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In September of 1983, my teenage self entered first year university. Friday of that first week, they had a local band playing the dry pub, where people danced, and recorded music across the hall, where people sat at barracks-like tables and drank.

The band announced a break just as I asked a strikingly attractive girl to dance. I improvised something about not wanting to dance to the recorded music, the band was so good, did she want a drink? They were serving non-alcoholic refreshments on our side of the hall.

A week later, we went on a date. As one expects from first year students, we inevitably began discussing our respective backgrounds. By this point, we'd returned and were sitting in my room, a cassette tape playing. Her questions became more specific. Then she got this wide-eyed look. "I know who you are," she said.

She fumbled through her small purse and produced a piece of paper, with my name, in my sister's handwriting.

Some months before, Carrie visited her sister in Toronto.

Our sisters knew each other, and they'd run into each other. Hearing that Carrie would be attending the same university as I would be, she gave her my name. She'd forgotten about it until that moment she made the connection.

The cassette tape continued to play, Synchronicity by the Police.

A prologue, of sorts.

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