A dark night, lit only by the street light that was sporadic at best. Well, at least it was lately. After the ‘twins of terror’, our term for the 8-year-olds who lived next door, attacked it with rocks last week. I dribbled a basketball, driving hard towards the hoop as my friend Bjorn tried to block my shot. We crashed together, titans for a moment.

I cried, “Foul!”

“That was totally a charge and you know it!” Bjorn responded.

“Says the dude who just ‘hacked’ me!”

“Oh, yeah. Check this out, hot shot!” Bjorn kicked the basketball into the darkness. It bounced down the street and we both got the hibijibies.

“Have you ever had déjà vu?” I asked, suddenly terrified.

“Like right now, dude,” he responded. “I think we should go inside. If we go after the ball, something bad is gonna happen. I just know it!”

We ran inside like Forrest Gump on speed. Kind of embarrassing, since we were in our Junior year of high school.

To this day, I wonder what would have happened if we had retrieved that basketball.