The school corridor was louder than usual.
Students crowded around the noticeboard, whispering among themselves. A teacher stood outside the examination office, speaking to the principal in a low voice.
Arin immediately recognized the room.
The examination office.
In his first life, this was where everything had begun to fall apart.
"What's going on?" Kyle asked, squeezing through the crowd.
A boy near the noticeboard answered, "Someone's taken the sealed papers for next week's academic examination."
Kyle scowled. "What? How does that even happen?"
Before Arin could respond, the teacher turned toward them.
"Alexander. Vale. Both of you, come here."
Arin's stomach tightened.
Not again.
He remembered this moment.
In his original timeline, Kyle had been questioned because someone claimed to have seen him near the examination office the previous afternoon.
Arin had known that Kyle was innocent.
He had also remembered seeing someone carrying a blue folder.
But when the teachers asked him what he had seen, he'd stayed silent.
He'd been afraid of getting involved.
That silence had cost him his best friend.
"Sir?" Kyle asked.
"Someone reported seeing you near the examination office yesterday afternoon," the teacher said. "Can you explain why?"
"I was returning a library book," Kyle replied. "I walked past this corridor, but I never entered the office."
"Do you have anyone who can confirm that?"
Kyle hesitated.
Arin stepped forward.
"I can tell you something about yesterday."
Kyle turned to him.
The teacher folded his arms. "Go on."
Arin took a breath.
"I saw someone carrying a blue folder near this corridor yesterday. I couldn't see their face clearly, but they weren't Kyle."
The surrounding students fell quiet.
For the first time in two timelines, Arin had spoken when it mattered.
The teacher studied him carefully.
"Why didn't you mention this earlier?"
Arin lowered his eyes.
"Because I wasn't sure what I'd seen."
It wasn't the whole truth.
But it was the first time he'd chosen honesty over fear.
"All right," the teacher said. "Both of you may return to class. We'll investigate further."
Kyle didn't move.
He stared at Arin as though he were looking at a stranger wearing his best friend's face.
Once they were outside, Kyle grabbed is shoulder.
"Since when do you volunteer information to teachers?"
"Since today."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only one I've got."
Kyle searched his face, then slowly released him.
"Well..." He gave a small, uncertain smile. "Thanks, bro."
Arin looked away before Kyle could see how much those two words meant to him.
He had heard them a thousand times in his first life.
He'd never understood their value until he'd lost them.
During lunch, Arin noticed Mira sitting alone in an empty classroom.
Her notebook lay open on the desk.
She was staring at a page with such concentration that she didn't notice him until he spoke.
"Are you writing another prediction?"
Mira shut the notebook.
"Are you following me?"
"Technically, I'm walking down a school corridor."
"Technically, you're standing in a classroom where nobody else is."
Arin sighed. "Do you always have to do that?"
"Do what?"
"Make every conversation feel like an interrogation."
"Only when someone keeps avoiding my questions."
For a moment, neither spoke.
Then Mira glanced toward the window.
"You changed something today."
"The examination paper?"
"No." Her eyes returned to his. "You changed your response."
Arin's expression stiffened.
"What does that mean?"
"In the version of events I remember, you said nothing when Kyle was questioned."
The room seemed to grow colder.
Arin stared at her.
"What did you just say?"
Mira looked genuinely unsettled by her own words.
"I don't know why I said that."
"Remember what?"
She opened the notebook again.
The page contained a single sentence:
Arin Vale will speak this time.
Beneath it was a date.
April 28.
Arin felt a chill run down his spine.
"Did you write that before this morning?"
Mira nodded slowly.
"But I don't remember writing it."
Arin pulled out his phone and showed her the message from the unknown number.
Kyle doesn't leave school because of the examination paper.
Mira read it twice.
Then she looked up.
"Someone knows what you're trying to change."
"Who?"
"I don't know."
"Then what do you know?"
Mira hesitated.
"That you aren't the only person who's afraid of what happens next."
A distant bell rang.
Mira quickly closed her notebook and stood.
As she passed him, she stopped at the doorway.
"Arin?"
"Yeah?"
"Whatever you remember about the future..."
She looked directly at him.
"...don't assume everyone else is living it for the first time."
Then she left.
Arin remained in the empty classroom.
For the first time since his return, he wondered whether the second timeline belonged to him at all.
The pocket watch began ticking during mathematics class.
Arin froze.
It was inside his bag, wrapped in a handkerchief. He had brought it to school without really knowing why.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
He slipped his hand into the bag and felt the cold metal against his fingers.
Then his phone vibrated.
One message.
UNKNOWN: You spoke up for Kyle. Good.
Arin's blood ran cold.
A second message appeared.
UNKNOWN: But you still haven't told him what you did in the first timeline.
Arin looked toward Kyle, who was busy copying a formula from the board.
How could they know?
Another message arrived.
UNKNOWN: Tell him before midnight, or he'll discover it himself.
The classroom clock clicked forward.
11:16.
11:17.
Every clock in the room stopped.
The teacher's voice faded.
The ceiling fan became motionless.
Even the students seemed frozen in place.
Everyone except Arin.
He stood slowly.
"Kyle?"
His best friend didn't respond.
Arin reached for his shoulder.
The pocket watch snapped shut inside his hand.
A whisper came from somewhere behind him.
"You've already failed him once."
Arin spun around.
At the back of the classroom stood a boy he had never seen before.
The boy wore the same school uniform.
He had the same dark hair.
The same eyes.
And the same small scar above his left eyebrow.
Arin stopped breathing.
The stranger smiled sadly.
"Still trying to become a better person?"
Arin couldn't speak.
The boy took one step forward.
"Then tell me, Arin..."
He raised his hand.
A broken pocket watch hung from his fingers.
"...what happens when the person you betrayed remembers everything?"
Tick.
The clocks started moving again.
The ceiling fan spun.
The teacher continued writing on the board.
Kyle turned toward Arin.
"Bro? You okay? You look like you've seen a ghost."
Arin stared at the back of the classroom.
The boy was gone.
But on Arin's desk lay a folded piece of paper.
He opened it with trembling fingers.
There were only six words.
YOU WERE NOT THE FIRST ARIN.