Relationship status: "Got me a time machine. Gonna get her back."
I didn’t know what it was exactly about my visit to the Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, Calif. that allowed me to twist things the way I did. It was just a private tour provided by some girl I met at a bar. Sure, I saw some offices no regular outsiders normally get to see, but the visit wasn’t that exciting. I mostly remembered it as an expedition through a bunch of boring rooms with giant computers with incomprehensible numbers on them.
After that visit, however, Facebook started to give me browsing options mostly reserved for Mark Zuckerberg.
It happened while I was at home on the day I switched to the “Timeline,” Facebook’s latest way of screwing things up. It was supposed to allow users to highlight events of their entire Facebook history, but I wasn’t a fan of it. It annoyed me that I couldn’t keep the old wall. I only switched because the website forced me to.
Despite my displeasure with the change, I did what everyone does when switching to that new Facebook look: I spent hours looking at past status updates and friends’ wall posts. It was entertaining and brought back an abundance of memories, good and bad. My favorite one was one from early 2010 from the day I announced I got my own apartment. I got like 50 comments on it, most of them being queries of when I was throwing a housewarming party.
I was going through 2010 still when I noticed the Timeline layout had icon options that appeared above the status when you dragged the cursor over it. One was a star that popped out the word “highlight” as you placed the mouse’s arrow on it. The other one was a pencil, which popped out “edit or remove.”
The third icon showed a clock. The word “visit” emerged as the cursor positioned itself on it.
I didn’t hesitate. Why should I? I clicked.
And back in time I went.
Things got blurry. My eyes burned and I blinked very hard for a few seconds. When I opened them … I was looking at a football field. I had clicked on my “Gasol is Godddd” status from the day the Lakers won Game 7 of the 2010 Finals against the Celtics, a day I remembered like it was yesterday: June 17, 2010. It was the same day as my sister’s high school graduation. The Timeline had landed me at the high school’s bleachers, next to my dad holding that unforgettable “Congradulations” balloon.
“Dad?” I said nervously as my heart began to race in confusion.
“Valedictorian,” my dad said with watery eyes. “I don’t know if I’ve ever been more proud of her in my life. She is …”
“… something else,” I finished his sentence, having recalled the moment.
My dad squinted at me, but before he had a chance to say anything else, I got up off my seat and walked down the bleachers, away from the crowds. I needed air. Your first time-traveling experience, especially when you’re not expecting it, is … something else.
I stopped near the restrooms and started to wonder if I was dreaming. I pinched myself. Ouch. I slapped myself. Double ouch. This was real. I was in a moment I had already lived before.
And then I remembered: FACEBOOK
The “visit” button, I thought.
I checked my pockets. My phone was there. Not my current iPhone, but my lame Samsung Omnia from 2010. By this moment, I was coming to terms with me having just time-traveled. I went on Facebook mobile, which had me logged in. I had to find answers and I didn’t know where else to look.
I pressed on the drop-down menu. Just below “Messages,” there was an option which read “Go back.”
I had never seen that option before. I pressed it.
It took about 30 seconds to load, but then I was back. Back in front of my laptop at my humble apartment in Atherton. Never had I been so happy to feel the discomfort of my disintegrating couch. I was home.
I pulled my phone out and called my mom and asked her if we still had family dinner plans for that night. She said yes. That was my way of proving I was back in March, 2012. My iPhone also had the present date on it, but I wanted to make sure. Goodness, this was all so silly, so unbelievable.
As I held my phone in my hands, I still couldn’t quite give credit to what had just transpired. I went to my laptop and carefully logged onto Facebook again. I clicked on my profile and scrolled down my Timeline. I dragged the cursor over a January 14, 2012 status that read “Who’s got it better than us? Nobody!” It was from the day the 49ers beat the Saints in the NFL playoffs.
Again, the three icons appeared. “Visit” was still there.
I smiled. What a pleasant thought it was to re-live the 49ers’ epic playoff win against New Orleans. But no. I couldn’t waste a “visit” on that. Who knew if there was a limit to what this thing could do? This was indeed some kind of Facebook time machine, and I was going to use it again, but for something much greater.
I was going to fix things with Catherine.
* * *
Catherine came into my life unexpectedly in March of 2008. She was a year younger than I and had beautiful, long black hair. She was a sociology major who wanted to work for low-income families. Cat had such good heart. We started off as mere acquaintances that saw each other once a week at a dance class at San Mateo College. Getting her phone number was kind of an accident. I really wasn’t planning on falling for her. It just happened.
The only problem was that I was a bit scarred from a prior two-year relationship and did not want to commit right away out of the fear of being hurt. Catherine was as understanding about this as one can be, for a while. Then, about a year into our “relationship,” she got fed up with my hot-and-cold attitude and silently stopped caring.
Catherine and I were never official and I only noticed her departure after a couple weeks of not hearing from her. Clearly, I didn’t give her the amount of attention she deserved. I just thought she'd always be there. By the time I wanted to make amends, Catherine had become detached from me.
Ouch. Double ouch.
Catherine resurfaced in my life a few months later, as a friend, but quietly disappeared again. That happened a couple more times. For whatever reason, I could never make it work with her. I still had her in my heart. It was frustrating to have lost her the way I did and being unable to get her back.
I had to go back to the origin of everything and make things right.
The logistics were simple that next morning on my couch: I log onto Facebook and click on an old status update’s “visit” icon. To get back, I just had to log on through my cell phone and select the “go back” option.
Only statuses had the “visit” option. Pictures, wall posts from friends and Words with Friends notifications remained unaltered. I also realized I counted with the advantage of not having to worry about “running into myself.” I didn’t know where I’d appear, but I’d be the only me.
“To Marty McFly and 1.21 jigawatts,” I toasted as I clicked “visit” on my chosen “I gotta date with the NBA dunkcontest tonight” status.
What a terrible speller I was.
My statuses were never about Catherine, but luckily I knew the key dates. After my long, forceful blink, I opened my eyes to find Catherine sitting in front of me at the restaurant where I took her for Valentine’s Day 2009.
“Hi Catherine,” I said smiling. She looked so beautiful. How did I never ask her to be my girlfriend?
“Hey handsome,” she replied smiling back.
The night went smoothly. I messed up a couple times when she made references to things that had happened a few days before then, but she didn’t make a big deal out of it. We had some laughs, I paid the bill and then we headed back to her apartment.
Everything was happening just the way it happened the first time. In this occasion, however, I didn’t plan to leave in the middle of the night, like in the original V-Day 2009.
In this new opportunity, I spent the night with her. She and I had breakfast the next day. Then, just as I was leaving, I took her in my arms, pulled her close to me and told her what I never had the guts to tell her before.
“Catherine, I love you,” I said. “Would you be my girlfriend?”
Her face lit up. “Yes!” she said as she threw her arms around my neck and kissed me. We spent a good five minutes at it before stopping. Then, still tasting Catherine’s strawberry lipgloss, I left.
More than pleased, I stopped in her building’s hallway, ready for departure to my own time. I pulled out my phone, logged onto Facebook and pressed “Go back.”
I was back home again, sitting on the same uncomfortable couch. I pulled out my phone. It read the correct, present date.
With the memory of Catherine’s kisses still fresh, I searched for her on my contacts on my phone. I couldn’t wait to hear her voice and see her in the now. I had just kissed her a few minutes before in real time, but that had been more than three years ago in time history.
But I couldn’t find Catherine’s number on my phone.
Frustrated, I went on Facebook on my laptop and looked for her on my friends list. I typed her name on the search bar and it came up. I clicked on it.
She was not my friend.
Exasperated, I clicked on “add friend” on her page. What in blazes was going on? How were we not even friends on Facebook? Why didn’t I have her number?
Two hours into my staring at the computer awaiting for a response from Catherine, a notification popped up from the left side of the screen. She had just accepted my friend request. Her name also appeared in my chat list.
I messaged her.
“Hey … how you been?” she responded.
“Good,” I answered. “Hey, I was just wondering how come we … you know … mmm well, I mean, are we in a fight or something?”
She didn’t type for a while.
“Lol. Nah. We’re good,” she said after a few minutes.
She didn’t type anything again for several minutes.
“Hello?” I typed. “What’s wrong? Are you mad?
“No why?” she answered.
“Because you aren’t really talking to me? And we weren’t friends on Facebook? We used to be together …”
After a few wordless minutes, she signed off.
My heart dropped. I felt my world crumble. I waited for her sign back on. She didn’t, but a couple hours later, I got an offline message from her.
“Sorry. Don’t mean to hurt your feelings. Just wanna keep my distance, you know? I don’t want the same thing to happen and don’t really wanna get too deep in talking about the past. Having to end things was hard because I really liked you, but I just couldn’t deal with how intense you were. It wasn’t right to not tell you at the time. But that’s how you are and you need to find the right girl and it’s just not me. Sorry. Hope you understand. Take care.”
I read the message several times with my mouth open. I came on too strong? Telling her I loved her and asking her to be my girlfriend was a bad idea? But she was so happy when I said it! That just couldn’t have been fake, could it?
I looked at my Timeline, I searched for February 15, 2009.
I had a status for that day. It read: “I’m in love with the most wonderful girl in the world!” and Catherine was tagged.
“Wow,” I said to myself. “I guess I know what she means by ‘intense.’”
I had to fix it again, I decided. I found the cursor and placed it over the clock icon. I hit “visit.”
I blinked and found myself in front of Catherine, kissing her. This was the moment right after I had told her I loved her.
The kiss ended and I looked deep into her eyes. I realized I hadn’t really thought through how I was going to fix things, but I was going to let my heart do the talking and hope the universe would let us stay together.
“I’m sorry, Catherine,” I started ... “I shouldn’t have said that. It’s not that I don’t mean that I love you, but I want it to mean even more when I say the next time. I care about you and I do want you to be my girlfriend and develop a better relationship. You’re the girl I want to be with … There’s no one else I think about. I’m sorry if I hurt your feelings with this just now. I just want to be as honest as possible and give us the best chance to make this work. I really like you, Catherine …”
Catherine looked at me intently, then gave me a light smile.
“It’s OK.” She said. “I wasn’t really ready for you to tell me that. I do want to be your girlfriend. And maybe we’ll both say the L word to each other some time in the future. We’ll see.”
I held Catherine’s hand and brought her close to me again. I kissed her softly and said good-bye.
“Don’t be so dramatic, guy.” She said laughing.
I smiled. “See you soon,” I said.
I walked through her building’s hallway, thinking of the chances that Catherine and I would be together when I went back to 2012. I regretted not having planned this trip to the past better, but I was happy with the end result.
“Time to get back to the future,” I thought. “Or my present or whatever.”
“Go back.” I said pressing the button.
And back on my couch I was. Apparently, there was no alternate reality in which I didn’t end up with this awful couch.
I pulled out my phone. The date was correct. I looked through my contacts.
Catherine’s name was there!
A smile spread across my face as I pressed the “call” button.
The phone rang six times, and then went to voicemail.
I tried again. This time it was picked up.
But it wasn’t her. It was a guy’s voice, “hello?”
My heart dropped worse than when she wasn’t my Facebook friend.
“H-hi, could I speak to Catherine?” I said.
“Who’s this?” the voice said.
“It’s Daniel, who am I speaking with?” I said.
I could hear Catherine in the background. She was saying something to the guy. This couldn’t be good.
“Sorry, dude. She said to tell you she doesn’t talk to cheaters,” the voice said. Then he clicked.
The phone fell from my hands. I dropped to my knees, feeling confused, angry and devastated.
“No … I couldn’t have … that’s not true …” I thought as tears rolled down my eyes.
“Why can’t we be together!?” I yelled in the midst of my hopelessness.
* * *
I laid facedown on the floor for a few hours. Just as I was about to fall into a painful sleep, I heard a noise I didn’t recognize coming from my phone. Was that a text message sound?
I grabbed the iPhone hoping it was Catherine texting me, hoping the text would read this had all just been a cruel joke. Instead, the text message was from an unsaved number.
It read: “Some things, you can’t change.”
I texted back: “I know.”
This was Sarah, the girl from the bar who had taken me to the Facebook headquarters before all this past-present mayhem took place. I hadn’t saved her number, yet I remembered her strange 512 phone area code.
More text messages from Sarah came through: “When we met, it seemed like all you wanted to talk about was your past choices and how they’ve affected your life. It gave me the feeling you were stuck on that. I wanted to give you a chance to see things happen for a reason and that you can’t dwell on that forever. That’s why I took you through the Facebook Travel room.”
Facebook Travel room? I thought as another text came through.
“As you can see now, it didn’t matter what you did. Some things aren’t meant to be.”
I finally texted back: “You some kind of witch? Screw off!”
“Let’s just say Zuckerberg is the ‘face’ while I’m the ‘book,’” Sarah texted back. “Time to let go. Live your life.”
I didn’t text her back anymore. I had bigger things to worry about, like getting over Catherine again. It was going to be really difficult.
I went on Facebook. As I suspected, the clock icon, the “visits” no longer appeared when I dragged the cursor over a status. I couldn’t even go see that one 49ers game again. How depressing …
* * *
It’s funny. You think you’re never going to stop loving someone. But you do. You go through a lot of heartache, but eventually it goes away. And then someone else comes in and you get to do it all over again. It kind of sucks, but it’s also kind of awesome.
It’s been eight months since that fateful call to Catherine. The guy who answered was her boyfriend Steve. I hear they’re still together. I also found out that I cheated on Catherine with one of her co-workers from school. I was really drunk, apparently. Go figure that one out. I wish I could remember what really happened. The Facebook Timeline Machine would really come in handy for that.
I can say I’m over Catherine now, though. I transferred to UCLA and I’m dating someone new. Her name is Karla. She’s amazing.
I’m almost done with my degree in English. I’m at the library right now studying for a big midterm. Catherine? I don’t know where she is nor I care.
Actually, hold that thought. I don’t believe this. She literally just walked into my floor and is approaching my table. Wow, I haven’t seen her since … never mind … I get confused with time.
She is in front of me now. Are those butterflies or am I just sick of seeing her again?
“Daniel, don’t give up on me,” she says.
I slam my book on the table furiously, “For the love of God. What are you doing here? Aren’t you with Steve?”
“Steve and I broke up over three year …” she cuts off.
“Was she going to say three years ago?” I think as I catch glimpse of a bulky, colorful watch-like object on Catherine’s left wrist. It has a white circle drawn within a white square, like a camera of sorts.
For a moment, I’m confused, but then I see what Catherine’s watch has written on it, and I think I begin to understand what’s happening.
The watch reads: “Instagram travel.”