The Day We Met Again — A Short Story for English Reading and Speaking

John was in his study again.

He called it a study, but it was really just the spare room of the house where he lived with his wife, Sarah, and their two children, Robert and Millie.

The walls were covered in old wallpaper. He had promised to decorate the room years ago, but somehow he had never found the time.

Now it had become his hiding place whenever he and Sarah had another argument.

Tonight had been particularly bad.

He couldn’t even remember what had started it. Something about the children, perhaps. Or money. It didn’t matter. They seemed to argue about everything these days.

He remembered Millie standing at the bottom of the stairs, watching them. She was only seven. He hated the thought of her listening to her parents shouting at each other.

John sank into the old armchair.

He was tired of it all. The arguments, the shouting, the threats of leaving.

He had even started thinking about turning the spare room into a bedroom. Perhaps it would be easier if they slept separately.

When they were younger, he and Sarah had been inseparable. They had loved each other so much.

What had happened to them?

He remembered asking Sarah that very question a few weeks earlier.

‘What went wrong with us?’

She had looked at him, her eyes filling with tears.

‘I don’t know, John. I really don’t know.’

He looked around the room. There were piles of boxes, old books and a large wooden trunk filled with clothes they no longer wore.

On a small table beside his chair stood a framed photograph.

It showed him and Sarah when they were at university. They were sitting together beneath a tree, smiling at the camera.

He picked it up.

They looked so young. So happy.

He remembered that day. It was the day they first met.

He ran his thumb across the glass, looking at Sarah’s face.

For a moment, he wished he could go back.

Back to when everything was simple.

John closed his eyes.

Somewhere in the distance, he heard children laughing.

Then a voice shouted something.

He opened his eyes.

The room had disappeared.

He was sitting on a wooden bench in a park.

For several seconds, he couldn’t move.

What was happening?

He looked around. Children were playing on the grass. A woman was pushing a pram along a path. Somewhere nearby, a dog was barking.

He recognised the place.

It was the park near his old university.

But that was impossible. He hadn’t been here for years.

John stood up.

He looked down at himself.

He was wearing an old T-shirt with the name of a rock band printed across the front. He remembered that shirt. He had worn it almost every day when he was a student.

He touched his face.

No beard.

He had worn a beard for more than ten years.

His hair was longer, too. And thicker.

A short distance away stood a public toilet. He remembered there was a mirror inside.

He hurried towards it.

Above the wash basin was a small, cracked mirror.

John stared at his reflection.

It was him.

But not the man who had been sitting in the spare room a few moments earlier.

This was his younger face. No grey hair. No lines around his eyes.

He looked about twenty-one.

John stepped backwards.

‘What the hell is going on?’

He rushed outside.

Everything looked familiar. The duck pond, the benches, the wide stretch of grass where he and his friends used to play frisbee.

He could even smell the freshly cut grass.

This wasn’t a dream. It couldn’t be.

He could feel the warm sunshine on his face and the hard ground beneath his shoes.

He walked towards a small group of trees at the far end of the park.

He and his friends had always called this place The Wood.

And then he remembered something.

This was where he had first met Sarah.

He had been playing frisbee with his friends when the disc had flown towards the trees. He had run after it and seen a young woman sitting with her friends.

Sarah.

He had been terribly shy in those days, but something about her had made him stop and speak.

His first words had been ridiculous.

‘We’re playing frisbee.’

Sarah had laughed.

‘I can see that.’

And somehow, from that awkward little conversation, everything had begun.

Their first date. Their first kiss. Their wedding.

Robert and Millie.

Fifteen years together.

John stopped walking.

Fifteen years.

He looked around the park again.

Could it really be possible?

Then he heard someone shouting.

‘John!’

He turned.

A group of young men were playing frisbee on the grass.

He recognised them immediately.

His old university friends.

Men he hadn’t seen for years. Men who now had jobs, wives and children of their own.

One of them waved.

‘Come on, John!’

The frisbee sailed through the air, passing over his head before landing near the trees.

John watched it fall.

He knew what was about to happen.

He turned towards The Wood.

There were several young women sitting beneath the trees, chatting and laughing.

And there she was.

Sarah.

Young Sarah, with her long hair and that familiar half-smile.

His heart began to beat faster.

He remembered the woman he had left behind. The arguments. The tears. The nights they had spent lying in bed, facing away from each other.

He could simply walk away.

He could leave the frisbee where it was and never speak to her.

Perhaps he could have a completely different life.

No arguments. No unhappy marriage.

But then he thought of Robert and Millie.

Their faces. Their laughter. The way Millie ran towards him when he came home.

What would happen to them?

And what about Sarah?

He looked at her again.

She was laughing at something one of her friends had said.

He hadn’t seen her laugh like that for a long time.

Perhaps things could be different this time.

Perhaps not.

John stood there for a moment, watching her.

Then he picked up the frisbee.

He walked towards the young woman beneath the trees.

She turned and looked up at him.

Those eyes. That half-smile.

‘We’re playing frisbee,’ said John.

‘I can see that,’ she replied.