Robbin

21. Parts One, Two and Three

Part One: Transported

Terra woke up from familiar dreams the second day and clutched her necklace. She got ready for school and clutched her necklace. She ate breakfast and clutched her necklace. She let her mom drive her to school and clutched her necklace. By the time she was sitting in her first period of the day, Astronomy, she could not take her hand away from her necklace at all.

She had a sudden urge to raise the hand that wasn't obsessively clutching her necklace. The Astronomy teacher eyed her wearily, her right hand twiddling nervously and continuously around the ring as if she was having some kind of mental breakdown. "Yes, Terra?" he asked.

"Do you believe in alternate realities?" she asked.

He stared blankly in response for a few seconds, struggling to find a valid answer in front of a class that was suddenly attentive. "To answer your question, some people do believe black holes are really loop holes into other galaxies." There was laughing. "What I believe, however, is that black holes are just exploded super stars that have collapsed so drastically there is no gravity left. It is a spot in the sky that sucks in light and all else nearby, and compresses it all into oblivion. In other words," he paused ominously, "there is no scientific evidence to support the latter theory." There was more laughing.

Terra frowned, unsatisfied. "Say you're right, could alternate realities still exist somewhere out there, some other way? Say, in another dimension?"

"I don't know," he finally admitted. "I would look up quantum physics and start from there."

Terra slouched back in her seat amongst the giggling and one brave soul even dared throw a wrapper. She didn't know what came over her—maybe her necklace really was getting to her head—but she suddenly spun in her seat, reaching down with her free hand to grab the wrapper, and on impulse, she chucked the thing back at the kid who had thrown it. The thing hit the boy right in between the eyes, a look of shock frozen on the kid's face.

The teacher ignored all of this so Terra raised her hand again.

"Yes, Terra?" He raised his eyebrows.

"May I use the restroom?"

She dropped the hall pass to the floor of the empty ladies' bathroom, not caring, and rushed to a mirror. The sight of herself today was hideous. She hadn't realized when leaving the house that she looked like such a train wreck. Her eyes were bloodshot from frequently interrupted sleep; her fingers shook slightly; she hadn't bothered to do her hair, or even blow dry it, as it was pulled back hastily in wet matted clumps and long stray hairs she had missed still fell down regardless. She looked paler than usual; her skin was clammy; she wore a black sweatshirt and overused shorts; and the look in her eyes: her brows were raised in terror, a wildness to her wide yellow irises that she hadn't seen before. She couldn't take her right hand from her necklace, and she was skipping out on first period merely to obsess over the thing.

Terra unclamped it suddenly. She stumbled over to a toilet with the necklace in hand and thrust it out over the opening as if about to drop it inside, flush it down where no one would ever find it again. She couldn't stop thinking about it. She wanted to go back to Carynthia. There was only one other thing to do.

Breaking out in a cold sweat, she had become incapable of letting go. She thrust the thing back and clamped it around her neck once more, coming to another rash conclusion: she couldn't go back to first period. She threw her loaded backpack, which she had thrown against the wall, back over her shoulder and marched for the exit to the bathroom, through the long abandoned hallways, (quickly, before she could get caught) and for the nearest exit to the building. Once outside, she felt a little bit better. She walked across the green grass which lined the bland walls and headed for her neighborhood park. She would decide where to go from there. There were another five hours before she would normally be heading home, so that gave her some time.