Travels in the Other - PART ONE : chapter four

PART ONE : chapter four

Part One

chapter one
chapter two
chapter three
chapter four
chapter five
chapter six
chapter seven
chapter eight
chapter nine
chapter ten
chapter eleven

Part Two

chapter one
chapter two
chapter three
chapter four
chapter five

Part Three

chapter one
chapter two
chapter three
chapter four
chapter five
chapter six

Epilogue

I don't know how long I wandered through the house in a daze. I even ventured outside the front door, hoping that I would find someone to help me. I put on my Protector outfit, and stumbled into the night, something I was normally forbidden to do. Mr. Neery from next door was standing behind a lawn mower in mid-stride. I didn't have to get any closer to him to know he was frozen like the rest. I went back inside and walked to my room in the back of the house. I fell face down on my bed and cried. It felt like I cried all the tears I could cry, and I could cry no more. Somehow exhaustion overtook me and I fell asleep.

It was when I woke up that I noticed the clock beside my bed. It said 15:36. I knew that wasn't possible. Michael had come to the house no more than thirty minutes after Tracy and Tim,and I knew they had arrived at a little before 15:00. I sat on my bed for at least five minutes,watching the clock as though it was a bomb ready to explode in my face. The time never changed. Suddenly, my face lit with a smile, I realized that the clock was broken, and hurried to the living room to read the correct time. It said 15:35.

I fell back onto my bed, and tried not to resume my crying. "How do I stop this?" I cried aloud, begging for it to end. I turned on my side, and begged and pleaded to the clock to make it all be a frightening dream to tell my father about when he came home from work. He would laugh, then, and I would be able to stop crying. During all of this begging, the clock by my bed suddenly changed to read 15:37. I grabbed it in my hands wet from tears, and the plug came out of the wall. My digital clock still read 15:37.

My guess is that I spent about seventy-two hours here the first time, trying to leave. I never got the time on any clock to change again, but I know why now. Hungry and alone, I finally went back outside to lie on the ground where I had been when this whole mess started. I lifted Michael's heavy leg back over mine, and fitted my body to the indentations in the warm grass that remained. I begged one final time to have everything return to normal, and just as suddenly as the world had stopped, it started again.

After spending so much time in perfect silence, the noise was deafening. "...didn't mean to, really, Candice!" Michael screamed. "...bies, boo-bies, boo-bies," Tim was chanting, over and over. The sunlight was too sudden, and my eyes ached and watered. I screamed at the top of my lungs for them to stop yelling, but they already had. Michael was looking down at me, and asked in wonder, "How'd you do that?"

I looked down at myself, expecting to see only the source of my embarrassment, but of course I didn't. When I had been in my bedroom before, I had changed my shirt. This one was yellow, not blue. This one was not torn.

intro | next | back