Interference (Chapter 4)

Sunday, May 7, 2088

Dear Journal,

I’m beginning to find it funny that I and many others in the past have started their diary entries with “Dear Diary” or “Dear Journal” or name their diaries and journals when the inanimate objects are not really the ones who listen to them.
So, I will now just write this journal like it’s a conversation, a prayer, to You. I know You hear me and listen to me, God, all the time. It doesn’t matter what I say to the journal, I guess, because You’re always there. You know a word before it’s on my tongue. Or the tip of my digital pen.
I’ll still keep this journal for my own recollection, however. I want to remember everything, everything You’ve allowed in my life, everything You’ve set out for me.
I went to the date on Saturday. We went out for coffee, and walked around in a park, a really nice one, one that I knew my best friend would have loved. She’s still single at the moment, hasn’t had a boyfriend since the end of senior year in high school, but she takes the single life very well. And most certainly doesn’t depend on a guy for her self-esteem. She is the incarnate of those talks in middle school about romantic-relationship dependency.
Anyway, everything went ridiculously well. I don’t know why I was feeling so bad about it on Monday last week.
Or maybe I do.
The sermon in church today was about trying to listen to God. Being still and listening to him, trying to discern what He (You) is/are saying to us.
I do feel a little uneasy after last night. Are You telling me something?
I don’t really understand, though. Alexander is great. He’s very respectful and polite, and very intelligent. He’s looking into a career in science, engineering, inventing things. He isn’t awkward with the amount of intelligence he had, no stereotypes for him. He’s got a lot of potential, though. I can see him doing something big someday...
And he’s so sweet, too. Maybe he’s just a good talker, but he definitely has me.
I could easily take to liking him. I guess I should just be careful.
He asked me out again for next Friday.
My friend is messaging me now...
“Hey, M. How are you? How’d your date with Alexander go?” she said, absolutely unsubtle about her desire for details and information.
“I’m doing very well. And it was wonderful...”
She smiled, smirk-ish, telling me to spill all the details with her green eyes. So I did.
I didn’t like coffee much, so I had a hot chocolate at the cafe, while Alexander had a semi-expensive cup, black. People around us were busy on their laptops, surround sound headphones on their ears, connected to their meTops, chatting away or typing and sending essays for their classes.
At first, it was awkward, I not knowing what to say, and him seeming to think over his words very carefully. But after a while, we warmed up to each other, and conversation came very easy.
He’s just a year older than me, and lives out on his own. He has a lot of drive in his plans for the future, for his career. He didn’t have a job at the moment, yet he still seemed to have enough money for necessities, maybe more. He’s been working on it for years. Outside of that, he said he mostly read and wrote some things. Recording his own studies and such. I know there had to be a creative side to him, however. He had a mePad that fell out of his pocket, with some sort of story title labeling it.
He wouldn’t let me see it, but I didn’t mind.
The only topic that he really seemed to avoid, however, was his family.
“So, you’re going to school pretty far from your hometown. How are your parents taking that? I mean, mine are definitely freaking out, they message me every day...”
He seemed to tense up, a hint of anger coming to his beautiful blue eyes.
“Let’s not talk about my parents, alright? So, what do you do outside of your class work?”
I decided with the sharp way he diverted the subject, I wouldn’t bring it up again. So I talked to him about everything.
“Then we went to a park,” I said to Natalia.
“Oh, cool! Which one? I’ve been needing one for this project...”
“I don’t remember the name, but it was really nice, you’d like it. It was about a few blocks from the school...”
I remembered us, though, the sky changing color above us, stars peeking out from the city lights smearing them. I remember that we were having a wonderful conversation. And so kind and traditional, he brought me back to my dorm room, which I usually shared with Natalia, who out at her parents for the weekend, and kissed me on the hand. I knew she’d find this ridiculously sappy, but I liked it.
I could not wait until next Friday. I write this as Natalia rants on and on... I still need to have my reservations. I still have to be careful. But I just can’t wait...

Kainni

I was wearing a blank tank top and cargo pants, dark black eye makeup and had spiked bracelets on, with a studded belt, my choker also shimmering a little in the sun. I had a sword. And I was fighting someone. We were sweating on the summer day, I was nearly losing. But I couldn’t let myself lose... the person I fought was my enemy, and I needed to win, no matter what it took.
My enemy had on a black sweatshirt, with the hood down over him. The sleeves were torn off from the sweatshirt, scratches and bruises on his yet-sculpted arms. I couldn’t even identify him from underneath the hood and the hair in his eyes. Even with our swift moves, circling each other...
He was moving too quick. This battle was important somehow. It was absolutely vital. Our surroundings were spinning, but it blended into the background. My opponent was all I could focus on...
He slashed at me, and nearly cut my arm. I started toward him faster. Our blades slammed into each other, and we mirrored this multiple times, before I pressed the blade very close to him. He pulled his away quickly, before charging at me. I put all my strength into the next move, strategically hitting his blade so as to knock it from his hand. He stood there still for a moment, and I started to move in, but he pulled out a dagger very rapidly, grabbing my sword on its blade. Blood poured from his hand, but my grip started to loosen as he attempted to rip it from my own fist.
I stood my ground, however, pulling it away from him, and he raised the knife...
We were both prepared to move, when our surroundings stopped spinning, and something crashed into my back, forcing me forward, driving the blade into the heart of the boy... and he fell backward, like in slow motion, as the hood began to come down. The dagger was released from his hand, and the force behind me, a hand, came to my back again, shoving me forward, the blade on a collision course for my heart...
I jolted awake, breathing heavily. My hand was across my heart, protecting me as I gasped for breath...
I didn’t get the chance to see who the person I murdered was. Or to turn around and see who shoved me toward what would have caused my death. I tried to breathe deeply. Where on earth did that come from?
There had been a strange, morbid power during that nightmare, though. Like I could win this battle, with whoever it was I was trying to beat.
Except for the moment my sword had finally driven itself to his chest. There had been a sick feeling consuming me, and I couldn’t even feel the pain as the force had shoved me to do it. Just that horrid feeling as blood came from him, as he started to fall, the hood nearly coming down. And yet I still couldn’t see that face.
I heard some murmuring from the hallway, snapping me out of the vivid memory of the dream.
There were pauses between words, and they were too close to be in the other room anymore.
“Shane... you’ve gotta go now,” Terra whispered to him. A pause, like their lips were meeting again. Ugh.
I glanced at the digital clock on the nightstand of the guest room. It said it was 5:30.
“Just a little longer,” he said, sighing slightly.
“Mom’s gonna be up soon...”
Another sigh.
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Shane replied.
Another pause.
I could tell they broke from each other again.
“See you Monday,” Terra whispered.
Shane didn’t reply as he started to walk away.
“Love you,” she said a little louder.
He paused as he walked, and still didn’t reply.
“Me too,” he said, distantly. It was hard to tell if he was telling the truth.
The door to the guest room was cracked a little, and Terra removed the oversized t-shirt she was wearing, revealing a few faded extra marks on one of her arms, and heading back into her room, before emerging in a sweatshirt and sweatpants, rather quickly. She then proceeded to go into the kitchen.
Wasn’t it Saturday? Was it not at least four hours too early for “teenagers” like us to be waking up?
The aroma of coffee soon wafted through my door. I groaned slightly, turning my head into the pillow I’d slept on. I didn’t want to be up at this hour, I didn’t want the memories of yesterday creeping into my brain, or the thought of bloody swords and shoving hands taking over my imagination.
I pulled the blanket over my head, but I knew without a doubt, I had no more chances of sleeping any longer.

Troy

A house door opened and closed, and I awoke. I cracked my eyes open a little, blinking slightly, as I adjusted to my surroundings. I was in Terra’s house, I remembered... and the events of yesterday poured back into my head. It had to be much too early for this. I closed my eyes again, leaning my head back down.
I heard footsteps coming back to an area in the vicinity of the room. It must have been Terra, the steps light, yet slightly heavy, from lack of sleep. A switch was flipped, and I assumed a light came on, my eyes able to detect the minor change.
She started pulling out a glass dish or cup or something, setting it on the kitchen counter, as a machine started to hum quietly. A strong, familiar, yet unfamiliar, scent wafted through the kitchen and living room. I felt a twinge my stomach.
Her mother’s door opened slowly.
“Morning, Terra,” came a weary voice, yawning. “Oh you made the coffee, thank you.”
“No problem, Mom,” said Terra, quietly. She must have done this a lot as well. A tiny door in the kitchen opened, maybe one of those above-storage... what did you call them? Cupboards? doors opened, and the sound of small objects rattling out of a small plastic container was cut off by, perhaps, landing in a hand.
The glass cup was picked up again, hot liquid pouring into it, sizzling a little. It was passed, I believe, perhaps to another hand.
“Thanks, sweetie,” Terra’s mother said again. Sip, swallow. The plastic container with the little capsules was shut back into the cupboard.
“I’ll be home around six tonight.”
Terra didn’t respond out loud immediately, pouring another cup of the hot liquid.
“Alright.”
Her mother picked up something by the couch, probably a purse, and traveled out the door, closing it quietly. Then she started her car.
I probably wasn’t going to be able to sleep much longer, so I decided to “wake up”. I yawned, sitting up gradually.
Terra took a sip of the hot, dark brown liquid, and then spit it out into the sink. She coughed a little before noticing that I was awake.
“O-Oh, morning, Troy. Sorry if I woke you. Coffee’s just a little too hot, you know?”
I nodded, like I understood.
I never really liked it. It reminded me of my parents now. One who’d grown to like it, one who’d grown to detest the innocent, mostly morning beverage. And now it reminded me of them as well.
“Want any?” Terra asked me, as she raided her freezer for a tray of ice cubes, preceding a jug of milk from her refrigerator.
Old technology. It was fascinating.
“No thanks,” I replied.
“Alright.”
I stood up gradually, stretching, and made my way into the kitchen as Terra pulled out a tall container of sugar and pouring a generous amount of it into her cup, dousing it with the milk until the coffee looked just a shade tanner than my skin tone. She then proceeded to take a sip of the pale liquid, and appeared to be much more satisfied with its taste and temperature than earlier.
“Uh, sorry for, umm... just leaving you guys out there like that last night.”
“Oh... it was fine. No problem.”
What was there exactly to apologize for? We truly hadn’t had any problems... it was more her and her poor excuse for a boyfriend that I was worried about.
She nodded, looking as though she felt a bit awkward.
“Well, I see you got the couch,” Terra commented, as she absentmindedly stirred her coffee with a small spoon.
“Yeah, it was alright.”
There was a pause in our conversation, Terra stopping her stirring for a moment, looking thoughtful.
“So... what did Shane mean last night, about you and Kai, or whatever her name is, erm... knowing each other?” she asked, tentatively.
I thought about the question, and internally winced a little as I pondered it. Should I go along with Kainni’s story, which cast me as the disliked and dislikable ex-boyfriend, or... something else? It made sense for me to be someone she hated. And she had all the reason in the world. I guess this would be the best transposition I could make for now, for it all to make sense...
“Yeah... w-we... we were having some problems, and...”
I had to think like a jerkish ex-boyfriend...
“No, seriously. What’s going on?”
Yet another reassurance of the lack of the Abbort lying (and acting, I suppose) gene.
“W-Well...”
A loud yawn very conveniently interrupted me as Kainni stepped out of the guest room.
“He was a jerk. That’s just it. Gosh, you guys are loud...”
“Sorry,” Terra grumbled, sighing, a hint of frustration in her voice. Kainni looked over at her, trying to figure her out, I presumed.
“So...” Terra started. “How do you and Troy know each other, Kai?”
“Yeah, Kai?” I asked, somewhat nervously. She glared at me, before she had that sinister glint in her eye again.
“Well... basically, he just generally ruins my life on a daily basis.”
Terra stared at Kainni suspicious, and I questioningly.
“I can tell you all about it.”
She was trying to be serious, but it all came out acidic, just like her previous speech. I was somewhat interested in her translation of what had happened in the future to how it could be if I was like the person she was trying to portray me to be. Whatever it was, I could take it, and it would be true.
I was looking down at the floor, not playing my part very well.
“Yeah, yeah, don’t need the details. Just work it out.”
She started heading toward her room again.
“Hey, Kainni, I’ve got some clothes, you can change into if you want...”
“Uh, sure,” she said, taken off guard, dragging out the removal of her cold stare from me.
I looked away from her, turning my back, and staring at the counter.
What did I do, but... I deserved this, I was sure. But somehow, it still hurt. I had to take it.
I didn’t let her fall earlier. When I watched her go with Shane, I felt concern for her. My father may have destroyed her family, and our time machines had interfered, but...
What had I done wrong?

Kainni

I still couldn’t bring myself to let this go. He was an Abbort. Maybe I would’ve fallen and hit my head on the ground, but how bad could that have been, yesterday? Maybe I would remember any of this and I could learn how to be a resident of 2009.
But I couldn’t. And he was the reason why. I couldn’t let it go.
Terra led me into her room, opening a drawer and pulling out some clothes, which revealed various concealed things... some things unrepeatable, probably used in the occasion in which her “boyfriend” apparently violated in entering her room, a strange clearish object, a lighter, perhaps? and a pack of... ugh, I now recognized them from the Substance Abuse History Unit of one of my social studies classes, cigarettes.
She didn’t look like she smoked or anything like that. She didn’t seem to be a person who would... be the way she is, yet... she was.
I glanced around her room. She had posters of bands and singers she might not even listen to anymore, a picture of her when she was must have been at least a few years younger, in black and white, a somber Asian girl with a gentle smile and a bright girl with dark brown hair on either side of her. A frame was turned down. Her mirror had sticky notes on it, reminding her of school assignments, her floor a little messy...
Around her room were many photographs, with labels as gifts from one particular friend, who signed her pictures simply, yet artistically, in very small script Kim.
Yet the most striking piece in her room was one that was not so in tact, as much so that it looked like it had been worn and literally, torn and put together again about at least 10 times.
It was of her, and Shane, probably taken as a candid photograph, his arm draped lazily and comfortably around her shoulders, both of them looking like they were having a good time, Terra mid-laugh, and him with a similar, light-hearted expression.
I could easily imagine what had brought her to rip this picture so many times, yet it almost hurt to look at it myself.
Another thing that caught my eye was a book laying open on the vanity of the mirror. The page was early in the book, about a girl and her friends in orchestra, her keeping a secret, and as much as I was drawn into reading this old-fashioned, printed novel, what I noticed, was the even more old-fashioned library card.
Sawyer, Terra N.
It had to be a mere coincidence, that her last name matched my mother’s maiden name...
“Good pictures, aren’t they?” said Terra, quietly startling me as she broke the silence. She extended her hand with a pile of folded clothes.
I accepted them cautiously.
Terra sighed.
“Kimura is... was... is a good photographer, don’t you think...” she said, wistfully, trailing off.
“Yeah, she... is.”
She swallowed as she dug some forbidden object out of her drawer. “You don’t mind, do you?”
It was the lighter and the box of cigarettes.
I shook my head, though I did mind.
“I’ll be outside.”
I nodded, taking the clothes to the guest room. I changed, wondering what had brought on the drop in Terra’s mood. Something must have happened to her friend... I bit my lip. I didn’t like to think of things like that.
Where I came from, everything now was rare. People lived long, mostly good lives, unless they got super-bacterial infections.
Or at least that’s what it looked like on the outside. Who knows what went on behind the closed doors?
Like Alexander Abbort and his propaganda...
I slipped on a pair of denim pants, jeans? and a cotton t-shirt. I debated on what I would do next. Glancing out the window of the guest room, I confirmed that Terra was outside, and snuck back into her room.
I looked at it, at the old school papers, and other items and such...
“Do you really think you should be doing that? Violating someone’s privacy that way?” came a quiet voice.
Abbort.
I glared at him. “Like you don’t. That’s the way you try to rule the world, isn’t it?”
“I... I don’t, I’m not...”
“Don’t try to defend yourself, you know you’re...”
“I’m not, I try, I... maybe I am, but...”
“You are.”
He turned away from me, shaking his head, trudging back down through the hallway.
I stared back down at Terra’s possessions, at the papers and the photographs. The one with her and Shane still stood out to me. She had one of just Shane, probably taken professionally with his thoughtful looking pose, leaning against a wall, maybe for school.
My eyes wandered down to the book. The girl in the book, I wondered... what had she to hide?
I picked it up, putting my right index finger in between the pages that Terra had left off on, to glance at the cover. Let It Out was the title. Hm. I paged through it, scanning over the first few pages and chapters, but one passage sucked me in...
A confrontation between her and her father, about a permission slip, which most parents would love to have where I was, yet it had turned extremely violent.
I could feel my heart beating faster just reading that passage. How could anyone live with such unloving, horrifying parents?
This was not a thing of the past where I was, yet it was studied like it was. Like our lives were so far above the meager existences of those who endured history.
Like everything wrong had disappeared, like the feigned peace speeches spelled out “utopia” for our far from perfect world.
I opened the book back up to where Terra’s library card marked her page. Terra N. Sawyer. My mom’s former last name had always seemed strange to me, a woman with the name Natalia having such a plain name like Sawyer for her last. Ceiltra fit her better, it wasn’t so plain. Though I knew my mom had entertained the idea of combining my father’s and her last name. It fit her to think like that, but I liked the name Ceiltra. I couldn’t see us as being Sawyer-Ceiltra’s.
Those details were insignificant right now. I wondered why Terra would like to read a book like this...
And then something else caught my eye. A handwritten poem attached to a letter.

Why
I was right there next to you
I watched you slip away
I watched you fade as I felt part of me
Slip with you
I never thought
That this could end so fast
That life could be lost so fast
That we could be over so quickly
I don’t know how to go on
Without you by my side
I don’t know what I’ll do
Without you now
After you,
I’m waiting
I’m lost, confused
Wondering why you had to go
Wondering why I’m left alone
After all we’ve been through together,
Why you leave me here
Why you had to go home so soon
And I ask God, why?
And I don’t want to believe
That you’re not here
I don’t want to feel your absence
Everywhere I go
Places that used to be full of joy and life
Empty and void and dark
Yet I know you’re somewhere
So much better than here
I know you’re not in pain
That you don’t even have the time or reason to miss me
And this dark place,
To face another day,
I’ll just have to live
By knowing one day we’ll meet again.

Dear Terra,
This was Kim’s poem about my brother that she wrote a couple years ago. She gave it to me, but I felt that maybe she would have wanted you to keep it. II couldn’t believe it when the news got here to our mission in Africa. My parents were crying with me by the end of the email. I’m so, so, sorry. I wish I was there right now, I’m sorry I can’t be there for you like I used to be. But we were called.
I thought about Lee, and the accident a few years ago, Mom and Dad thought about him too, probably, a lot after finding out. I have no doubt where they are, though, Terra. They’re in Heaven, content and without pain, endless joy with God and they’re together, Terra. They’re happy.
God works in mysterious ways. Earlier today, because we still had to go in and help with the church building and the teaching in the elementary school, 10 kids and adults came and accepted Christ as their savior. It was incredible.
And I dreamt about them last night, Terra. He showed me they were doing wonderfully. It’s a beautiful place.
I hope you’re doing well, Terra. We’ll be back soon, don’t worry. And don’t forget, you’re never alone. The Lord is always there for you. I hope you realize that. Don’t forget.
Love you like a sister,
Alana

Attached, was a picture of the dark-haired girl with people I assumed were her family, and a group of African children gathered with them, looking like they were a part of Alana’s family as well.
I swallowed, as I lifted up one of the overturned picture frames. The frame was flimsy, and I pulled on the back of it, sliding off easily.
On the back of the photograph was the label
“15th birthday. Left to right: Lee, Kim, Alana, Me, Shane, 2007. Taken with Kim’s fancy camera with the stand.”
The somber girl in the picture was Kimura, a photographer, gone far too young. Alana’s brother had also died too young. Why had such things happened back then? Now?
Did they still happen? Why?
I stared at the photographs, as I lethargically put Terra’s room back to the way I’d found it, walking out slowly.
Troy was standing by the counter, staring at the floor, looking thoughtful and unhappy. He looked almost exactly like his father, but his hair was longer and his eyes, they had not yet become cold and unfeeling and deceiving.
But warm, filled with emotion, transparent, a true gateway to his soul.
He glanced up as he saw me entering the room.
“Look... I... I’m sorry_”
“Don’t be,” he murmured. “I know... I’m... I’m sorry, too.”
Troy Abbort finally looked me straight in the eye. Such a stare could easily break the hardest hearts.
I could stare him back for a moment, before my gaze landed on the floor. I heard the sliding back door open, Terra stepping in.
Troy walked to her. I could smell the scent of her carcinogen-filled stress relief easily upon her clothes now.
“Hey... Sorry... about that,” she said, yawning slightly. “I think... if it’s okay, I’m gonna go back to bed. Is that okay?”
I nodded. She seemed drained. I felt a tiny sliver of understanding from the glimpse into her life I’d gotten from her bedroom and the sounds of her hallway at 5 in the morning.
“Thanks.”
Once again, she retreated to her bedroom. I began feeling guilty for violating her privacy now, yet I was beginning to understand some things about her. Maybe even beginning to understand some things in this world. Peculiar that I should land 100 years in the past... it used to be one of my dreams when I was younger. I don’t understand what my fascination had been with that, and now that I was here, I couldn’t possibly imagine why I’d wanted to come here.
I yawned, feeling tired, yet knowing I was unable to fall asleep.
Troy poured a cup of coffee into a clean mug, cautiously, and brought out the milk and sugar that Terra had taken out a little bit ago. He made a cup similar to hers, drinking it hesitantly.
Coffee. That was a certainly a good idea. Maybe it could wake me up a little more... not that I really needed it after my unnecessary venture to Terra’s bedroom. Terra N. Sawyer. I couldn’t get that last name out of my mind. It wasn’t as though it was horribly uncommon. I poured a cup of the steaming-hot coffee for myself, hoping it was okay with Terra. On the rare occasion I allowed myself to use such a substance as caffeine to assist me during the day, I tried not to make it less concentrated. It was strangely contradicting to what I’d even expect from myself, but coffee was better without such things interrupting its consistency and flavor.
I took a sip, immediately noticing that it wasn’t nearly as good as it was where I had come from, but it would have to do.
Troy was watching me again.
“Could you please stop?” I said, doing my best not to sound irritable. My attempt wasn’t very successful.
“I’m... I’m sorry. Again. But... how do you drink your coffee black like that? Isn’t it kind of bitter?”
I shrugged.
“It tastes fine to me.”
He shuddered a little.
“I don’t like coffee.”
I shrugged again, as I downed another fourth of the cup. My father drank his coffee black like I did. It was more of an addiction for him and Mom, yet now she tried to avoid it unless it was entirely organic, and maybe for other reasons. I didn’t ask why. Part of me wished I did now, though it was so trivial, so insignificant. But now I knew I could very well never get the chance. I stared into the cup, feeling an ache creep into my gut, into my heart again. I didn’t want to think about this. I wanted to be angry again.
It was his fault. I shouldn’t be apologizing for anything, this was an Abbort’s fault, after all.
I glared at him sharply again. I stared down at the cup, and then at him. My wrist jerked a little, the liquid flying from the cup to his chest, and I slammed the coffee mug angrily into the sink. So what if it broke. It was his fault, all his fault... I hurried out the sliding back door, slamming it shut, a gust of air blasting into the kitchen, as I shoved my way outside, out of her backyard, into her neighbor’s yard and onto the sidewalk, wanting to be anywhere but here.

Troy

I didn’t realize how hot that stuff was, even when I was drinking it. Then again, there had been the milk in mine. Kainni’s drink was splattered all over one of the shirts Terra had so kindly purchased for me the night before, and it caused a stinging, immediate pain, that soon faded, yet I knew had to be taken care of. It wasn’t as bad as what I’d felt before, that I knew.
I deserved this somehow. Didn’t I?
But all I had asked was a simple, innocent question. I picked up another shirt, and ducked into Terra’s bathroom, removing the shirt and retrieving my roll of auto-bandages. This was hardly anything, if these things worked like they did in the future, I wouldn’t have any problems. As long as she didn’t see them. I supposed they might look like something from this era, just had certain different properties that made them a little bit more powerful than this time’s average bandaging mechanisms.
What had I done?
Remember, I told myself, that she has every reason to hate me... she has every reason to treat me this way, she has all the justifiable excuses in the world to do so, all of them, every reason...
I sighed shakily as I wrapped the bandages around the reddened area on my chest. I tried not to look up at myself, as even my own reflection reminded me of my father... and of my mother, and how I shared almost none of my appearance with her.
We had the same blue eyes, though his were a shade darker, fitting for him, dark hair, skin tone. There was almost nothing very indentifying that made us distinctly different beings on the outside, though my hair was longer and that I was younger. I wasn’t even an inch shorter than him.
My own reflection reminded me that I could never truly get away.
I stared at myself, as the bandages started to match my skin tone and its abilities starting to heal the very slight injury.
At this moment, I made a very rash decisions, ripping them off of my skin, knowing it was probably in vain, to make myself anymore different than him in appearance. The redness had already gone down. All it had been was just hot coffee spilling on me... it was hardly anything.
Why did I try to heal my scratches and bruises and burns and bones? Why were all of these things almost entirely reversible where I was? It would be one thing I could control to make myself less like him.
Longer hair was almost a win for me, an eighth of an inch a success. But it wasn’t enough.
On the inside, I had tried to make myself different. I tried to convince myself that I was. That I absolutely was not like him, that I wouldn’t turn out to be like him. But as I’ve grown, I learned that would never happen. I thought like him, I thought of how stupid people had been once, how easy it was for them to give into him, I wondered what it would be like. What that kind of power felt like. But it was not something to envy, not something to desire.
The only reason I’d want it was to conquer him. To become more than him. But I would never be better than him. He may have even had the same reasons to keep on climbing the way he did. We had too much in common, though I hated to admit it. I was caught in a cycle that went on and on and on and would never stop.
Until now. I would do whatever it took to accomplish the goal I’d had in mind. And if I didn’t... there’s always a backup plan.
I stared in the mirror again, a part of me wanting to slam my fist into the glass, images pouring into my head like the way melodramatic historical television used to be, my hand bleeding and the glass shattering my image in grim triumph. Yet I knew I shouldn’t do this. It would just be causing Terra more problems, it would be completely disregarding her earlier kindnesses, entirely disrespectful. And highly unnecessary.
But I still wanted to do it, and I was fully capable of doing so. Instead, I pulled on the other t-shirt and stepped out of the bathroom, carefully putting the coffee-stained shirt into the “laundry” room at the end of the hallway.
I wound up on the couch again, staring up at the ceiling, back where I’d began. It wasn’t even six o’clock in the morning yet. It sure was early. I yawned, and closed my eyes, before the cup in the sink came back to mind... was it broken? I slowly rose to my feet and brought myself to the sink again... the mug was fine, to my and probably Kainni’s, relief. Maybe. I think she’d care about this...
I didn’t feel like I’d be able to get much more sleep, and it was rather early in the morning, and Kainni was out there, out on the sidewalk somewhere... she’d be fine, I knew she would. And once again, she didn’t want me there. And all she wanted to was express this to me.
Yet I wanted to make sure she was okay... she seemed pretty upset. And I caused this, did I not? I caused her to wind up here, where she never wanted to be, when she had a better cause to be at...
“‘I wanna time travel... I want to go back a hundred years or something like that...’
‘I can take you... I can take you back...’
‘...thank you, thank you, thank you, so much!’”
I wondered why this girl kept coming to my mind. She was an old friend, I knew that much, and she might have been important, but when we moved that time my father had gotten his first promotion... she just wasn’t there anymore. We were just so far away. Who was she?
Why was she haunting me?
Those bright green eyes, that smile, the bright red hair...
I scanned Terra’s house for some method of writing. I knew how to write freehand, I had a very highly monitored mePad, something I knew that private tutors showed my father, because they were his minions as well. I really had no privacy where I came from... but that was minor compared to the way it used to be.
I found some oddly colored paper, a tiny stack of little squares. I pulled one off; they all had some sort of adhesive on the back of them. A pen was laying on the counter. I took it, writing that I had gone out to follow Kainni and that we would be back soon.
I didn’t want to impose on Terra much longer, yet I didn’t find it to be a very appealing time to go wandering the streets of 2009 just yet.
I hurried out the door into Terra’s backyard, closing it gently, though it didn’t make too much sound, even when it had been slammed. Just blew in a lot of air.
The first thing I noticed out here, however, was the sky. It was painted several shades of orange and pink and yellow, as the sun was rising. And it was so clear, for the miserable storm that had been there the night before.
Though the ground still held the wet and sometimes muddy aftermath of the storm, this bright sunrise shone above it.
Gradually, I made it out of the backyard, and to the sidewalk.
Kainni hadn’t gotten far. A few blocks ahead, she stood still, staring at the sky as well. Once again, it felt like I was interrupting a moment for her. But I continued walking ahead. The city wasn’t so entirely visible here, with the sky like it was now. Kainni’s silhouette was shrouded in the light from the sunrise.
I had now crossed the street. I felt nervous as she turned a little, having heard me approach, I assumed. But rather than give me a sharp, piercing stare, she looked down.
“Weird how it can be so nice after a storm like that.”
I nodded, coming closer with great caution. Now I stood beside her. She directed her eyes to the sky again, which was growing brighter with every second.
“Yeah,” I replied, quietly, unnecessarily.
We watched in silence as the sun continued rising, as the sky started turning light blue once again. It was not an awkward silence, but one with each of us for once not lost in thought, but in awe of this beautiful piece of nature.
“I’m sorry about earlier,” Kainni said, very quietly, very uncharacteristic for what I’d seen of her. Suddenly, another memory of the girl came to my mind.
We were on a swing-set, the girl and I. I was swinging fairly high, yet she was getting higher. The girl then jumped off her swing, appearing to fly off gently, landing perfectly.
“How did you do that?” I asked.
She looked at me, very surprised. “You don’t know how to jump off a swing?” she said.
I nodded. I really hadn’t ever tried.
The girl immediately came up behind me, pushing me, pushing me higher and I kept getting higher, and then she shouted, as she gave me a forceful push...
“JUMP!!”
So I did... I landed hard on the ground. I almost immediately began to cry, because hitting the ground that hard had hurt, badly, and the girl, came down next to me. She cried as well.
“I’m sorry, oh, I’m so sorry, Troy, I didn’t mean to...”
I stared at Kainni, and looked down quickly, knowing she didn’t like me watching her. She had green eyes, pale skin.
Red hair.
That wasn’t enough for a person to be the same person you knew too many years ago. That wasn’t enough defining character to fit a person you haven’t seen in over ten years.
She danced in the thunderstorm yesterday. The little girl had run to the window. That girl had loved rain, too.
A coincidence...
Though I may not have understood, there had to be a lot of people who appreciated storms like I thought she did. Did she even really like them, or did she just take them in for the moment?
Kainni yawned minutely, and started turning around. “C’mon, we should probably get back to the house,” she said, starting slowly back toward Terra’s home. I walked beside her. Surprisingly, she didn’t try to walk too far ahead of me, or behind me, or directly push me away. I mirrored her strides as we made our way back.
As soon as we reached the entrance of the back way into the house, Kainni stepped inside, making her way back into the guest room without another word.

Kainni

Why do I feel guilty? Okay, so I threw hot coffee on him... but didn’t he make me wind up here? Had he not most likely destroyed my chances of getting back to where I’d wanted to be? I should not be feeling guilty, not for an Abbort, never.
But I still did. I hated those eyes, that gently piercing stare that you could read as well as it could read you. The things hiding beyond his gaze. I didn’t want to think of him as a person at this point, I realized, and I was regarding him cruelly, because I didn’t want to have to admit that there might be more to him than what I thought he was. I knew I could be acting very ridiculous right now, but it WAS his fault I was here.
And in the first place, it was his father’s fault that I’d left the way I did. It was all their fault, I couldn’t help that.
But somewhere, deep down, I knew it couldn’t be all his fault. I knew I just wanted someone to blame, to make it easier for me to handle, to turn grief and helplessness into anger and power, and for me not to have any responsibility. It was just easier that way.
I knew that I’d made him end up in this same place. He didn’t seem to like being here any more than I did. Even though I’d wanted so badly to travel back one hundred years as a child.
Which reminded me, he’d helped me accomplish one of my childhood dreams. Although the world I’d landed in was much less of a fantasy of historical intrigue, than more like opening the mythical Pandora’s Box.
As I flopped onto the bed, something square-ish and solid obscured the softness of the bed, nailing me in the small of my back. I stood up again, to observe the obnoxious thing, when I realized it was Terra’s book.
Attached to it was small handwriting crammed onto a tiny piece of pink paper.

I figured you might get bored around here. Sorry for ditching you guys again. Here’s a book if you feel like reading or something when you get back. Not the happiest thing on earth, but it’s pretty good anyway.
-Terra

I picked up the book cautiously. There was a strange plastic film on it that it made look older than I knew it was, and I glanced at the back cover, a little barcode covering the other one stating it was from a certain library. I flipped through the pages before deciding to start at the beginning of it.
I’d never really read a real, printed book like this. All of mine had been digi-books, accessible through the same novel-processor, you purchased one and you had an entire library on your digital book pad. You could highlight things and underline things with the various tools of the processor.
The processor tried its best to make a perfectly clear, readable formatted novel, that even allowed you to flip through pages by dragging your finger across them, but it was absolutely nothing like the weight, the concreteness, of a real printed book.
Curling up against the headboard of the guest bed, I read through the first few pages, almost automatically captivated by the plot as it was being set up, the vague way of saying that all was not well for this unfortunate heroine.
It felt like hours had gone by when I was finally pulled out of the well-written, miserable world of Olivia and her friends, to be sucked back into this similar land, the seasoned shouting of Terra into her phone dragging me back.
“Shane, could you at least TRY staying home for one day?!... Yeah, I know... I know... I’m sorry... I know, okay, okay...” She sighed.
“Yeah, yeah. Well, you’d have to leave before six... no, you can’t come back after that... What is with you?... If you’re so desperate to come over, then leave now... ugh, whatever, alright, bye.”
It looked we were going to have some extra company again.
I folded down a corner of the page of the book, and left the solace of the guest room once again. Terra sighed again, looking only the tiniest bit less drained than earlier.
“Oh, hey, Kai... can I call you that? It’s kinda easier than...”
“It’s fine,” I replied, letting go of my frustration. It wasn’t a bad name or anything; I just liked my full name better than that plain nickname.
“So, what’s happening now?” I asked, though I was pretty sure I knew the drill, even for just being here one night.
“Shane... fought with his dad again and he’s coming over here. Again. I hope you two don’t mind,” Terra said, trying to sound nonchalant, and as non-frustrated as possible. The way she spoke, now turning on the sink for the coffee cups, let me know that Terra, although she seemed a little dissatisfied at this morning’s events, she would have let him come over whether we minded or not. Troy nodded from the couch, staring at the screen of an old-fashioned television. It was very old, square, a cube shape on a stand. Most of the televisions we were shown as examples from this era were more similar to the main monitor screens that most people had in their homes—flat, stuck upon a wall, and very wide.
The littler box was a bit more interesting, however. Something different. I hesitantly sat down next to him. He had a remote control, and had fixed himself to a music video channel. The corner of the screen showed a logo of the word “Fuse” and there was a man playing a guitar, on a couch, pages of someone’s writing on a wall. The scenes flashed from him to a teenage girl walking through what I assumed to be a school, pulling down her sleeves, and writing in her diary. The man with the guitar sang about a girl named Kristy, asking if she was okay...
Almost immediately, I recognized the lyrics from the book. The main character’s friend and her had been having a conversation in song lyrics, and this had been one of them. Paying closer attention to the video, I realized that there were many parallels between it and the novel.
Troy sighed, and pressed a button to change the channel. “No, wait... I want to watch this,” I said, reaching for the remote.
“It’s just a music video,” he mumbled, as he changed it back. He seemed a little distracted, or inattentive, his mind in other places. I kept watching the video intently.
And then we were interrupted by a loud, obnoxious doorbell ringing, followed by a couple rapid knocks on the door.