THIS.
IS.
....well.
fluff i'm working on... largely for my own amusement. (i make me laugh and that's enough for me, LMAO.) huge, HUGE portions of this you will recognize from animorphs, ender's game, and even star trek && star wars. ^^ so, in a sense, this really is a fanfiction.
this will never be published (a., i am a terrible author and b., it would be wrong, imho, to try to publish THIS on sooo many levels... plus, i make a much better editor), but i still appreciate comments and crits (and questions!), etc. =) please tell me what you think. i have some huge plot-y plans for this, but the beginning is so friggin' slow. Dx i blame my focus on early, BLATANT character development as opposed to subtle characterizations over the course of several more 'active' scenes.
also, some "wordage" is present, so you under-thirteens should at least briefly consider not reading. spare your not-so virginal eyes.
as a note, i italicize thoughts and not-English words. (and characters always think in 'english'. =])------------
Log 7329.21.2140 - Kyle[spoiler]My name is Kyle.
Kyle the Mighty. Kyle the Awesome. Maybe you’ve heard of me… and maybe you haven’t. Not
yet, anyway.
Here’s the deal. I’m an easygoing guy- decent grades, great friends, and no particular life path commitments waiting to tie me down. But I’ve spent my
entire, 15- (almost 16-) year long life in this lame blip of a ’burb not even enterprising enough to sport the title “home of the world’s largest insert-any-obscure-noun-here”. And no offense to the old-timers and their local museums and outdated “mom-and-pop” shops, but I don’t plan to hang around; I’ve got better things to do. As soon as I graduate, I’m out. Believe it; I’m gone.
Hasta la vista, kiddos.
But getting back to all the reasons I hate this town- I’ll start with the fact that
this town has my parents in it. Parents who, for no great reason, feel like it’s cool to knock out my Sundays with a bunch of stupid… time-consuming… CHORES.
THWACK.
For probably the thousandth time, I brought my rake down like a sabre and speared the wet grass. A crow squawked- no doubt protesting the commotion- and took to the air, swooping quickly out of sight. I traced its path against the atypically clear sky, wiping the sheen of uncomfortably cool sweat from my forehead. My fingers tingled with the promise of blisters to come as I shifted my grip on the wooden rake handle and swept the hefty pile of moldering leaves into a ragged pile.
As the leaves settled, the wind picked up. I sighed loudly, aggravation provoked as my workload increased, dropping to the ground in apathetic bucketloads from only-God-knows-where. At least I had one thing to be (grudgingly) thankful for: the rain from the previous night kept the leaves wet and heavy. What I’d already piled up wasn’t going anywhere before I got around to bagging it.
Two deep voices, carried by the shifting afternoon air, snagged my wandering attention. Although the rumbling of an idling truck engine masked the conversation, I could guess at the subject.
New neighbors moving in, I remembered, still slowly adjusting to the realization that had arrived earlier that morning with the moving van.
About time someone
bought the lot; that house’s been empty for a long time. Another thought suddenly occurred to me.
Maybe… there’s a remote chance that… maybe a girl my age… And my imagination immediately took off.
Well, you get the idea.
I propped the rake against my chest and mentally slapped myself. Reality check: what were the odds
that would happen? Eager to squeeze in an extra minute of procrastination, I rolled my shoulders and twisted, trying to break up the knots of muscle congregating on my back. My stomach growled a short complaint: it was already hours past noon, and I still hadn’t had lunch.
Five minutes, I promised myself.
Give me five minutes, and then we’ll do lunch.It was the snap- like a whip-crack in my ear- that almost,
almost made me jump. Habit kept me from moving , though, and a millisecond later, an aggravated sigh from the woods beyond the yard prompted a smile from my chapped lips. I went back to my work as if nothing had happened, attacking autumn’s refuse before more found its way into the yard.
Oh.
If you were wondering, that was the sound of my best friend, Liu. We’ve known each other since we were in diapers, and we have an equally long-running joke: although I’ve never been able to pin his ass once, he’s never been able to sneak up on me. While I
did almost beat the (award-winning, nationally-recognized, blah, blah, blah) martial artist –once– that took more planning than you’d ever want to know about; Liu swore for a month afterward that I’d developed some sort of psychic ability. Unfortunately, the best I’ve got under my belt are a few years of soccer and lacrosse, so you can imagine how any “wrestling matches” we have end up.
Not pretty.
As for him, he’s made it some sort of twisted goal to catch me off-guard. Scare the pee out of me, if he can (he claims it has to do with “training”, if you believe it). And normally, I’ll take it all in stride, but it sure as hell can be inconvenient when-
“-OOF!!” The air in my lungs whooshed out as a familiar weight knocked my feet out from under me and sent me sprawling through
(through!) my pile of damp leaves. I watched the rake fly in the other direction and spin wildly over the grass; out of the corner of my eye, I saw a figure nimbly reach out and grab the handle of the rake (without looking, the smug bastard) as it skidded toward him.
Silent, I lay completely still, holding my eyes loosely shut. A long second later, and the rake handle was firmly prodding my back. “…Kyle. Dude. ….Kyle?” After I’d timed next poke, I rolled over onto my back, took hold of the handle, and used it to lever myself into the air, swinging my best friend into the leaves as I hooked a foot around his ankle and tugged.
“HAH.” I winked, and offered the rake, handle-end down, to my friend. “Gotcha.”
Liu smirked, snagged the handle, and leapt to his feet in a single movement, pulling the rake to his side like a character out of Mortal Kombat. He blinked, laughed, and handed the rake back to me.
“You heard me, didn’t you?” He accused, brushing himself off. “And you waited for me to get you so you could do that.”
I laughed. “That would be pretty wild, Liu,” I replied noncommittally. I looked from him to the now-scattered pile of yard debris and sighed dramatically. “NOW, I’ll have to finish this mess even faster; you know, I haven’t had lunch yet and I’m friggin’
starving.”
Liu was already sidling up to the kitchen window in my backyard. He eyed whatever was going on inside with interest, then shot my workload a glance.
“So… if I help you… I get a free meal, right?” He appeared to contemplate something, rubbing his nose to stall for time. “My uncle is cooking tonight. I’m not sure I even want to go home. He’ll force leftovers on me!”
I chuckled. “So help, then,” I said, and flung a box of trash bags at him. I didn’t blame him; I’d sampled his uncle’s “creativity” in the kitchen on more than one occasion… and I don’t think I’d ever come out without sacrificing my digestive system for half a day.
Unrolling a black plastic bag from the box, Liu casually dropped the rest onto the ground and bent to scoop leaves into the bag.
A half hour later, I paused over the last pile of leaves.
“There’s a car coming,” I observed absentmindedly, and I turned to take a peek at the house across the street.
Liu watched me with a raised eyebrow. “Aaand…?” he prompted.
“I think it’s gonna be the new neighbors. …I don’t recognize the engine. Watch.”
“…The engine. Ri-ight. Or it could be someone passing through,” came the argument.
A second later, a beaten-up station wagon lurched into view, pulled up behind the mover’s van and shuddered to a steaming, gurgling stop.
I grinned smugly; Liu snorted and rolled his eyes. “All right; you were lucky.” Under his breath he added, “you
and your superhuman hearing .”
Grabbing the last bag, Liu continued, “Let’s get these put away… and… a-HEM.” He cleared his throat at me, waiting for my attention. I’d been intently watching for whoever was inside the car to come out.
I suddenly glimpsed a shock of long, dirty-blonde hair before a dirt-streaked hand appeared between it and me. I blinked and focused on Liu’s smirking face. “…THEN we can go check out the new neighbors.”
I grinned and turned to land a punch on his shoulder. He, of course, dodged. With an impish grin, he gestured with the mostly full bag, holding it out at his side. I gaped and rushed forward. “Oh no, you d- ACK!”
Upending the bag of leaves, the martial artist took a moment to ensure I was thoroughly covered before jumping agilely out of the way as I reactively half-roared and ran at him, intending to tackle him into the leaves. Unfortunately, I never made it one step closer toward my goal.
Because that was the instant my life changed. Because
that was the instant the entire world changed.
…And by “change”, I don’t mean “change” in some intangible, futuristic prophesying sort of way. The world Changed, and I was immediately lost. The laws of physics evolved and forgot to take me with them.
First, the world heaved and rippled, knocking me to feet. ….Or, that’s what it ought to have done. Instead, I had frozen in midair, feeling each ripple like a sledgehammer to the gut. Each spasm was quickly followed by a wave of… fluorescent, negative color. I instantly lost my sense of “up” and “down” and, although I was trying to crouch down to wait the horrifying sensation out (presuming it would stop and that this
wasn’t The End Of The World), I couldn’t tell if my muscles were even responding. I couldn’t move.
I screamed; I couldn’t hear myself screaming. It sounded like thousands of noises rushed forward and crashed in on me at once. The leaves had disappeared, and so had my backyard, my house, and my best friend. While I couldn’t feel a thing, I simultaneously felt as though I was being torn apart; I could see myself in three, or maybe thirty dimensions, and I screamed again as the body I saw began to turn inside-out, splitting along the sides and rotating until my innards threatened to fall out. I sucked in air through my gritted teeth as I felt something…
else… stick its dirty fingers into my head. I wrenched forward, trying to pull away.
It was as though I had been sucked through a wall of cold molasses and into a sauna. I choked, realizing that I hadn’t been breathing.
Or… hadn’t I?
The landscape had mutated again before I’d even noticed. As if through a pair of oil-smudged glasses, I observed streaks of blue in a sea of some nondescript shade of off-white. Under the unexpected glare, I squinted. A blurry blob of color flew by, accented by a distant, flickering red light. I attempted to force my eyes to focus, to hold onto the image, and failed. Trying to turn, I felt something pressed against my back, legs and feet. Then something suddenly murmured into my ears and I futilely attempted to open my mouth to ask it to repeat itself.
Without warning, I felt sleep shove me down in the same way Liu had done a minute (a month?) ago; my eyes shut and the world shrugged back into place.[/spoiler]
Log 9223.21.2140- Aarón[spoiler]Groggily, I rubbed my dry eyes and stared blearily down at the novel I’d been “reading” for the last hour. Wondering why the heck anyone would care about the “motivations” and “development” of some fictitious runaway from a couple hundred years ago, I returned to the adjacent computer monitor.
At least I finally managed to score the private study lounge, I thought dryly, recalling waiting an hour for the previous occupant to finally close her improbably thick monster of a book and leave.
It wasn’t like she needed a computer to read it, unless it was in Korean and she needed to translate every word
or something.I skipped unhurriedly across the monitor with the mouse, clicking through two programs before entering what appeared to be a DOS command window. This, however, was the command window for a separate OS, a series of programs I’d flung out into the recesses of the library system’s local intranet nearly three years ago. I could access it easily from any public access computer within the library and, tapping into the memory resources of this computer lab (and every other lab connected to the library intranet), I could do what every computer geek had ever dreamed of doing… and then some. With the added boost (and some improvements to the original compiler program), I could multitask, unhindered by a “slow” computer or the threat of a hardware crash. An OS like this one, however, made life easier for me in other ways. Here, I could write some of my more complex programs and store them, undetected, behind a series of computer function re-routers, my personal firewall system.
My hobby, if you couldn’t tell, is computer programming, among a few other, similar things… all legit, I swear.
As a shadowy form swept past the glass curtain wall- the only thing between me and the aisles of books beyond- I feigned interest in my book, flipping a page as I quickly tapped a two-key sequence to bring up the Windows OS. I didn’t want to give the surly-looking librarian an excuse to harass me.
I watched her huff by as she levered a precariously stacked pile of books against her hip and sighed.
Close call. I’m really falling asleep, here.I checked the time.
3:51:06.
“
¡Dios!…” I exclaimed and shoved backwards, leaping out of my seat.
I was supposed to have been gone a half-hour ago! I bent over the keyboard and hit a combination of keys.
Done.
I hit enter.
Suddenly teal and crimson began to bloom all over the screen. I frowned and plugged another line of code into the command window. As I re-ran the algorithm, I cursed again.
That’s not right, it was just working…Then, to make matters worse, reality suddenly tripped over its own feet.
Now, you can think I’m crazy, but that’s exactly what happened; I don’t have any other words to describe it. I’d never seen anything like it in my life- things mutated through space, as though God had suddenly decided to make his own changes to a universal program. I saw colors I never knew existed and as I watched myself stare (simultaneously) into the stacks, under the stacks, and through the stacks, the computer monitor caught my eye.
As it should have. Because here was the odd thing: while the rest of the world made abstract art of desks, students, and bookshelves, the screen was sitting perfectly still. On it flashed a single, cryptic message:
NOTICE... NOTICE- CODE RED: MACHIES IN SECTORS 4.2 THROUGH 4.8- TECHS TO FOURTH FLOOR CORE UNIT; SQUAD 7 SEE COMMANDER BRIGID FOR ASSIGNMENT.As I gaped, the words flipped through varying shades of fluorescent pink and red. But before I could even seize the concept of reality making a mess of itself, let alone what the hell “machies” were or how, logically, the computer had managed to display the incomprehensible message, it all stopped.
It was as though reality had been a dribble of water sucked up into an eye dropper… and had finally been spat back out again. As my eyes tried to adjust, I lost my balance and dropped to my knees, banging them on the thinly-carpeted floor.
“OW!” I hissed, blinking back tears. I grabbed the edge of the desk and pulled myself up. The computer sat silently, the screen dark.
I hit the power button.
And again.
Cursing, I swiftly gathered my books and slipped out of the room, making my way through the biography section.
Crap. Crap! I broke it! …Somehow…And if they find out it was me, they’ll never let me near a another computer. I’m screwed! Whatever that was, it must have somehow messed up the computer through my programs. But how? I designed that program to work independently of outside operations. Only a program from the same OS- from behind
the security I’ve already put up- should be able to do something like that.The realization only then hit me as I nearly laughed at myself.
As if the computer breaking is so much more illogical than what just happened to me
! God, what the hell is happening?I glanced down each narrow bookshelf corridor I passed, opting to use the rarely frequented rear exit. The silence bothered me. Shouldn’t someone be panicking? Shouldn’t there be screams, mass exodus from the library… something? It didn’t make sense. I cautiously (but quickly) note of the librarian from earlier, growling incomprehensibly as she indignantly rearranged a shelf of books.
Nothing unusual there, I thought, simultaneously amused and unnerved.
The rows of dimly-lit study desks came into view. I meandered more slowly between these and nearly walked into one of my classmates.
“Oh, hey! Aaron!” the guy- Dru- greeted me. At my pause, he raised an eyebrow. “You okay, man? You look kinda spaced out.”
I tried to laugh, but the sound fell pretty flat. I was shaking. Hadn’t he seen anything?
Like the librarian, he seemed unphased. In fact, as I craned my neck, it seemed as though everyone else, each hunched over his own work, remained unaffected by what I’d just seen.
I shrugged. “Nah, I’m fine. Uhh… you didn’t see… anything… a second ago, did you?” I asked, trying to lower my voice, not wanting to draw attention to myself. Internally, I wrestled with reason.
I could have been dreaming, right? I mean, I was falling asleep there. But then… I can’t explain how I got out of my seat…Dru just stared back at me and I knew my answer before he could say it. So I tried to cover, pretending to clarify, “on your computer.” I gestured at the PC sitting on his desk.
The kid shook his head and replied, “I dunno. I didn’t see anything, but I was grabbing some books for that paper Ms. Turner assigned for Friday. What a bummer, yeah? And I haven’t started the math homework, either.”
My distracted silence didn’t discourage him. “Hey, speaking of the math homework,” he continued, “you wanna work together? We’d get it done so much faster.”
I, staring past him, mentally choked; it had nothing to do with the homework, but what I’d caught on the computer screen at the desk next to us.
4:11.
Now “late” wouldn’t even cover it- I was screwed. I backed away, calling, “I’m kinda done already,” I lied, trying to cover my panic. “But definitely some other time. I gotta go; my sister needs me to help baby-sit tonight.”
Dru smiled, less enthusiastic. “All right; yeah, we’ll do that.”
In an instant I was gone, waving briefly at my classmate as I beat it to the back door.
* * * *
Biking back home, I could feel the air cooling as the afternoon sun maintained its downward arc; it helped calm my nerves. I caught a glimpse of a moving van as it passed me by, leaving our modest corner of suburbia, and scratched my chin.
Maybe that house down the way finally sold, I thought.
I subconsciously began to turn my bike in the direction opposite the receding, odious exhaust… when my penchant for procrastination finally caught up to me.
“AARÓN ALFONSO SÁNCHEZ RIVIERA, you get your BUTT into this house,
AHORA MISMO! You are in SO much trouble!”
I ducked, as though to ward off the verbal blow, to no effect. My little sister towered in our doorway, two houses from where I sat: four and a half feet of grim, ladle-wielding ruthlessness.
“
Ay, Dios,” I murmured beneath my breath. Only an hour late at the most, I recognized that my sister seemed more perturbed than usual. Not something I’d’ve guessed could be my fault alone.
As I slunk toward the dungeon door, my ardent taskmaster, and the work waiting inside, a triumphant shout danced out the door. My sister’s eyes widened considerably as she flicked her eyes backward, then wheeled around hastily and sped inside, yelling as she went, “Marco, NO! What have I told you about climbing on things? I don’t care what Julio double-whatever dared you to do; you get your butt DOWN from there before-”
CRASH.
Wincing, I glanced around once, wondering if the neighbors had seen anything. Not that this sort of drama would have been news to them. However, an unidentified feeling crawling in my gut made me wary, suspicious. The earlier incident had by no means left my mind; now, it was all a matter of carefully figuring out what had happened before I really did lose my mind… or, more importantly, before anyone else could figure out that I’d lost it.[/spoiler]
Log 5625.21.2140- Liu[spoiler]Like Kyle said- the world flipped out. At the time, I remember fighting to keep my brain from shutting down. Now, the memory plays whether I want it to or not, fast-forwarding in slow motion, like an awkward foreshadowing.
I remember emptying the trash bag. I remember the leaves falling and that putrid, mildew smell everywhere; there's nothing like a heavy rain in the fall to bring out the best of decomposition in nature.
Three seconds.
I timed my friend’s reaction as easily as I breathe- Kyle’s predictable like a clock. I smiled, shifted my weight toward Kyle’s right (his slower turning point), anticipating his lunge.
Then the leaves began to decelerate, and instead of watching for Kyle’s return strike, I remember thinking,
how the heck…? and grabbing at the leaves, watching my hand snaking in among them like a fish through kelp.
Kyle looked as shocked as I felt, and he, like oozing dough, slowly-
slooowly- put each foot on the ground.
Then someone hit “play” and everything fell apart.
I don’t usually scream.
I’m not a “screaming” guy. I might shout, but that’s a
ki-focusing tactic. You use it to distract an opponent and redirect energy into a hit.
This scream didn't do anything like that. There was no tangible opponent, no hit to make.
This was way, way beyond my control. And I screamed.
I don’t know if you’ve ever been in a vat of Styrofoam, or maybe like a sensory deprivation chamber, but that’s where I was. And then, at the same time, all five of my senses were screaming information at me, like the Styrofoam was layered with a noxious, ear-splitting, skin-melting poison. I felt like giggling like a lunatic and sobbing like a baby all at once. At some point, I remember my lips trying to utter the words to the blessings my mom had whispered over me when I was little- I couldn’t remember all of the Mandarin, but the hell it mattered.
And then it ended. It ended as abruptly and irrevocably as it’d begun, and everything was exactly the way it’d been. The leaves finished their waterfall cascade to the ground. Birds chirped and squirrels chattered at us from above. Sky and ground had found their niches again. And as I began to take stock of myself, vertigo hit me the same way you can be running along in a dream and unexpectedly find yourself falling.
Yeah. Annoying as hell.
Needless to say, I hit the ground. The impact I didn't mind: pain told me that I was still alive and muscle aches announced that I still had two knees, ten fingers, a head attached to a neck attached to everything else.
I heard a groan; I turned in time to see Kyle fall forward and plant his face in the grass.
He didn't even bother to put his hands out to catch himself. Still reeling from the shock of watching the world in its death throes, I found myself at Kyle's side before I'd processed moving. I dropped and grabbed his shoulder.
“Kyle. Kyle!” I shook him.
Unconscious? What...?Kyle’s eyelids fluttered and he choked out something unintelligible.
“Hey, not funny,” I told my prostrate friend. I pulled him into a sitting position. “Kyle!” I snapped my fingers in front of his face. Then I waited a half-second and backhanded him.
Kyle groaned and reflexively brought a hand up to shield his face. After a moment, his eyes flicked to me and focused; I sighed.
“Dude; don’t scare me like that.”
You looked like you were going into epileptic shock, I added grimly. Then I had to wonder if I hadn’t looked like that myself a second earlier.
Not that I ended up on my face in the dirt, though.Kyle leaned forward and I let go of his shoulder. Rubbing his cheek intensely, he glared. “What was that for?”
I snorted. “You were twitching like a dog in heat, dreaming of the **** down the street, is what. Thought I needed to bring you back to reality.”
Reality… I pondered the consequences of looking like a psychopath for asking Kyle about what had just happened, but I waved off the hesitation; Kyle has been my best friend since diapers. I licked my lips and asked, “…Hey, you didn’t see all that…”
Realization and relief dawned in Kyle’s eyes. “… The way the universe like, completely flipped out?” he finished.
“Yeah. …Whatever that was. What… what d’you think…?”
Kyle made a rude noise. “Like
I’d know. Maybe I should check with my mom or something. I’m sure it’d be on the news or…” He grunted as he pushed himself onto his feet.
As he took a step toward his house, he staggered, clapping his fingers to his temples.
I froze. “Kyle, you okay?”
He grimaced and waved me off. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just a headache. Weird. Didn’t have one a moment ago.” He flashed me a half-hearted “no sweat” grin before strolling tentatively up to the back of his house. Then he paused by the sliding glass door, hand hovering over the handle.
“My sister and my mom… they didn’t see anything.”
“You’re sure?”
Kyle rolled his eyes in my direction, with a look that said clearly,
You’ve known me for how long? And since when don’t I know these things?I laughed unenthusiastically. “All right; you’re sure. But… okay… what now?”
I could almost see the wheels in my friend’s head turning. He flicked his eyes to the leaves, then to me, then back into his house. Scratching his head, he slowly replied, “Uhmm… something outside, maybe? Like… in the leaves. Maybe a fungus or weed of some sort got raked up with the leaves and while we were playing around in it, we accidentally breathed some in or something…”
I raised an eyebrow. “You mean you think we accidentally got high off of ‘shrooms? Hallucinogenic fungus fumes? Are you
serious?”
Kyle smiled apologetically. “Not really. But it’s the only thing I can come up with. If it didn’t affect my mom or my sister, the chances of its being an isolated event are pretty big, don’t you think? I dunno. Maybe this weather, the dead vegetation… it might explain this headache, too. Maybe I’m allergic to it, whatever it is.”
“I didn’t know you had allergies.” I narrowed my eyes. “Me either, to think of it. This would be a first.”
“Well,” the brunette replied, “it’s either that or… the two of us are insane.”
“Sudden psychotic episode? Both of us, simultaneously? Haha, really funny, Kyle.”
That being said, I thought,
what else makes sense? Something
happened, that’s for sure. But I’m not sure I buy the “inhaled plant hallucinogen” theory, either.“Only as funny as how you’re going to look, cleaning up this mess,” Kyle replied, picking up the rake. “Look, if it never happens again, we know it’s nothing to worry about.”
I followed his lead and grabbed the bag, too involved in my grim thoughts to do anything else. The question on my lips was, I knew, already in Kyle’s head- but I knew that he didn’t have an answer… and he probably didn’t want one any more than I did.
…And what if it does
happen again…?After a minute or so, Kyle shot another look, this one menacing, at the back door. Breaking the silence, he growled, “They were talking about that pain-in-the-ass, Ryan.”
Ryan, if you don’t know, is Kyle’s sister’s boyfriend- and someone who had managed (with very, very little effort) to scrape away my best friend’s patience. I knew what was coming, so before Kyle could open his mouth to recount whatever recent, not-quite-altercation had happened between his overprotective ego and the notoriously snot-nosed freshman, I elbowed him.
“Hey. It’s getting late,” I pointed out. “If you don’t get your ass across the street and introduce yourself to that blonde chick soon, you’ll have to fight for her attention while she’s up to her neck in boxes the rest of the week.” I smirked and shoved Kyle forward; he raised an eyebrow and then turned to crane his neck around the side of his house.
“Ahh… mmm… all right… I’ll go check it out.” He tied the last bag of leaves and tossed it at the side of the house, where the rest of them lay in lumpy, shadowy communion.
“Good luck, man,” I replied.
As I made to leave, however, fingers closed around my arm. With a slightly pale but determined look on his face Kyle added, “…and you’re my backup. Got it?”
I moaned. “Do I have to hold your hand?” Promises of food aside, I was anxious to get Kyle distracted and get myself away, but Kyle wasn’t moving.
“No; you gotta come with me. What if she…”
“All right; all right! You’re pathetic, you know?” Sighing, I followed my friend as he strolled stiffly across the street.[/spoiler]
Log 9866.21.2140- Audrey[spoiler]Upset? Yes. I’d lost my temper, but my parents had it coming.
I huffed angrily into the chilly air with my back turned to the two adults who were, no doubt, watching me with their patent looks of patronizing concern.
Okay, Audrey. Calm down. Calm down! Could they have missed it? I tried to reason myself out of dumping my frustrations on my unsuspecting mother and father.
No way, I decided.
How could they not
have seen it? Impossible! And I didn’t dream it; I couldn’t have. I don’t have that
sort of imagination.I wanted to reason with my parents; I didn’t need them thinking that I was losing my mind. I
didn’t need to give them another reason to be clingy.
Well, I’ve gotten ahead of myself.
I’m Audrey Vivienne Anderson, recent alumnus of the University of Southern California’s graduate program in both design mechanics and biotechnology. I’d just suffered through the last mile of a long, long drive from biggest cities on the West Coast to the smallest town I’d ever seen. Period. It had also been the longest possible drive from my friends, personal expectations, my dreams.
If you could call any of them that.
To reiterate: this was a tiny town. The kind of town with two dozen traffic lights and one strip mall. Population 5,000: smaller than my graduating class. It was an unnerving change. I kept imagining 19th-century western films: the single General Store, one train station… it didn’t help.
Sitting in the backseat of my dad’s ancient station wagon (complete with faux wood paneling on the doors), I slid my sunglasses onto my nose, then focused on the cookie-cutter houses as they passed.
Well, good luck spotting the new place, Dad. If it weren’t for the address, we’d never find it.“Audrey,” my mother suddenly announced, like she’d just won the grand prize at a bingo game, “look! We’re here, honey! Look out your father’s side of the car.”
Ignoring the way my stomach seemed to slide into my liver, I obliged, leaning on a timeworn armrest. A standard-local-issue, two-story brick house with a tacked-on two-car garage and covered porch rolled into view.
And that’s when I realized how my mother had managed to differentiate our house from every one of the hundred other houses in the neighborhood: the porch, the shutters, the garage door- anything not brick- were all a grotesque, clashing shade of salmon pink. Easily visible from the street. I swallowed hard.
Well, those photos I downloaded were spot-on, color-wise, I remarked sarcastically to myself.
How…“Quaint, isn’t it?” my mother asked brightly.
Actually, “garish” came to mind, but… I bit down on my lip. “It’s great, Mom. Just like the sales guy said it’d be.”
Finally curbside, the car shuddered to a stop. Dad muttered something about the carburetor as the engine’s spluttering gave way to ominous hissing. I groaned as he popped the hood.
“You’re not going to find anything, Dad,” I said. “Why don’t I…”
“Now, sweetie,” he began. He gave the car a pat. “I’ve had the old girl for seventeen years; there’s nothing about her that I don’t know. Don’t you remember when…”
…And that’s when I dropped it.
Ignoring Dad’s anecdotal spewage, I noted that Mom, all smiles, had long since started a conversation with the moving guys on the driveway. Knowing her, she was probably about to invite them to stay for dinner.
I sighed and wondered again why I’d ever agreed to move across the country with my parents.
You had job offers. You could have become the youngest, full-time biomechanics consultant in North America. You could be living in San Fran right now, reading a nice book on a leather recliner on your back patio, overlooking the homes of some of the richest people on the West Coast.My nose flared as the regret surfaced; I frowned and shoved the feelings aside. I had my reasons, I argued with myself. Even the promise of a six-figure salary hadn’t been enough of a reason to stay behind and watch my parents move. Some part of me knew I wasn’t ready to be out on my own. Not at sixteen, anyway.
Oh, face it, my mind sneered mercilessly,
you’d be utterly alone, out there. That’s your only reason for tagging along.But being alone wouldn’t have been the end of the world. I could- I
would have adapted.
So why did it seem so terrifying?
“Audrey, honey, come look at your new room!”
“Oh, boy,” I muttered as my train of thought derailed. My hands moved of their own volition, grabbing the door handle, propelling the rest of my body onto the asphalt.
“Coming, Mom. Just give me a- ” I reached back into the seat to find that I was no longer reaching into the car, but into…
My stomach?!?I screamed and pulled my hand back.
Or, that’s what my mind frantically shrieked at my hand to do as it flopped weakly inside my gut. I couldn’t move! While I struggled to reorient body parts, the sky decided to flatten me to the pavement. Abruptly, “dimension” and “direction” were meaningless.
I tried to pull air into my lungs and found my body unresponsive to my mental urgings. I felt overwhelmed, bloated- but only in a manner fitting of a full tube of toothpaste being run over by a pick-up truck.
Colors were wrong. Sounds were wrong. Things that I had taken for granted- gravity, the wave-particle duality of light, the conservation of mass- they no longer applied.
I was nothing. I was everything, which was nothing. The universe rushed together, sweeping forward, coming at me, looking to overwhelm and drown me. I tried to scream, to stay alive even while I was convinced that I’d already died.
Then, in a manner as benign as their coming had been terrorizing, the fluctuations stopped. The luminescent overlay evaporated and the world exhaled, sending everything back to its place.
I gasped, thinking to make up for the air I hadn’t been breathing, only to find myself hyperventilating; my lungs protested. It was as if nothing had happened.
“What was
that?!” I cried. I panicked; for all I knew, the whole thing could happen again at any moment.
I whirled. Dad reappeared from under the car. Mom had come back to grab suitcases from the car; now she dropped them and turned her attention on me.
“What was what, Audrey?” she asked.
I stared. “That… that
thing! The whole street, no, the whole
world just… just pancaked!” I used my hands to demonstrate. “I nearly died!”
It was my parents’ turn to stare.
“Dear, perhaps you had a fainting spell, is all,” my mother suggested, putting the back of her hand against my warm forehead. “You haven’t been sleeping well lately.”
I shook my head.
How could this be happening? I wondered frantically.
How could they have missed it? “It couldn’t have been!” I argued. “It was real!”
My father held his hands out, his intent to placate me at odds with the engine grime between his fingers. Reflexively, I shied away.
“Take it easy! Maybe you had a nightmare get the best of you. You’ve been under a lot of stress.”
“Perhaps you should go inside and sit down for a moment. With a little break, some rest, I’m sure it’ll pass,” my mother agreed.
I shook my head. This was ridiculous. I knew what I’d seen. My parents just… they just…
I had no answers. I itched to find out what had just happened. I had to
know. I didn’t want to go inside and sit down like a good little girl until I had the opportunity to convince myself that it hadn’t been real.
It took a long minute- my parents consoling me and reassuring me like they would a three-year-old with “monsters under the bed” syndrome- before my rationality managed to wrestle near-hysteria into submission.
If the both of them didn’t see it, it is
more likely that it didn’t
happen, I reasoned.
But either way, I won’t accomplish anything by trying to convince them that something happened when they are equally convinced that nothing did.But before I could head inside to find some peace and quiet and
think, my parents suddenly shifted, gazes focused on something behind me. I turned.
“Ah… excuse me?”
I turned to see a boy –no, two boys, both around my age –walking toward our house from across the street. The one who’d spoken, the taller of the two, looked grim and anxious.
As though he wanted to say something.
Something about what just happened! My mind eagerly leapt to the conclusion. But my hopes had no sooner been raised than the newcomers dashed them to the pavement. The taller boy pursed his lips and looked- not at me, but at the boxes on the driveway.
“I, uhm…” He paused and our eyes met. Under the intensity of his gaze, I began to blush. Embarrassed at being embarrassed, I frowned sharply.
“What?” I snapped. Irritation warred with disappointment.
The second boy returned a narrow look of calculating distaste.
“Uhh…” The first boy hesitated.
“Oh, don’t worry about Audrey,” my mother cut in suddenly. She reached around my shoulders to give me a quick hug. “She’s had a long day, it seems. She’s a sweet girl, once you spend some time with her, right?”
I bit my lip.
Really, Mom? Do you have to do this to me now?The first boy smiled warily. “I’m sure it’s been… a long day,” he agreed. “Uh… My name’s Kyle. I live across the street.” He gestured: his house mirrored ours without abusing the red end of the color spectrum; his shutters were a soothing blue.
“I was hoping I could, you know, help out a little. Carry your things inside?” Having found his social footing again, he took another step forward.
My dad did the same. “Excellent!” he exclaimed, shaking each teen’s hand. “It’s great to see people willing to help a neighbor out in this day and age. I’m Henry. Henry Anderson. This is my wife, Joni, and our daughter, Audrey. Joni, don’t you think we could use a little assistance?”
I tried to hide my displeasure. Mom didn’t bother to hide her enthusiasm.
“Of course! I’ll break into the cooler later and set out some snacks; it’ll be a little move-in party!”
Dad nodded and leaned forward. “Not to belittle the moving agency, but I don’t really trust them to take care of our items the way we would,” he confided.
“Mmm,” Kyle replied noncommittally.
“Audrey,” Dad continued as he began to transfer things from the back of the car to the waiting arms of the two strangers, “why don’t you show these young men the house? At this rate, we’ll get these things inside before dinner!”
I’m sure the face I made then was terrible, but my parents had already gone. At least I had the satisfaction of seeing the newcomers step back.
“…Right.” As the two boys huffed under the weight of the luggage, I quickly sized each box up.
“This is for the living room,” I told Kyle, and I peered around his large box at his friend. “And I didn’t catch your name,” I said, staring down quiet, almond eyes.
“I’m Liu,” he replied evenly. “I live further down the street. Kyle’s my best friend,” he added.
It was impossible to miss the warning:
mess with him, and you’re messing with me.
Like I care, I thought vehemently.
Liu shifted slightly then, putting himself (I noted) out of my immediate reach. Kyle interposed himself awkwardly between us. “So… uhh… where is your living room?”
I sighed: the fortieth time that afternoon. “Just… follow me.”
After I’d pointed Kyle toward the living room and Liu to the kitchen, I took the box I’d grabbed and ran to my bedroom upstairs.
The room, white on white, was deceptively spacious; folding doors on one wall revealed a disappointingly shallow closet. Gauzy curtains pulled back to frame a view of the large but unkempt backyard.
“Just like the photos,” I muttered. I dropped the box, slung my backpack into a corner, and turned to leave.
“K-Kyle!” I gasped, stumbling a bit. The boy, standing in the doorway, grinned sheepishly.
“Sorry to startle you,” he said. “I thought you might need help.” But before I could gather myself and snap something in response, Kyle’s eyes widened and he spun toward the landing.
“What… what is it?” I asked, butterflies spinning in my stomach.
The boy grimaced as he looked back to me. “I think… Liu’s dropped something,” he said, embarrassed.
I raised an eyebrow. “How can you t- ” But I couldn’t finish my sentence; the boy had vaulted over the railing and rushed down the stairs!
Taking the steps two at a time, I arrived on the porch a second later to find Kyle and Liu huddled guiltily over a small pile of…
“My things!” I gasped, and dropped to inspect the damage.
“I’m sorry. The bottom fell out,” Liu said quickly. “I caught most of it but…”
Caught it? I wondered. For a second, I believed he was exaggerating. Then I saw the pile of assorted books, binders, and picture frames neatly laid down by the boy’s feet… and the box, thrown roughly to the side, a large rip along one of its bottom hinges. I moaned.
And I’d duct-taped the center! I didn’t think the side would give out, of all the stupid, improbable…“Are these yours, too?” Kyle held up a broken frame. Inside, one of my diplomas.
I nodded. Liu and Kyle exchanged a wary look- you know, the kind that conveys an entire conversation in maybe 30 seconds? It didn’t take brains to know what they were thinking, either. I’d seen the look before.
“I’ll pay to have them fixed,” Liu offered.
Shaking my head, I moved to pick up the pile of broken items. “No. It’s fine,” I mumbled.
It’s not like I’m using them now; they were doomed to decorate my bedroom wall… not much else.“Here. I’ll carry them inside.” Kyle swiftly flattened the cardboard box and stacked the papers- separated from pieces of broken wood and glass- with some of the rest of the contents of the box on top. “Where should I put them?”
I straightened and took the things from him, ignoring the brief look of hurt confusion on his face. “I’ll do it. Just… Get a trash bag or something; I’m sure you two can clean up this mess without making it any worse.”
I left, flustered, confused at being flustered, and only too glad to leave the two boys to their own devices.[/spoiler]
