Black and White

6

As I shake off the disorientation that follows the visions, I look around the space I find myself in. It strikes me as resembling that space Harry Potter visits between life and death; I finally understand what he meant by the pure absence of anything. So when I glimpse a figure walking towards me from the distance, I stupidly blurt, "Professor Dumbledore?"

As the person gets closer, I begin to blush as I realize that this is not, in fact, the famed headmaster of Hogwarts. Instead, he is a boy around my age, with close-cropped brown hair and blue eyes and a handsome face and a perfect smile and -- wait, oh my god he's smiling at me. And I am dressed like a freaking cat.

"Hey. I'm Aiden. Didn't expect to ever see anyone else in a place like this." His words are casual and confident, but now that he is close enough I see that his smile doesn't reach his eyes, which look worn down, defeated.

"I'm Elodie." I smile prettily (I hope) back at him, looking into those blue eyes for a second too long. This gives me time to remove my tail. It occurs to me that multitasking qualifies as advanced flirting, which is flattering, I think.

Surprisingly quickly, he breaks away from my eyes and looks down at the... ground, floor, whatever this is. "Well, we better get used to each other, because we're gonna be here for a long time. Forever, in fact."

"Aw, c'mon. Don't be so dismal." I punch him lightly in the arm. Physical contact is an important part of flirting, right?

"I'm not joking." Aidan abruptly looks directly at me again, and his expression is enough to convince me that he's serious.

The smile slowly slides off my face. "But... I've done this before. This is just another vision, right? I'm gonna wake up and be back in my dorm. You're wrong."

"No. This is real. I thought it was another vision too, at first." He sighs. "But it's not. It's a prison. This is Paradox; time doesn't exist here. We don't exist. Our friends and family never knew us."

He states the words like they're facts he memorized, like he knows what he's talking about. And nobody would say something that disturbing casually. The place I'm in, with the never-ending white, seems strange enough for me to believe any explanation; as he goes on, I believe him more and more.

"We were put here because we misused time travel -- we each created a paradox. As punishment, and to stop us from doing any more harm, we were safely locked away in this... place." He emphasizes the word "place" bitterly, as if it's not really a place at all. "Being here resolves the paradox, too, by suspending the moment it was created using massive amounts of energy -- it gets pretty complicated." He pauses. "And there's no escape, so don't even bother looking. If you try walking too far in any direction, you just come back to the Podium. I know from experience."

"Wait, what's the Podium?" My voice cracks. I'm attempting to absorb all of the new information and the shock of realizing the gravity of this situation, all while still seeming cool for Aidan. It's not working very well.

But he seems to understand my confusion and sadness. After all, he went through it too. His face and voice soften. "It's where I learned all that. Walk in any direction, it'll be there. C'mon."

I follow him as he picks a way to go, wildly looking at my surroundings -- or lack thereof. And suddenly, out of all the nothingness, we come upon the Podium. It is a literal podium, made of something that looks like dark wood but can't be -- it feels as cool and hard as metal to my touch. On top of it is an enormous closed book entitled Guide to the Land of Paradox in large, gold-printed letters. Opening the book reveals dictionary-thin pages of miniscule print.

I look back at Aidan. "You read all of this?"

"Yup, and I've memorized the first fifty-three pages, too. Not much else to do when you have eternity to spend. What I just told you was all in the first few pages; later it explains this place in more detail, and towards the end it lapses into novels and stories by random authors, from all eras. Guess whoever put us here had the mercy to keep us entertained."

I nod, still in shock. He lets me stand there frozen for a very long time, staring at the strange podium surrounded by white, trying to process the depth of what has happened to me.

I break the silence eventually; I have to, because time doesn't exist -- we're here forever. Slowly, we begin to discuss Paradox, him reciting the book while I listen. The conversation moves wishfully to our lives -- our old lives -- and I learn that he has -- had -- a sister, Sofia, who was six years older than him; loving parents; and a dog named Rory. We discuss the world, life, everything. (I get a chance to casually deposit my tail and mask beneath the Podium.) And gradually, gradually, I come to terms with Paradox. It's not such a bad place, because Aidan is here. He's not the worst person to spend eternity with.

Also, I think I've made progress with my flirting.