FleshForward

 13/25

It was a full moon and an ensemble of stars glittered over the rooftop bar. Drunken laughter chattered over the thrum of traffic below and glasses clattered together as overloaded waiters milled around the patrons with trays of drinks. He felt dazzled by the colourful cocktails and sparkling fairy lights. One minute they weren't there and the next they were everywhere. Surrounded by people yet alone – a perfectly painted statuette with soft curves and smooth skin. People kept their distance like one might do to a masterpiece in a gallery. It was a chilly night and the skimpy leather dress did little to keep him warm. His delicate body prickled in the cold – familiar sensations on a form that felt truly alien to him. Alone...and then, his name was called. He looked over his shoulder towards its source and soft hair swished across his back. His glossy lips dropped open when he spotted the slender woman in black striding towards him. He tried to focus on her face and then everything vanished...

When the collective consciousness of the earth's population leaped forward two years and thirty-six days no-one knew what had just happened. It only lasted for a little over two minutes but it was enough for people to see their dreams realised, their worst nightmares or, perhaps most terrifying, nothing at all. It was written off as some kind of shared hallucination until stories started to surface online about people who had seen themselves living in great mansions winning the lottery, people suffering life altering accidents after seeing themselves in a wheelchair and others meeting partners they had seen themselves with. With every passing day it became clearer that the world had seen a vision of its future.

Being a famous influencer with legions of online subscribers, Joel was asked frequently about what he had seen. The comment sections of his Youtube videos were stuffed with speculation and his fanbase became increasingly frustrated with his insistence on ducking the questions and reverting back to his usual topics of men's fashion and travel. When it finally became impossible to ignore the probing he just brushed it off saying that he must have been asleep because he felt like he was dreaming. At last his fans seemed satisfied.

But for Joel it didn't end there. What was fun speculation for his viewers was a ball of fear in his stomach. Every time he closed his eyes the sensation of the tight leather dress returned – the squeeze of the high-heeled boots hugging his calves. But how? It was impossible. It had to have been a dream...right? How else could he have had a vision of being a delicately beautiful young woman in a rooftop bar while everyone else's visions were coming true? He couldn't let his imagination run wild. There had to be a perfectly reasonable explanation. And that slender woman that had just moved into his building...the one that always dressed in black and smiled a little too widely when he passed in the halfway...that was just a coincidence...right?