Liza wasn’t sure if it was her hacking ability or just a software blip that made it happen. In any case, she found out that she could not only peek a few years back at a Facebook user’s timeline, but ahead as well. That’s how she discovered that Quentin Adamson, a frail widower, would win the lottery next year. What an opportunity!
Quentin still missed Claire, but he was helpless before the wiles of the young, vivacious and shapely young women who appeared in his life suddenly without warning. He could not understand why she was so enamored by a sickly 78 year old living a dull existence on a small fixed pension. To him it seemed like an odd wrinkle in the universe, a blip. And yet there she was.
Within weeks they were married at City Hall before a judge and a few witnesses pulled off the street. Quentin was anxious to consummate the marriage but Liza requested patience. She sent him out for his daily stroll to the newsstand to pick up his usual tabloid and lottery ticket.
Later that month, Quentin said he’d forego consummation if Liza would grant him a simple kiss. She hesitated but relented. He’d get his kiss.
They stood together in the tíny main room of Quentin’s efficiency apartment. Liza tried to ignore her disgust. Quentin tried to stop his knees from shaking. Then, they did it. They kissed. Liza quickly wiped her lips. Quentin lost his balance and fell to the ground.
Liza took over the trips to the newsstand, but she never got a winning ticket. Quentin nursed his broken hip. One morning when she was out, Quentin looked at her computer which was opened to Facebook. It was opened to his timeline, a few weeks into the future. He read the entry:
“It is with great sadness that I report my beloved wife Liza has been committed to an institution. She became manic and kept muttering something about a blip.”