[ TT ] You go to sleep tonight and wake up on 1st January 1990 with a note next to you saying `` Try again . ''

I wake up with the uncomfortable realisation that I'm not in my own bed. It's like the first morning in a hotel; the jarring sensation of a pillow that's too hard, a mattress that's too soft. It's close, except I know I'm not on holiday, and I did n't go out last night yet somehow - this is not my bed. 
 
 I jerk up and look around, wondering a moment later if the best approach might have been to pretend I was still out of it. Luckily there's no murderer; for now at least. I'm in a room with blue walls. It's small, compact. A wardrobe, a dresser, a desk with a blue chair and a calendar. No laptop. Everything is dark wood and simple. Devoid of personality. 
 
 I shiver. Late morning light filters through the window next to me. I lean across, not quite ready to plant my bare feet on the carpet, to moor myself in this unknown territory. The street outside baffles me; it's like an American film, a picture of suburbia. A man stops to let his dog sniff a lamppost. A preteen in dungarees cycles past. 
 
 It's fresh, and wholesome, and completely alien to me. How could I possibly have flown to America without realising? I sit back, leaning against the headboard and that's when I see the slip of paper. I pick it up slowly, the edges sliding against my fingers as I unfold it. 
 
 Two words.'Try again.' 
 
 For a moment I'm nonplussed. Then I wonder. Last year, when I applied for that job. The one in Washington, the one I did n't get because of my lack of experience. Is this some weird second chance, a bizarre hazing? I leap up, my heart pounding against my chest now as it all catches up to me. This is real, this is happening. I grab the calendar from the desk. 
 
 January... 1990? 
 
 I'm still, my feet tingling. It must be a joke. And yet it's not, it's real, it's the 1st of January 1990, and some sick fuck has sent me here to - to what? Apply for a job in twenty six years? I have n't even been born yet. I close my eyes and breath. And then I think. 1990... the beginning of a technological boom. iPhones, Ebay, chart topping number ones; none of them exist yet. 
 
 I need a notebook, something to write with. A plan. Screw the hospital job. I'm about to make history. 

