Chapter Text
Sometimes, when I wake up, I find myself crying.
My friends joke I’m just terminally single, and that my dreams are of a life with romance I don’t have.
I never remember what I was dreaming of, and my best friends think I’m stuck in the past.
My dad doesn’t know, because I don’t want to bother him with something stupid.
My parents are sure that whatever this is, I’ll get past it, just like I always do.
But I know one thing for certain.
I’m missing something in my life.
Someone is supposed to be here.
But I don’t know what.
But I don’t know who.
The smell of fresh bacon was strong in the Lacsamana house as Nicole stirred from her sleep. She leaned forward, stretching her back and arms as she swung her legs over the edge of her bed. The new school year was upon her, and she was hopeful that her freshman year of high school would set her up for success in the future.
As she went through her morning routine, Nicole brushed her hair for a few minutes before tying it into a ponytail using her typical teal and yellow bow. She’d done this so many times that it felt like second nature, instinct, but it felt right for her. She liked this hairstyle. She couldn’t imagine her hair anyway else.
Donning her school uniform, she checked herself twice before grabbing her bag and throwing it onto her back. As usual, when she looked in the mirror, she saw Nicole Lacsamana, a smart, talented, and prank-loving teenager. She wasn’t perfect, but she tried her best, and she had a glow that her parents always said lit up the world and the people around her. She’d always get embarrassed by these claims, but even her best friends thought it was true.
Speaking of Jake and Kate, if she didn’t get breakfast soon, she’d miss them on her way to school, and she would miss her favorite part of the day.
Bounding down the stairs, Nicole landed at the bottom with a bright smile, greeting her parents as she always did in the morning. “Morning, mom! Morning, dad!”
Her father turned around, spatula in hand, as he placed a few strips of bacon on the platter beside the stove. “Good morning, honey,” he exclaimed, giving her a big, warm smile.
“How are you feeling today?” her mother asked, placing plates and silverware on the table.
Nicole was about to respond, but her father joked, “Well, she figured out her ponytail today, so she’s better than yesterday.”
The comment confused the teenager, one of her eyebrows rising out of curiosity. “What do you mean? I always wear my ponytail.”
Her parents both blinked, exchanged a look themselves, before her mother spoke again. “You didn’t wear your ribbon yesterday,” she explained, looking quite confused herself. “You mentioned you didn’t feel like it.”
“You woke up late, too,” her father added, putting the rest of the bacon on the platter. Picking it up, he continued, “We assumed you had simply been worried about making it to school on time and didn’t want to delay yourself.”
As they all sat at the table, Nicole looked at the plate in front of her, empty without the food she had yet to be served. She couldn’t remember anything like that. In fact, now that she thought about it, yesterday was sort of a blur. “I don’t know,” she finally responded. “Maybe you’re right. Guess I should be going to bed earlier.”
Her mother nodded, and the family began eating and talking about the day in earnest. The strange bump in the day that was her foggy recollection of yesterday didn’t come up again until she had left the house.
As she walked down the road from her house towards school, she saw two familiar faces, waiting for her at the crossroads as they normally did for her. “Morning, Jake! Morning, Kate!”
“You’re back to normal,” Kate noticed when they met up on their path to school.
Once again, Nicole looked at her with confusion as the trio began to walk, “What do you mean?”
Kate’s brother snorted, “We thought you’d been abducted by aliens yesterday. I mean, seriously, you always have your hair up, and you didn’t even recognize us.”
That caused Nicole to nearly stumble as she took in the new information, “How could I not recognize you, Jake?”
Jake shrugged, then began to smile devilishly. “Oh, I get it. This was one of your new prank ideas, huh?” Jake ran ahead of the two girls and began to act, “Oh look, I’m Nicole Lacsamana, I don’t remember my best friends or how to do my hair!”
While Kate snorted this time, Nicole scoffed, “I wouldn’t do that!”
With an exaggerated roll of his eyes, Jake joined Nicole’s side opposite Kate and countered, “Then how do you explain yesterday?”
Nicole opened her mouth to respond, but she closed it and pouted. “I don’t know,” she finally said after a few paces.
Kate shook her head, “Whatever, I’m not interested in this stupid prank. You finished your art project, right?”
Glad to move on from the subject of yesterday, Nicole nodded. “Yeah, a few days ago. I’m going to do some touch-ups today before class, but it's already in the art classroom,” she explained.
“So whatcha make this time?” Jake asked, elbows up as he held his hands behind his head.
“You’ll just have to wait and see,” Nicole teased, winking towards Jake.
On her opposite side, Kate gagged, “Please don’t flirt while I’m around. I’m not going to third wheel you guys.”
At this, both Nicole and Jake blushed, with Jake scratching the back of his head and Nicole looking down as if to pretend no one could see her.
As their journey to school continued, they heard someone talking quite loudly, with a crowd gathered around them. It took Nicole a moment to recognize the voice, but based on the reactions of her friends, they recognized it immediately.
“I have done so much for this community already,” Mr. Corpuz highlighted. “Improving road quality, creating and filling a myriad of public service jobs, and implementing rehabilitative programs for people looking to improve their lives.” As his list finished, murmurs in the crowd spread, though Mr. Corpuz continued to speak. “Many may criticize the number of factories that have opened in Purok Pagasa during my term, but I would argue that the creation of jobs and making living affordable in this city is well worth the risk when our track record of keeping the city clean is as strong as it is.”
Jake and Kate both kept their heads down, opting to ignore their father and his early morning speech. Nicole couldn’t blame them - since she could remember, Mr. Corpuz was never a kind man, and while she understood all the good he did for the community, she also knew that behind closed doors, her friends never felt comfortable around him. Knowing him, he likely made this speech here just so he could see them on their way to school in an attempt to catch them not going to school.
Thankfully, the clearing he was using was small, and the time they were visible to him was minimal.
The rest of the walk to school was rather typical from that point, and Nicole promptly tried to forget about whatever oddities people around her observed. Classes went smoothly, though she noticed some odd details in her notes for history - yesterday’s notes were sparse and were peppered with information that didn’t seem relevant to the class.
One note mentioned that people were calling her Nicole, and that she apparently knew the Corpuz twins. It noted that her hair was different today, but she “couldn’t find any pictures before going downstairs that indicated what it was supposed to look like”. Underneath that, it noted that she wore a ponytail in her ribbon. It also noted down the teachers' names and, strangely, had notes from all her classes, not just history class.
She didn’t remember taking down any of these notes. It was an odd find, and she wondered if Jake had pranked her, but he seemed confused about what had happened with her yesterday. She briefly considered if someone else would have, but she wasn’t exactly close with anyone else. It would be weird for anyone else to pull this sort of joke.
“Ms. Lacsamana, are you ready to present your art piece?” Ms. Flores said, startling Nicole out of her daze. She stood up and grabbed her piece, though a number of her classmates giggled. As she walked to the front of the class, Ms. Flores shushed the class, whose giggles were clearly directed at Nicole. If her notebook was any indication, she realized, she probably didn’t respond to her name being called yesterday.
Once she had presented her piece - a beautiful palm beach during a sunset - Nicole sat back down and tried to get the strangeness of yesterday out of her mind. And thankfully, the rest of the day went by quickly.
“Can you believe we’re already high schoolers?” Jake asked, staring up at the evening sky as they walked home from school.
“Jake, we’re only freshmen,” Kate responded, clearly unimpressed with Jake’s amazement at their age.
Clicking his tongue, Jake shook his head, “Yeah, sure, make us sound young. We’re only a couple years away from being adults.”
Nicole nodded, “It is sort of weird, thinking about it. The past few years have moved quickly.”
Sighing, Kate nodded, “Yeah, I guess.”
“What do you think you’ll do after high school?” Jake asked, though the question seemed almost like he meant for it to be an inside thought.
“Not here with our parents,” Kate pretty quickly responded, though after a pause, she continued. “Maybe I’ll pick up music, like Nicole.”
“Like a guitar?” Nicole asked, a smile etched across her face.
“You don’t have a musical bone in your body, Kate,” Jake teased, which earned him a slap on the shoulder from his sister. Smiling, he thought aloud. “I just like making people smile. Maybe I’ll try being a comedian.”
“Mhmm, and I’ll become a magician,” Kate shot back.
The image made Nicole laugh, “And pull a bunny out of your hat?”
With a snort, Jake sideeyed Kate. “That’s a thought - you wanted a bunny when we were younger, right?”
“Only so it would eat my carrots,” Kate explained.
“You could’ve just given them to me!” Jake argued.
“Because you can’t see, right?” the sister smirked, having cornered her brother.
Cringing, Jake looked to Nicole, “You’ll be a pianist, right?”
“Good save,” Kate rolled her eyes.
Nicole couldn’t help but giggle at their banter, but nodded in response to Jake. “That’s the goal. I’ve still got to work on a couple pieces of my own.”
“That’s good. You always look happiest when you’re playing,” Jake responded, the smallest hints of red tinting his cheeks.
His sister nodded in agreement, “Yeah, you’ve already got your life figured out from here. Graduate and become a famous pianist.”
Nicole shook her head, “No, I wouldn’t go that far. I love playing, it’s true, but if I can’t make ends meet, then I have to try something else, right?”
Jake nodded, then looked around. “This is our street.”
“We’ll see you tomorrow,” Kate said, waving once before heading down the road. Jake smiled at Nicole and waved enthusiastically before running after Kate, leaving Nicole for the evening.
After dinner, Nicole went into the piano room and opened up her binder of music, only to find that her works in progress were disorganized. Looking through it, she realized they also had a handful of added notes. Thinking about the sound the new notes would make, she put the pieces back together in the correct order before sitting up straight and preparing to play.
Her fingers danced across the piano, the sound of her first piece echoing around the walls of the room. As the sound of the first few pages rang, she realized that the new additions, while a little clumsily added, didn’t sound too bad. She almost liked it. She couldn’t remember adding these notes, though, nor would she have held them that long. The notes were poorly timed, but the idea was enough to inspire her.
Cleaning up the additions, she tried the piece again, this time with the new stanzas added, flowing well from where she had left off. This was the type of progress she had been looking for over the summer - she had struggled to continue the piece because her instinct felt too repetitive.
What was happening with her life? It was like someone else had entered her body and lived a day in her life, then given her back control the following day.
It was preposterous, though, and Nicole soon found herself in pajamas and curled up in bed, the echo of her piece ringing in her mind as she played it over again. She really did like it. But the question remained - why did everything from yesterday seem so odd? And where did her school notes and music notes come from?
Deciding she wasn’t about to lose sleep over it, Nicole pulled the covers over her shoulder and let herself drift, the sound of piano lightly playing in the back of her mind as she thought more about how to finish the piece.