She’s coming in the door as you – and the half-dozen people walking with you – are headed out. She holds the door open to let you pass.
“Hold up,” you say, and then bend over, pantomiming picking up the five dollar bill you’ve got palmed in your hand. You straighten up again and hold it out to her. “I think you dropped this.”
“Don’t think so,” she says, stepping around you.
You turn to watch her bobbing head disappear into the flow of traffic.
“Do you mind, dude?” someone says.
You turn to find a young woman in a pea green sailor’s jacket twice her size and half of her hair shaved off. You realize you’re still standing in the doorway.
“Sorry,” you mumble, standing back to let her through – and the twenty other people behind her.
When you’ve finally fought your way out of the building, you settle down on the low wall running along the path, holding up a hedge. You watch as the crowds clear out, everyone getting to their different destinations. You'll soon have the whole quad to yourself, except for the occasional straggler, rushing to class late – like you were earlier this morning (was that only just this morning?).
You’ve figured out what’s going on. You’ve been making your way through repeated permutations of the butterfly effect. You keep putting yourself in the same exact situation, but each time subtle differences – your tone of voice, your facial expression, your body language – elicit different responses from Inez. It would be fascinating if it weren’t so damned frustrating.
In the long run, though, it’s good news: it means that if you keep on trying eventually you’ll come up with the right combination that yields the results you’re looking for. Thanks to the House, you can ask her as many times as you need to. You need her to say “yes” only once.
It also occurs to you that passing each other in a crowded doorway is just about the worst situation to try to strike up a conversation with anyone.
You jump back five minutes in time. But this time, you don’t leave the building at all. You stand cross-armed, leaning casually (you hope you look casual) against the wall, watching the river of humanity flowing past.
You finally spot Inez among them. You let her go by, not even glancing in her direction, but then you turn and follow her down the hallway.
Once you discover what classroom she’s headed into, you settle down on the floor across from the door to wait. You pull out a textbook to create the illusion that you’re just another student cramming before a big exam.
You continue this ruse for about three minutes until you realize that no one really cares. So you put the notebook away and start playing games on your phone.
Eighty minutes later, the sounds of three dozen chairs scraping backwards across the floor signals the end of class. You stand and re-assume your casual pose.
You watch people stroll out of the room, half of them already texting someone on their phones, until Inez appears.
You act surprised. “Wait – Inez?”
She turns to you and blinks. “Yes?”
“I thought I recognized you. How have you been?”
She joins you against the wall, but her face is wary. “Do we know each other?”
“It was that party, at the start of the semester. We must’ve talked for at least an hour.”
“I don’t remember that.”
“I’m not surprised,” you say easily. “You were pretty wasted.”
A knowing smile crosses her face. “Now I know you’re bullshitting me.” And she walks away.
With a sigh, you watch her go. The fact of the matter is that it's been so long since you've asked a woman out that you have no idea how to do it anymore. But you've got all the time in the world, of course – literally – so there's no reason to stop trying. Maybe it'll start coming back to you.
Like riding a bicycle, you tell yourself, without much conviction. Then you jump back sixty seconds into the hallway full of people, half of them already texting someone on their phones.
Inez appears. How should you break the ice?
Or you can think better of it, deciding instead to