Today is yesterday again.
Do you have any plans for Christmas? you asked, and (watch your hands) worked the water cooler. Staying in town?
Sylvia shook her head, and (you break) yours (to) shook too in a politely social sympathy. “Gonna go up to visit m’partner’s folks, up to Portland. Renting a car, in case we run into snow in the mountains.”
(Drive slow, you say, watch out for black ice in town, while) you asked about his mother (instead). “Pretttttty ooooooooool–” A torus, turning over on itself, poised in the cooler; about to bloom into a bubble AGAIN, and (you cry and strike out and tip all the moneychangers over, but)– “–llllllld, yeah, she’ll be ninety in March. Hale as a hare, but y’never know which Christmas’ll be the last, right?”
(Again, you vow, and again and again and again. Today was tomorrow, once.)
Have fun, you told her.