Chapter Text
The moment John woke up was also the moment he realized that something had to have gone wrong. Well, maybe ‘woke up’ was the wrong term, considering he seemed to be standing, but either way he came to the sudden realization of self-awareness without warning.
It didn’t help that he woke up to a lecture hall full of people staring at him.
Moments pass. Several of the students...he assumes they are students, anyway...shift in their seat. Someone murmurs. Someone giggles. Peripheral vision tells him that he’s up there alone.
Finally, someone speaks: “So are we done, for today?”
“Yes.” Because what else can John say? He has no recall of why he’s here. Or why everyone is dressed up like it’s hippie day, or something. Or, you know, what is going on in general. Where here is, even. “That’s all for today.”
People start talking and file out. He wonders if he should follow or start going through the bag on the desk behind him for answers or something.
One girl, however, does not leave. And while she waves at a few of the students who are leaving, could one really say that they’re waving back to her? Not..exactly? One or two of them make a motion, but.
Still, she smiles at him, brightly. “That was an interesting class.”
“...oh good?” Of course the first thing he comes across is a faculty ID that says it’s Spring 1970 with his name on it. So that elicits some staring at a little plastic card. “I mean...did I teach it?”
That, apparently, gets a smile and a laugh. “Of course! Who else?”
“You never know.” A little more rummaging gets him a class syllabus. Art as Protest. Special topics in art with a humanities requirement. “...huhn.”
“I would always know.” Pointing at his name on the top of the syllabus, right under the class title. Wasn’t she over across the room a few minutes ago? Perhaps not.
Still, he leans back a bit and blinks at her. “Photographic memory?” He nods. “Yeah I see it...I just don’t get it. Am I dreaming?”
“Something like that.” She tilts her head at him, shrugging. “Do you think you’re dreaming?”
“Are you a philosophy major?” Even in dreams, there are rules. “Somewhat.”
“You could say that. Everyone’s dreaming. Everyone’s awake.”
“Okie dokie. I hope I have a planner in here somewhere...”
“I’m sure that anything you would have, you have.”
“...yeah?” A little more digging. “Don’t you have a class after this?”
He may even find it, deep at the bottom of that bag. “It’s possible.”
“But is it likely?” Well, then. Find it he does.
“Oh, sure. Anything’s likely.” Smiling, brightly. “See? There you are.”
“Here I am.” Flipping through it. Dinner with Riley, so there’s something familiar, but the address is not. “So since I might be dreaming I think I don’t know your name?”
At least she doesn’t seem to mind that he doesn’t know it? “Allison.”
“Nice to meet you.” He’s even more confused by the date, when he actually takes it in. “Thought you couldn’t read in dreams...”
“Maybe you’re special.”
The look he gives her is a long one. “Maybe.”
“Assuming it’s a dream.”
“Do we have these conversations often?”
“Not recently.”
“...okay.” He wonders if he’s dreaming and going crazy or what?
“Don’t worry, Professor. Everything’s going to be fine.”
“I’ll have to take your word for it. Thanks, Allison.”
“You’re welcome.” Another smile. “I probably should let you get ready for...dinner.” Looking at his book over his shoulder.
“Thank you.” Giving her another look before he decides to just gather everything up, get a coffee, and sort himself out from there.
At least coffee is considerably cheaper in the 1970s? She waves at him as he goes, but really makes no move to leave his classroom until he has left the classroom.
Things he doesn’t notice right away. Things he does notice? The clothes. Good lord, the clothes and the colors make him wonder if every fashion designer in his dream isn’t high out of their goddamned minds.
He only has an hour or so before he’s supposed to meet up with Riley and everything else, at least, seems to be following it’s own logic. Except for the intense feeling that he’s walked into some sort of entertainment program of one sort or another.
It’s entirely possible that he spends at least five minutes looking for recording devices.
But eventually he has to go to this dinner, right? Asking a teacher’s assistance where he might’ve parked his car helps. He has the keys. He remembers how to drive it. He just doesn’t remember ever purchasing it. Or being a professor. Or any of this.
So, needless to say, he goes into dinner in a rather weird mood, but he’s still happy to see Riley. Even if he’s dreaming. Though the conversations at dinner are strange. Riley doesn’t live with him, which doesn’t fit with his memory, and seems to think that his wondering if he’s dreaming is a sign that he’s just not getting enough sleep.
It might, perhaps, stand to reason. But then again, maybe it wouldn’t? If it’s a dream, it’s a very detailed one, isn’t it?
The girl, at least, does appear to have some sort of existence outside of the classroom. A listing in the student directory, registration in other classes. Not that this is proof of whether or not this is a dream, but it must mean something yes?
Does he see her again before his next class? That’s harder to say.
Probably not, considering that the day in between is spent in a hospital ER, claiming that he thinks he might have a concussion just so he can get checked out. Because in dreams? You don’t fall asleep and wake up to the exact same, impossible scenario. Honestly he’d feel better if something really impossible happened, like a fifty-foot lizard rampaging downtown. Unfortunately? No such luck. It is still spring of 1970 - he still lives alone - Riley claims they met through a blind date hookup, not in school like he remembers.
Granted he remembers a future nearly a hundred years beyond the present of his “dream” so that’s problematic too. Considering he has no proof. No reason to believe this isn’t real except for his strong conviction that it isn’t.
He hasn’t quite gotten to the full-blown paranoia stage where he starts looking to make sure that everyone is real. He does, however, decide that he might as well figure out what the hell this thing is he’s supposedly doing for a living.
His apartment is plenty helpful for that, at least. There are plenty of graded and ungraded papers, syllabii from previous semesters, notes from students, notes to students. That’s at least a little helpful, isn’t it?
It is. It gives him a starting point (and a seating chart). Grading the assignments proves to be several hours during which he stops worrying about his clearly degenerative mental state and can just...do something. Which may or may not be useful, but, hey.
John does notice that he’s only been teaching about a year and a half. There are photographs from his own graduations, a completed PhD which completely boggles his mind, and a half-ignored journal from several years prior. There’s a postcard that confirms Riley’s first-date story, and a letter from his mother with no return address. Photographs of his parents with him. The happy family he doesn’t remember ever having.
Something else he notices, but doesn’t really process: Allison Young has taken one class that he’s either taught or TA’d every semester of his entire teaching career at this college. Granted, she’s one of maybe four or five repeat students, but still. It strikes him the next day when he knows exactly where to look for her amongst the seats as people file in.
And there she is, isn’t she? Third seat in the third row and smiling just as much as she did the last time he saw her. Talking to another student, until John actually looks at her, and then the other student sort of wanders off to his seat as if he weren’t talking to her at all.
So maybe that’s a little strange.
He’ll write it off as a trick of his mind. Besides, for all he knows the conversation finished.
The lecture, this time around, has a lot less poignant pauses while he gathers his thoughts, but he can tell from a few glances that it’s also a little different from his standard at this point. A lot more engagement. It’s less lecture and more polling for information for him, really.
Not that anyone complains, really? It’s sort of like a minivacation in the middle of the day for them. They answer all of his questions as best they can. And Allison? Takes copious notes.
Something he finds...interesting because it’s not like he thinks there’s a lot to take notes on. So. He waits to see if she offers some weird, quirky insight to his class at the end.
She does stay after, doesn’t she? “Did you learn what you wanted to learn?”
“In what respect?” The non-lecture, or his still waking dream life?
“With the questions. I don’t think that they noticed. Much.”
A blink. “Are you sure there was something for them to notice? You took quite a lot of notes for a lecture that was more questions than dictation.”
Notes that she’ll hand over. “In case you forget.” So she basically transcribed the entire lecture.
More blinking. “You didn’t have to do this.”
“I don’t mind.”
“...has this happened before?”
“To you?”
“Well to anyone, let’s start broad.”
“That seems likely.”
“Narrower. That you know of?”
“Not that I know. Personally.”
“Is there any point during my teaching the last few years where I seemed to be suffering from amnesia, short or long-term?”
“Not in the past few years.”
“Have you known me longer than that?”
“No, I haven’t known you longer than a few years.”
“...okay then.” Frowning at the notes. “I’ll make a copy and return these to you next class.”
Smiling at him. “All right. Thank you!”
“You’re welcome.” Sometimes, he thinks, her cheerfulness must be unsettling to others.
Quite possibly, quite likely. She just smiles at him for another moment before heading back out. If he doesn’t have more questions, anyway.