Let's Fix The Past

I wrote a letter and posted it to myself. They charged me ten times the usual. I knew sending a letter to the past was expensive but I hadn't expected it to be this steep.

"Time machines take up a lot of electricity, Sir. Our charges are quite nominal. If you compare it with other postal services - "

I paid the amount. It was after all a fair amount to pay considering that the letter would save my past self from committing a number of mistakes.

I went home; happy, apprehensive. I stopped going to work. After all I should have been a professor of literature or psychology. My current job was only a consequence of the stupid choices I made as a teenager. My poor health only an indicator that I should have exercised when I had started smoking and drinking. And my loneliness was only because I had kept the wrong women in my life and left the only woman who loved me dearly. But all of that was about to change the moment the letter was delivered to my past. He would fix everything.

I spent my days at home, digging into my savings and making plans about how I would start my life anew. On the twentieth day, I received a letter. It was from my future self. He said that while I waited for my past to act, I was screwing my future. My future self said that he had lost his job because of me and that he had either to steal or commit suicide.

I immediately called up my work, made excuses that I was sick and said I was joining from the next day. Lucky they agreed. I dumped the cigarettes I had at home. I called my ex-girlfriend who had married by now, and apologized.

"It's too late now," she said,"but I am happy I married a better man."

"In what ways is he better than me?"I asked.

"He is matured and responsible. And I am happy. That's all that matters." She said and hung up.

I never got to tell her that soon I would be happy too.