Tackled by You

Chapter 43 – Waking Up Changed

The morning sun was familiar. So was the sound of the city traffic below, the faint buzz of a phone on the nightstand, and the warmth of a blanket tangled between them.

Sheik blinked slowly, then sat up.

He was tall again. His arms were long. His voice — back to normal.

Andrea stirred beside him. "We're back?"

She looked down at her hands, turning them over slowly. They were hers again — eighteen-year-old hands, painted nails, little scar on her left thumb from when she cut herself peeling mangoes last year.

Sheik let out a deep breath. "That was real, wasn't it?"

Andrea nodded. "Somehow… yeah."

They sat in silence, both of them overwhelmed by the strange peace in their chests. The world hadn't changed — not really — but they had.

Andrea turned to Sheik, her voice quiet. "When we were twelve… I felt fearless."

"I felt free," he agreed. "Like love wasn't complicated."

She smiled, reaching for his hand. "Maybe it doesn't have to be."

They got dressed and headed out for breakfast — everything looked the same, but there was a lightness in their steps, like their hearts had been reset.

While walking past a street vendor, Andrea stopped. Her eyes landed on a little plush toy dog — floppy ears, big eyes, a ridiculous pink bow on its head.

It was the same one she remembered from a shop when she was a kid. The one she begged her mom for and never got.

Without thinking, Sheik bought it.

"For twelve-year-old you," he said, grinning.

Andrea clutched the toy to her chest, eyes misty. "You remembered."

"Everything."

That afternoon, they sat on the rooftop of Sheik's apartment building, the breeze playing with Andrea's hair. They didn't need to talk much — the quiet was full of meaning.

They hadn't just traveled back in time.They had rediscovered something they'd almost lost in the noise of growing up:The simplicity of joy. The purity of love. The magic of just being.

Before they went back inside, Sheik pulled something from his pocket.

It was a tiny note, scribbled in pencil, worn and wrinkled. In the shaky handwriting of a twelve-year-old, it read:

"I think I'm going to love you forever. — S.J."

Andrea looked up at him, tears in her eyes.

"You kept this?" she whispered.

"I think I wrote it last night," Sheik said, his voice cracking. "In the past. And it followed me back."

Andrea didn't say a word. She just hugged him — tightly, completely — like she'd found a piece of her heart she didn't know was missing.