Tonight was the night. Marcus was finally going out with Rachel. He put on his favorite pants for the occasion.
“Stop!” Future-Marcus and the professor rushed in. “I can’t explain now, but if you wear those pants our life will be ruined. I had the professor build a time machine just to warn you—me!”
“Okay, then I’ll change my paaaaaaaaaaaa—” Marcus faded from existence.
“What happened?” Future-Marcus asked.
The professor stroked his chin, “Apparently those horrendous pants were essential to the time-space continuum and without them Marcus voided himself from existence.”
“Then why am I still here?”
The professor shrugged.
![bookmark](http://briefconceits.com/wp-content/plugins/share-and-follow/images/blank.gif" height=){kind=small}
"I dunno, you seem to be doing pretty good for myself; got a ticket to the past after all, that can't be cheap"
"I was actually surprised at how easily I convinced myself to change pants… I loved those pants!"