The conference room held the familiar scent of leather chairs and expensive cologne, mixing with the lingering traces of someone's morning coffee. Five executives sat around the mahogany table, their expressions carved from years of saying "no" to dreams like mine. But I'd seen this scene before, lived it before, and this time I knew exactly which strings to pull.
"Let's hear what the kid's got," said James Morrison, head of A&R, his silver cufflinks catching the fluorescent light as he gestured toward the speakers. In my previous life, he'd been the one who'd suggested watering down the sound, making it "more commercial." Today, I watched him lean back, already preparing his critique.
I nodded to Rico, who started the playback. The first track, "Future Memory," filled the room:
*Déjà vu in reverse*
*Living every day rehearsed*
*But the script keeps changing lines*
*In these backwards moving times*
*And I see what's yet to come*
*Like yesterday's rising sun*
*Every choice a different door*
*Leading back to what's before*
Morrison's eyebrow lifted at the bridge, where I'd deliberately layered production techniques that wouldn't become mainstream for another five years. The snare pattern switched time signatures in a way that made his foot tap unconsciously, while the bass line carried hints of genres that hadn't been named yet.
"The production quality is..." he started, then paused, searching for words that wouldn't come easily. I suppressed a smile, remembering how in the original timeline, he'd called it "technically impressive but commercially risky." Now, with the benefit of future knowledge, I'd crafted something that straddled the line between innovative and irresistible.
"Extraordinary," finished Catherine Wells, the label's marketing director. She'd been silent in my previous pitch, but I'd structured this version of the EP knowing her reputation for spotting trends before they emerged. "The sound is familiar enough to feel comfortable, but there's something... prophetic about it."
If she only knew.
The next track began, and I watched their reactions carefully. This was "Timeline," the song that, in my original life, I'd written in 2015 after years of moderate success. Now, reimagined through the lens of actual time travel, its lyrics carried a weight that even I hadn't anticipated:
*History's ink isn't dry*
*Pages turn, moments fly*
*What's written can be undone*
*Future's thread can be unspun*
*But the cost of changing fate*
*Is the pressure of its weight*
*Every step a choice to make*
*Every dream a chance to take*
Rico's hand found my shoulder, squeezing slightly as he noticed the executives' heads nodding in unison. He couldn't know that I'd spent weeks refining these tracks, incorporating elements from two decades of musical evolution into something that would sound revolutionary but not alien to 2005 ears.
"There's a sophistication to the arrangement that's... unusual for someone your age," Morrison said, his tone shifting from skeptical to intrigued. In the corner of my eye, I caught his assistant frantically taking notes.
"Music isn't about age," I replied, the words coming easily because I'd had twenty years to think about them. "It's about understanding where sound has been and where it's going."
The final track began to play, and I closed my eyes, letting the familiar-yet-new melody wash over me. This was the song that would change everything – the one that would catch her attention. In my pocket, my phone buzzed again, but I didn't need to look. I knew who it was.
The future was changing, reshaping itself around these moments, these sounds. And as I opened my eyes to meet Morrison's calculating gaze, I saw what I'd been waiting for: the look of a man who knew he was hearing tomorrow's music today.
The price of dreams had always been high. But this time, I was paying with the currency of experience, and that made all the difference.