What’s the Weather Where You Are?
by Jeffrey Hermann
ast week, completely by accident, I traveled three days into the future. By accident I mean one minute it was Tuesday morning and the next it was Friday morning. I discovered the discrepancy when I received the reminder I set for my therapy appointments, which are on Fridays. But it’s Tuesday, I thought to myself. When I checked the date it was not Tuesday. It was Friday. So I went to my therapist. I think I’ve traveled three days into the future, I said. It could be a trauma response, she posited—what happened to you on Tuesday afternoon? I don’t know, I said. When I got home I took note of what seemed different. The laundry was folded but the kitchen was a mess. I had a small bruise on my shin. There was leftover Thai food in the fridge. I looked through my phone and found a text chain I didn’t recognize. Me telling someone named Amy that I’d had fun that night. Thursday night. I’d also told her I hoped we could get together again. Who was she? How had we met? And why hadn’t she texted back? Maybe I’d been dull at dinner. Maybe she found me unattractive. Just then my father called. How was your week, he asked. I hesitated, then told him it was fine. Normal, I said. Same here, he said, normal. Did his voice seem different? Frailer, maybe? I stepped into the bathroom and looked at my face in the mirror. It seemed unchanged. Or almost unchanged. What are your plans for the weekend, I heard my father ask. I felt my phone ping. Maybe it was Amy. I have some things to take care of around the house, I said to my father. Or, I added hesitantly, I might spend time with this girl I’d met recently. Well, he said, it looks like the future is full of possibilities. Yeah, it looks that way, I said out loud, but, really, I thought to myself, who was I to say?
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Author's Note
It feels like the impossible and the extraordinary appear in our lives all the time only to be swept up in the tide of ordinariness. We all have jobs and struggles and schedules to keep. But how many fawns are born while we’re on our hands and knees cleaning our baseboards? How can we argue with the insurance company while the earth is growing green beans and apples? And then there’s the fact that we have no idea what the next moment will bring. It’s a surprise we get anything done at all. That we don’t just stand and stare into the sky all day. A miracle, really.
Jeffrey Hermann writes short fiction and prose poems in his spare time. One day when he retires he will write in his regular time. His work is out there if you look. His wife and two children and dog mean everything to him. He has two books forthcoming in 2027, from Unsolicited Press and Gnashing Teeth Publishing.
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Published September 2026 - Fiction