#we're heading back to the 80s this time around with a time travel au babey

[bluejeanlouis]

FIC PREVIEW: We Were Such Fools by kiddle

(M, chaptered, time travel au, coming soon!)

Rule #1: The Rewind Machine cannot be used to change the past, only to experience it. History will reset itself to the original timeline every 24 hours.

On his fiftieth birthday, two things are consuming Harry’s mind: what he’s going to make the kids for dinner tonight, and the fact that his marriage is crumbling at his feet.

So, when his best friend gifts him the trip of a lifetime, Harry chooses to venture off to the summer that set his life on its course—all the way back in 1987.

It only took him one summer to fall in love the first time around. How hard can starting all over really be?

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Preview under the cut:

They strolled the midway, mouths greasy with fryer oil as they chewed the crunchy bottoms off their corn dog sticks. Harry ordered his with mustard, but Louis liked it plain. Every time Louis spoke, Harry had to remind himself not to stare at him. It shocked him every time he turned his head to see his husband shrunk down nearly thirty years. Even his voice was just slightly higher. Melodic, even.

Before he left, Harry was worried that he may feel older than everyone else, like an intruder in his own life. But being in his younger body felt so natural, so real to what he remembered. Somehow, this was real. He may have kept the experiences of the fifty-year-old he was deep down, but here he was twenty-one. Every other part of him felt as young as he looked. Was this why some people didn’t want to go back?

“The beauty and evil of carnival games is they are always smarter than you think you are,” Louis explained as they stood in front of a ring toss, a healthy distance away as they watched a man try to win his girlfriend a stuffed bear that she surely didn’t care about.

“But someone has got to win eventually,” Harry argued. “Even if by pure luck.”

“Not even,” Louis clarified. “Only. The only way anyone ever takes home one of those stupid giant stuffed animals is by pure dumb luck, usually after blowing a hundred bucks just to increase the odds. You know what kind of fancy dinner you could take your date to with that kind of money? And all this poor girl is gonna get is a five-dollar bear that she’ll have no clue what to do with when she gets home.”

“Maybe he’s got good aim,” Harry shrugged.

“That won’t matter. Those rings are made so thick that they barely fit around the bottle. Have you ever felt one of them? They’re as light as a fuckin’ balloon. As soon as the ring makes contact, it bounces off in another direction. If you’re lucky, it bounces directly over another bottle. And that’s it again: luck.”

“Okay, but the games can’t all be like that. If they were impossible to win, no one would play them.”

“And that’s where the mind of a casino owner comes in. Follow me.”

They walked three stalls over to the balloon dart game. Harry’s chest fluttered like he was rewatching a scene from his favourite movie.

“Look at the wall of balloons back there. You see how they’re different sizes?” Harry nodded. “They’re filled up to different capacities because it changes the tension of the balloon. The shinier the outside, the thinner it is and the better chance you have at popping it. Problem is, you have to pop five balloons to win. Only two out of every five on the board are thin enough to pop, even with a pretty good throw. The odds are against you, but that doesn’t mean you won’t get lucky and hit five thin balloons, or hit an angle that makes the thick balloons pop. But how would you even know when you’re throwing from ten feet away?”

“You couldn’t,” Harry gave in.

“So, if you get a taste of winning, you feel like you can hit the jackpot even though you spend so much that you barely break even with your prize. Not to mention…” He jogged around the corner and asked the girl running the booth to hand him one of the darts. Harry followed, feigning reluctance just for fun.

“This dart,” Louis held it up to show Harry, then poked it into his palm. “It’s dull.” He turned around and threw it at the board. It bounced sideways off a purple balloon and tumbled to the ground. “My point exactly,” he said.

Harry nodded, looking between Louis and the dart as if he was almost impressed with the throw. “Would’ve been pretty sick if you popped a balloon just then, though,” he admitted.

“I know,” Louis scoffed, shedding his confidence. “For the sake of my pride, I’m going to tell you that I wasn’t trying.”

“Is every game rigged like that?” Harry wondered. They kept walking, tossing their corn dog sticks into a nearby trash can.

“Don’t say the ‘R’ word in front of Todd, but pretty much, yeah. That basketball throw over there? The hoop is small and shaped like an oval, so the ball can barely fit through. Plus, it’s taller than a standard basketball hoop, and the ball is under-inflated like those damn balloons. I’m telling you, the odds are always against you.”

“You ever feel dirty when you get people to play your booth, then?”

“Not when I’m running Skee Ball. Of all the carnival games, that one has the highest skill to chance ratio. A skill, which I may say, you do not have.”

“I do have luck, though,” Harry pointed out. “It tends to always be on my side.”

“Not today, it wasn’t,” Louis laughed.

Harry just smiled. “I beg to differ.”

#hello hello i'm writing something new!!! #we're heading back to the 80s this time around with a time travel au babey #it's still a few months out but I wanted to share a little bit of what I've been working on! #larry fanfiction #larry fics