as if walking and thinking were the only way to organise her thoughts. “I can’t wait for something to happen. I have to act,” she whispered firmly. She felt this was something profound, and now, she didn’t doubt it for a moment.

Suddenly, she stopped in the middle of the room. “Maybe it’s not about one mistake,” she said quietly. “Maybe it’s about everything. Every step I take.”

She realised there was no turning back now. Whether it was about a decision she had yet to make or something that was slowly revealing itself to her, one thing was clear—her life had just crossed a line from which there was no return.

The confusion in her mind was still intensifying, but with it, so was her resolve. This couldn’t be a coincidence. The girl, the letter, the feeling that she needed to change something—everything was coming together, but she lacked the key explanation.

She couldn’t sit around waiting any longer, hoping something would happen. She felt something breaking inside her. She had to act.

She was sure she would find the answers outside. If she stayed inside, it would suffocate her. She opened the door and let the cold air flow into the house. The wind bit at her face as she took several steps forward.

She looked around the garden. Once again, she searched for the girl who, until this morning, had been a stranger. She frantically looked around, fearing she would miss something important, but the girl was nowhere to be seen. Her heart pounded with anticipation. Something was about to happen.

She took another step forward when, out of the corner of her eye, she saw movement. She turned her head and there, at the end of the path, she spotted a flash of red disappearing among the trees.

“She’s there,” she whispered. I have to follow her.

Without hesitation, she ran towards the forest, her steps growing quicker. Her movements became more frantic, the rain hitting her face like tiny needles. She felt the cold air pushing against her, but nothing could stop her. She couldn’t let the girl slip away. Her feet carried her to where she sensed the girl could be.

When she finally arrived at the spot where she had seen her, the girl was standing there. In the middle of the path, holding the red umbrella, her back turned to Mia. Mia stopped for a moment. Her breath was uneven, but her eyes were fixed solely on the figure.

“Who are you?” she called out into the silence. The girl slowly turned. And then Mia understood.

It was her. A younger version of herself. The one standing on the brink of something big, something fateful. As Mia stared at her, the girl smiled softly as if to tell her that everything would be alright. She watched Mia, breathless, with wonder in her eyes.

“You’re me,” Mia whispered, her voice faltering. “But how, why?”

The girl’s expression didn’t change; with a smile on her lips and an icy calm on her face, she slowly stepped closer. “Your decision will change everything,” she said quietly. “You must trust what you feel. Only then will you find the right path.”

Mia swallowed and took a step back. “What should I do? What happens if I make a mistake?”

The girl simply nodded. “It’s not just your life, my dear,” she whispered. “You know what you must do.”

Mia stood in the silence, surrounded by the rustling of leaves and the rain, which now sounded like the echo of a distant melody. Her thoughts were scattering like raindrops hitting the ground, but one thing was clear. This girl – herself, younger, unfamiliar, mysterious – was here to lead her to a decision.

She breathed deeply, as if trying to calm something that had been building inside her for a long time. “I know what I have to do,” she whispered into the air, as if waiting for confirmation. The girl with the red umbrella watched her, her eyes focused and unwavering. Mia felt everything inside her churn. Fear and uncertainty, but also a strange kind of understanding, had been eluding her until now.

“Your decision will change everything,” the girl repeated softly, her voice like an echo in the wind.

“But what kind of decision is it? Why do you speak to me in riddles?” Mia felt lost. Her fingers nervously traced the fabric of her shirt as if the answer could be found there. Around them, the rain murmured, and the ground was wet, but the world around them seemed, for a moment, blurred, veiled.

The girl stepped closer. “I cannot tell you more. I came to warn you. Listen to your heart,” she said softly, as though the words carried more than just information. As though it were a truth Mia already knew.

She took in the words, closing her eyes. She remembered the article, the theory of a mirror universe where time flowed in the opposite direction. As unimaginable as it was, she knew it wasn’t just a theory; it was real!

She opened her eyes again and looked at the girl. That girl was her reflection. She terrified her, but at the same time, she felt drawn to her, perhaps from another world or another time. But one thing was certain – their fates were intertwined. Every decision Mia made had consequences, and now she was standing before a decision that could change everything.

Her breathing was laboured, the cold air mixing with her breath. “I have to choose,” she whispered. Her younger self simply smiled slightly. And in that moment, Mia realised that all this time, she had been searching for answers elsewhere, when she had had them within her all along.

She turned back towards the house. “The decision isn’t about what’s to come… but about what I choose now,” she said to herself, as though she had finally solved the riddle. There is no theory, no mirror, just her and her choice.

When she turned back again, the girl with the red umbrella was gone, as if she had never been there. Her breathing calmed, the tension in her body eased, and for the first time in a long while, a strange feeling of peace washed over her. She felt at ease.

-Anna Rajmon