(Day 12 assignment. Write a conversation based in real life with foreshadowing in it. Today’s game, spot the foreshadowing. Tell me what you think it is and what you think it’s foretelling.)
“Didn’t you know that’s how you get a green card?” he said as I leaned over the table to hear him over the din of two-hundred students celebrating the end of the week drunken law student style, by talking about anything that could be argued under the sun and over beer.
“You just have to come here for school and you get your green card?” I said. That couldn’t be right.
He tossed his head back, laughing a booming goofy laugh that made the people at our table and probably the ones around it stare at him.
“No.” He shook his head. “I got one when I was here before for a year; it carried over. They just let you keep it after ten years.”
“What?”
He held up a hand, saying something I couldn’t quite catch with his accent over the noise. “I’m completely messing with you. For, like, the last ten minutes. It’s really difficult to get a green card. I’m here on a student visa.”
I bit back an embarrassed grin. Yeah, I was going to make a great lawyer. Couldn’t even tell when someone was pulling my leg. “So, what you’re saying is I shouldn’t believe a word that comes out of your mouth?”
He nodded, putting on a solemn face. “That’s exactly what I’m saying, yes.”
“Well then, I don’t think I can keep talking to you. It’s going to be pointless.”
“Yep, you should go.”
“And by that, you actually mean I should stay?”
“Because we are in a backwards reality, no.”
“But if we were in a backwards reality, we wouldn’t know it. It’d be forwards there. And the forwards reality would be backwards.”
“I have no idea what you just said.”
I giggled. “Me neither.”
“Well now I’m confused.”
“Me too!”
“Then we should just pretend we are in a forwards reality and say what we mean.” He stood, walking over to my side of the table, all wide smile and earnest brown eyes. “And I need another beer. Can I get you some?”
“I don’t like beer. But thanks.”
“You know you can’t say you don’t like beer to a German, right?”
“I did not know that. My apologies. But come on, the stuff they have in that keg isn’t real beer anyway, right?”
He laughed again, loud and unapologetic. “Are you sure you’ve never been to Germany? Or at least have some in your family?”
“Positive on the first. Second, not that I know of. I mean, I want to go travel. I just haven’t done a lot. I’m still working on the whole life experiences thing.”
He looked over his shoulder towards the swarm around the booze table. “I think they have wine.”
“Oh.” I straightened like a prairie dog. “I’ll take some wine.”
He grinned bigger, if that was possible. “I’ll be back.”
“So that means you’re not coming back, right? Because I can’t believe anything you say?”
“Exactly,” he said with a pointed finger. “I will not not be back.”
I stuck my tongue out at his back as he slid into the crowd/line to the drinks.
I turned my attention back to the table and the two girls I was slowly making friends with (and had sat at the table originally because they were people I actually recognized) gave me knowing looks.
“What?”
“I see a little romance happening,” Liz said, winking at me.
“You like him?” Cassandra asked, nodding towards the crowd.
“I just met him.” I took a sip of my water, pretending I couldn’t feel my face heating up.
David sat down after getting his drink and they took off on another topic with him. Thank god.
“Hey,” came over my shoulder a few minutes later. He handed me a plastic cup of white wine before sitting next to me instead of taking his original seat on the other side of the table.
“Hey man,” David said before I could get out my thanks, “you going to the Eighties party tonight?”
“I don’t know… I don’t have a ride.”
David nodded at me. “Millie said she’s going. Why don’t you give him a ride?”
“Of course,” I said. “I’m going about nine. I’d be happy to take you.”
(FYI, this was based on a real conversation I had about four years ago with someone I’d just met, who turned out to be one of the defining characters in my life. It’s so perfect for today because I remember looking back on that conversation and thinking it was foreshadowing fit for fiction.)
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