I'd like to live permanently in October 1988, when I started

Host: The air was heavy with autumn, the kind that smelled of burning leaves, coffee, and memory. A soft wind stirred the yellow leaves scattered across the cobblestone courtyard of an old university. The clocktower chimed eight, its sound rolling through the evening mist like the echo of a distant youth.

Jack sat on a bench, his coat collar turned up, eyes fixed on the bronze statue of some forgotten philosopher. His grey gaze was distant, as though it could see the past hidden behind the fog.

Across from him, Jeeny arrived, a book in her hands, her cheeks flushed by the cold. She smiled softly, the kind of smile that carried warmth even when the world had cooled.

On the bench beside Jack, a note was scribbled in ink, caught under a coffee cup:

“I'd like to live permanently in October 1988, when I started college. I had no responsibility and the energy to do whatever I wanted. My optimism wasn't dented by experience or low self-esteem.” — Sue Perkins

Host: The wind lifted the edges of the paper, rustling it like a whisper from the past.

Jeeny: “It’s a beautiful thought, isn’t it? To want to live in a moment before life began to bruise you.”

Jack: (half-smiling) “It’s nostalgia, Jeeny. A trick the mind plays when the present starts to hurt. We romanticize the past because it’s the only place that never changes.”

Jeeny: “Or maybe it’s the only place where we still believed we could change everything.”

Host: The lamplight glowed through the mist, casting a honey hue on their faces. Leaves fell around them in slow motion, golden, gentle, inevitable.

Jack: “You think that hope was real back then? Or was it just naïve? People in their twenties think the world is waiting for them. Then they grow up and realize it’s already taken.”

Jeeny: “Maybe that’s why hope is beautiful, Jack. It’s blind. It doesn’t ask for permission. When I was nineteen, I used to wake up and feel like the whole day was a promise. Now it’s a list.”

Jack: (chuckling softly) “A list of bills, emails, and things to fix, right?”

Jeeny: “Exactly. But still… sometimes, I miss that girl who didn’t care about tomorrow. Who thought love could fix anything. Who thought dreams were currency.”

Jack: “That girl didn’t know what life would cost.”

Jeeny: “Maybe not. But she lived without fear. And that’s worth something, isn’t it?”

Host: The wind tightened, whirling leaves into a spiral. The sound of a guitar floated faintly from a dorm window—some student still awake, still believing.

Jack: “You know, I used to think like that too. I had this plan—to build, to become, to matter. Then life happened. One responsibility after another. Dreams got smaller to fit the budget.”

Jeeny: “So what? You’re here, aren’t you? You’re breathing, working, thinking. That’s still becoming. Maybe it’s just not as loud as we imagined it would be.”

Jack: “Or maybe it’s quieter because we gave up.”

Jeeny: (firmly) “No. It’s quieter because we grew up. Growing up isn’t the same as giving up.”

Host: The clocktower struck again—nine—each chime fading slower, as if even time was reluctant to move on. Jack leaned back, exhaling, the sound of youth still echoing in the distance.

Jack: “You ever wish you could freeze one moment? Just… pause everything?”

Jeeny: “Every day. But that’s not how life works. You can’t live in October 1988 forever, Jack. But you can carry it.”

Jack: “Carry it?”

Jeeny: “Yes. Carry the optimism, the energy, the innocence. Those things don’t have to belong to a time. They can belong to you.”

Host: Jack’s eyes softened, the hard edge of cynicism cracking. The rain began to fall, lightly, delicately, the droplets tapping against the bench, the books, the coffee cup.

Jack: “You really think we can go back without going back?”

Jeeny: “Not to the moment—but to the feeling. That’s what Sue Perkins meant, I think. She didn’t want October 1988—she wanted the version of herself who believed anything was possible. That girl is still in there, Jack. Under the fatigue, the doubt, the routine. She’s just waiting for you to remember her.”

Host: Jack looked down at his hands, rough, strong, but still capable of building, of holding, of starting again.

Jack: “You ever wonder if we’d be happier if we’d never learned the truth? If we’d stayed young, reckless, unbroken?”

Jeeny: “No. I think truth is what makes us human. But hope—that’s what keeps us alive. And those two can coexist. They have to.”

Host: The rain intensified, glimmering in the lamplight, washing the leaves clean, paving the cobblestones with shimmering gold.

Jeeny stood, pulled up her hood, and looked at Jack with a smile both tender and tired.

Jeeny: “You can’t stay in the past, Jack. But you can visit—just long enough to remember who you were, and why you started.”

Jack: (softly) “And maybe that’s how we heal… by visiting, not living there.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. The past is a classroom, not a home.”

Host: The bell tolled once more, the sound rising through the mist like a call to return to the present. Jack nodded, a quiet smile forming, the weight in his chest lightening as though the fog had lifted from the inside out.

Jack: “You know, maybe I’ll take a walk tomorrow. Just to feel it again—the air, the hope, the possibility. Maybe October 1988 isn’t gone. Maybe it’s just sleeping somewhere inside me.”

Jeeny: “And maybe that’s all we ever need—to wake it up every now and then.”

Host: The rain softened to a mist, the lamps flickering in a halo of warm gold. Jack and Jeeny walked across the courtyard, their footsteps echoing like old songs.

Behind them, the bench remained, the note still fluttering under the cup, its words glimmering faintly under the rain—

A reminder that youth isn’t a time, but a feeling that can still return, quietly, whenever we dare to believe again.