I Can See the Expiry Date of Everything

Chapter 2

Kevin’s lungs burned, the icy morning air slicing through his chest like jagged glass as he sprinted back toward The Roasted Bean. He didn’t think; he reacted. The jump in the numbers—the sudden, violent excision of an entire hour—had stripped away any veneer of logic or sanity. It wasn’t a disease or a hallucination. It was a scoreboard, and the game was rigged.

He saw her through the front window. Megan was standing up, gathering her bag, her laptop tucked under her arm. She was turning toward the exit. Above her, the crimson numbers were a frantic, bleeding blur.

"Megan! No!" Kevin screamed, his voice cracking against the glass.

Passersby turned to look at the man sprinting down the sidewalk like a madman, but Kevin didn’t see them. He didn’t see the architecture or the traffic. He saw only the red light above her, shifting again.

02d : 22h : 59m : 10s... 09s...

He reached the door just as she pushed it open. She blinked at him, looking startled, a polite but concerned smile hovering on her lips. "Kevin? You scared the hell out of me, why are you—"

"Move!"

He didn't wait for her to process the word. He tackled her.

It wasn't a gentle nudge; it was a desperate, full-force shove that sent them both sprawling onto the concrete. As his shoulder hit the hard, unforgiving pavement, a thunderous CRACK echoed through the street, vibrating deep into the marrow of his bones.

A massive, rusted steel billboard—one that had hung precariously above the storefront for years—tore itself from its mounts. It slammed into the exact spot where Megan had been standing a fraction of a second before. The impact was deafening, a shriek of tortured metal and pulverized brick that showered them in dust and gravel.

The silence that followed was heavy, suffocating.

Megan lay beneath him, gasping, her wide, terrified eyes staring up at the gray sky. Pieces of drywall and debris rained down around them like a mockery of snow. She was trembling violently, her chest heaving as she tried to force air into her lungs.

"Kevin..." she wheezed, her hand clutching his jacket. "What... what just happened?"

Kevin didn't move. He kept his eyes locked on the space just above her head. The red digits had stopped their rapid descent. They weren't jumping anymore. They had stabilized, though they were still a stark, impossible crimson.

02d : 22h : 59m : 00s.

He rolled off her, his heart hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. He sat up, shaking the dust from his hair, his pulse thumping in his ears. People were screaming. The street had turned into a frenzy of panicked pedestrians and shattered glass. A man—a stranger with a briefcase—had been walking past the café entrance. He was lying nearby, not injured by the steel, but clearly in shock.

Kevin looked at the man. Above the stranger’s head, where there had been a steady 40y only moments before, the numbers were shifting violently.

12y... 06y... 02y...

Kevin’s stomach turned over. He looked at a woman who had been standing even closer to the impact zone, a woman who had simply been watching the scene unfold from the safety of the sidewalk. Her numbers were dropping too.

30y... 25y... 20y...

The reality hit him with the force of a physical blow. He had cheated the system, but the system had a balance sheet. Every second he had stolen for Megan, he had forced the universe to extract from someone else. It was a zero-sum game played with the currency of human lives.

"Megan," he rasped, grabbing her shoulders to pull her into a sitting position. "Are you hurt? Tell me you’re okay."

She looked at the twisted wreck of metal only inches from where her head had been, then back at him. Her face was pale, her expression a mix of shock and dawning horror. "I... I think so. How did you know, Kevin? How did you possibly know that was going to fall?"

He couldn't tell her. How could he explain that he had seen her death, that he had witnessed the clock counting down to her final breath? He looked around the street. The chaos was intensifying. Sirens were beginning to wail in the distance, a rising chorus of high-pitched desperation.

"I just... I saw a flicker," he lied, his voice hollow. "The sign looked loose. I just had a bad feeling, Megan. Just a really, really bad feeling."

She stared at him, her skepticism struggling with the impossible fact that she was alive only because he had thrown her to the ground. "A bad feeling? You tackled me into the dirt over a 'bad feeling'?"

"It saved your life, didn't it?" he snapped, perhaps too sharply.

She flinched, pulling away slightly. "Yes. It did. Thank you, Kevin. Really. But you’re scaring me. You’re acting like you’ve lost your mind."

He stood up, his legs feeling like jelly. He looked around at the growing crowd. The numbers above them were flickering, struggling to find equilibrium after the shock of the incident. It was like watching a swarm of insects, chaotic and predatory. He felt a wave of nausea. He hadn't just saved her; he had become a thief. He had traded the lives of innocent bystanders for the extra time Megan now possessed.

"We need to get out of here," he said, ignoring her protest. He grabbed her hand, hauling her to her feet.

"Kevin, wait! My bag, my laptop—"

"Forget it," he hissed, his eyes darting through the crowd. He was looking for someone, anyone, who might be watching him. He felt exposed, as if the glowing, hateful digits were not just visible to him, but were projected onto his own skin for everyone else to see.

They moved toward the subway entrance, weaving through the mass of people. As they passed a group of onlookers, Kevin saw the numbers over their heads stabilize. The 30y became 29y. The 12y became 11y. The cost was already being paid.

"Where are we going?" Megan asked, her voice tight with panic. "Kevin, you’re hurting my hand."

He loosened his grip but didn't let go. He couldn't let go. "Home. We’re going to my apartment. You’re not going to that presentation, and you’re not going to work. Not until I figure out how to stop this."

"Stop what? The accidents? The signs falling? You think you’re some kind of guardian angel now?"

He stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, pulling her around to face him. He looked into her eyes, searching for a trace of the woman he had known for years. "I’m not a guardian angel, Megan. I’m a witness. And I’m not letting you go until this—whatever this is—is over."

She opened her mouth to argue, but the look in his eyes stopped her. It wasn't the look of a man having a breakdown. It was the look of a man who had seen the end of the world and was trying to build a shelter out of nothing.

He led her through the side streets, keeping his head down, avoiding the eyes of anyone whose countdown might be flickering. He felt like a criminal. Every time a car backfired or a door slammed, he flinched, expecting to see another death date drop, another soul extinguished to balance the debt he’d created.

They reached the alleyway shortcut to his apartment block. The shadows here were long, stretched thin by the setting sun. Kevin kept his pace brisk, his hand firmly on Megan’s arm.

"Kevin," she said, her voice dropping to a whisper. "You need to talk to someone. Daniel Cooper, remember? He’s a doctor. If you’re seeing things, if your brain is misfiring like this, he can help."

"Daniel can't help with this," Kevin muttered, turning a corner into the narrow corridor between two brick buildings.

"How do you know?"

He stopped, realizing he was being followed.

He didn't hear footsteps, but the air felt heavier, charged with static. He turned around, pulling Megan behind him. A man was standing at the entrance to the alley. He wore a heavy, charcoal-colored wool coat that seemed to absorb the dim light. He stood perfectly still, his hands tucked deep into his pockets.

Kevin looked above the man’s head. There was nothing.

No numbers. No ticker. Just empty, dark space.

A chill that had nothing to do with the wind crawled down Kevin’s spine.

"Who are you?" Kevin demanded, his voice barely audible over the distant hum of the city.

The stranger didn't move. He tilted his head slightly, his eyes shadowed by the brim of a fedora. When he spoke, his voice was smooth, like cold silk.

"You have a very dangerous gift, Mr. Brooks."

Kevin tightened his grip on Megan’s arm. "Stay back."

The man took a slow, deliberate step forward. He didn't look at Megan. He looked directly at Kevin, his gaze cold and all-knowing.

"You think you’re saving them," the man said, gesturing vaguely toward the street behind them where the chaos of the fallen billboard still echoed. "But you’re only rearranging the furniture in a burning house."

The stranger stopped, his eyes glinting with a sharp, predatory intelligence. He leaned in, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial, chilling whisper.

"You’ve just signed a death warrant for someone else, haven't you?"