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The Search
We begin halfway through August. Eden sits and reads his latest check-out, a story about a crazy man and what he goes through to justify his belief. “Ego…” he mutters to himself, as the story unfolds, and the man takes every step towards his downfall.
“When has the pursuit of truth ever been so significant?” He adjusted himself to a comfortable position and stretched his legs out onto the other seat of the bus. No one else was there, and yet he continued, in his whisper: “What will you get out of this?”
He forced himself to follow the words along each page until the bus halted and he was told to get off.
“Great, we’re right by the library. See ya, mister.”
“Good luck, daddy-oh.”
“Daddy-oh?”
He eyed the driver and walked away quickly.
PSIONICA CITY LIBRARY – NOW HIRING stabbed him in the eyes as he turned the corner, and not a second later, CLOSED kicked him while he was down. He dropped the book in the box and checked his pocket for a quarter for the next bus ride. Nothing.
“Ah, damn.” He said under his breath, and decided that he would have to walk all the way home, all twelve blocks of it.
Normally, one could walk the twelve blocks straight and turn left, and arrive at his home. But today, on this day, he didn’t quite want to take that way home. He wanted this one. ‘This’ way home would take him from one side to another, winding left and meeting and greeting dead ends.
“Have you seen a dog anywhere around here?” asked a boy about his age, whom seemed to pop out of nowhere. “No, but I wouldn’t mind helping you look for her. What does she look like?” Eden asked. This seemed like a chief time to prove to himself that he was a good Samaritan. He figured losing a pet would be like losing a family member, this being dependant on the owner. This is where the author tells you his personal thought: Any pet is family. “He! The dog is a male! He is a golden retriever that wears a yellow collar. He’s pretty well fed, and is too friendly for his own good.” The boy gave a documentary, when all he needed was ‘golden retriever’.
“Well, what’s his name? And yours, as well?” Eden asked, with a smile. “His name’s Trevor, and mine’s Roen. Weird name, I know. You can call me Roe. And you?”
“The names Eden. Nice to meet you, Roe. Where do we start?”
“Well, I’ve already looked around near the busway, and the neighborhood is pretty quiet. I’ve searched at least four blocks left of here, with no luck.”
“You mean north?” (Eden and his humor.) “I just came from the library, and I didn’t see anything. I say we head south.”
“Sounds good. And I know my NESW. Never eat sour worms. I’m just not a nerd, kid. Let’s go.”
They looked high and low, to no avail. “TREVOOOOOR! HERE BOY! COME ON, TREVOR!” There had come a time where they’d shouted so much their voices would crack uncontrollably. Laughter and despair battled over their time.
Advent
The end of the day had come, the sky’s own three-color painting on the horizon. They had lost all hope over finding Trevor, and trust themselves with the thought that Trevor would choose to come back home on his own time, using the canine sense of direction all dogs seem to have.
They sat down, exhausted from the day’s search. Neither of them had seen nourishment for what seemed like ages, so they saw this as magnificent time to go door-to-door and ask, in hopes that one of the people they asked would take notice of their fatigue.
Knock-Knock-Knock. No answer. They knocked again. As if driven by the wind itself, the door thudded back, as if to reply to the rude knocking. Whoever knocked back held no discretion as they banged on the door.
“What the hell?” Eden thought to himself, and avowed: “Please open the door, we could use a hand with our search, we’re looking for a lost dog!” Their attitude overthrew their conscience.
No answer. The door cracked open, and a depressed vibe welcomed them into the house. …A poor decision.
“I don’t think I want to go in there, but I’ve got this feeling that tells me I’m obligated to, and I might get some fun out of this.” Eden proposed, and Roe objected, “…No. Bad idea. Who knows what could be in there… some rapist or something could be watching from up the stairs… I can see it already, local newspapers exclaiming- TWO CHILDREN FOUND WITHOUT LIMBS IN FRONT OF ABANDONED HOUSE!”
“Oh shut up, you’re going to let a door knock some sense into you? Let’s just go inside, I promise you nothing will happen, and I’m a man of my word.”
“Boy. And I’m not afraid. Just extremely aware of what could happen. But you know what? Let’s go. I hold you to your word, friend.”
“Friend…” echoed through Eden’s mind and sat soft into his conscience.


O sweet sanity
O how I treasure thee
Why do you taunt me
O my sweet sanity
Just out of reach


Acquaintance
Roe looked around, and spoke his mind. “Man… this house is insanely old… how could anyone even live here? Much less even survive in the world, with such a retro pad?”
“Whoa whoa whoa, nice retro attitude, a**. How are you so certain whoever lives in this house didn’t here what you just said, and be he a murderer, how are you so certain he won’t kill you first?” Eden chuckled.
“I’m so afraid.”
“Glad to see you understand something for once.”
“Shut up, hehe,” Roe said as he jabbed at Eden.
They proceeded up the stairs, the whole first floor had been silent, and Trevor had a knack for going for the high ground. The first room on their right caught their attention- a small dog lay slain, it’s neck snapped so roughly the vertebrae protruded it’s neck skin.

“Oh, god what the ********… no wonder it smelled so gross… is that him?” Eden asked.

“Couldn’t be, my dog is at least twice it’s size. But thank god it isn’t.”

“What would he do about it?”

Then, the unexpected happened. The pup got right up, and stared them cold. They froze in disbelief and awe. The dog made no sound as it walked right between them. It stopped and looked upon them, as if making sure of something. Then it continued across the hallway and to the second door past theirs.
“I’m not following it… what the hell is this… am I… Oh my god, that dog is… this is so god damn weird, what the… hell…” Obviously, Roe was at a loss for words.
“This kind of thing was meant to happen. We were looking for a dog and now we’ve found one. And I know this sounds like a bad idea, but I get this odd feeling like that hallway was there for us, this dog was killed for us, and what we’re truly looking for lies just beyond that door. I say we go. Enter with no regret.”
“…Yeah.” Roe sighed. This is the kind of thing he sees in a video game, and he expects to see the gateway to hell just around the corner. He reluctantly followed Eden across the hallway.
The door closed, and yet the dog had walked through it. Roe stammered, “W-what the, didn’t that thing, whatever the hell it was, j-just walk through here?”
“This is some reeeally creepy s**t. Oh god, let’s just open the door already and fall into hell.”
“Where else,” Eden agreed.
They entered a room painted completely white, all of the furniture was white, the walls were white, and the sun shone directly through the window, at the very center pane. A dead tree was painted in jet black on the floor ahead of them, and in the very corner of a room, a girl sat crying. The dog was nowhere in sight.
“…Um, hello? What’s wrong? Why are you crying? How long have you been here? …And where did the dog go?”
Eden had injected reality into her personality after such long isolation. He cleaned off the syringe with the end of his sentence. She lifted her head from her palms and looked upon them with green eyes, eyes that were no longer apparent in humanity.
“Where… where am I? What is going on? Who are you?” she looked at them in disbelief, as if to be in a nightmare of some sort.
“I guess I’ll answer your questions first,” Eden said, as he took a few steps into proximity. He sat down on the bed beside her. “I’m Eden, and this is my friend, Roe. We’ve come across you as abruptly as we’ve crossed each other today, and we’re all very odd acquaintances. We came into this house looking for our dog, and quite frankly, I don’t understand why we would search in an old house—” “What? This house was made just two years ago, I’m pretty sure of that.” She interjected.
“I don’t know how this is possible, but let me continue. We walked up the stairs because the whole lower floor was empty. We came first to the room two doors left of here, and we saw something amazing.”
“A small dog. But not just any small dog, this one was… possessed, or something. Oh, and it’s spine was sticking out of it’s neck. It looked and smelled of death. But you wouldn’t believe what happened. It got up. It got up, walked across the hallway and into this room. And the door was closed!”
“Well that’s pretty freaky, I wouldn’t have followed a dead dog through a closed door in an abandoned house. But I don’t know how I got here, I don’t understand. I went to sleep and woke up here, on this bed, in this white room. What time is it? Anyways, I didn’t understand, so I cried. Yes, I know, An odd reaction. But who knows where I am? I thought you’d know.”
“It’s half-past seven, and you’re in an old looking house on 7th and Blue. And the sky is quite blue itself. Now, having seen so many movies in my life, I would have to say someone shot you up in your sleep and put you here, and they’re on their way home, with condoms, perhaps.” Eden joked. Humor was good for as confusing a situation as this. An old house. A white room. Seven o` clock on seventh street. A girl with green eyes on blue street. What has this world come to?
She smiled. “ In that case, we should get the hell out of here, I don’t like this place. This white room, this odd occurrence, this coincidence of meetings, this is all too weird…
…
…
…
I live here. This is my house.

…

What ********?”


Revelation. Realization. Comprehension. Grasp. Disbelief. Acceptance.

“My name is May, pleased to meet you.”





Dream
Yeah
Sharp like the edge of a samurai sword
The mental blade cut through flesh and bone…


They headed to Roe’s house. Eden’s was a few miles away, and they’d decided on the three of them spending their night at Roe’s house. Not that anyone was there to notice he was gone.
“I feel like I’m in a different world,” May said, eyeing the oddly colored houses that had no mailboxes. “Like a movie or something, where the kid goes to sleep a bad boy, wakes up thirty years later as a full-grown man, has his revelation, and goes to sleep again to wake up a ten year old once more. Except… I haven’t been bad, I live alone and I don’t talk to people much, so there really hasn’t been anyone for me to do wrong. And I don’t have those intentions either… God, this is all so weird!”
“I don’t know what to believe right now. This has got to be some crazy dream of mine, dead dogs and mystified females and all.” Roe said, feeling around in his pockets for the keys.
“Ah, you just proved it wasn’t. You never realize it’s a dream in a dream. Not until you wake up.” Said Eden.
“Guys, you don’t understand,” Roe opened the door and May continued as the entered, “nothing that’s happening right now makes sense. I’m not supposed to be here. This is someone else’s life, not mine. When I went to sleep, people had mailboxes.”
“And dead dogs didn’t rise up and walk through closed doors,” laughed Eden.
“Hah. So funny. I forgot to laugh… anyhow, do you have a bathroom? Or do you pee in the sink. Or do you even have sinks?” May said, trying to drown out her confusion with humor.
“There’s a sink in the bathroom, if you’re asking. Hehe. And by the way, Mailboxes were officially stated obsolete in 2015, almost five years ago. E-mail is universal now.” Roe explained.
“It’s 2020? What the hell?! I—have to pee. Let’s talk about this when I’m done.” May said.
“I’ll make some coffee,” Roe said, heading to the kitchen. “Hope you like yours strong.”
“How the hell is it 2020… this must be some cruel ******** joke, who would do this to me?”
May looked around for the bathroom while running through her thoughts, trying to remember who these two people might just be.

“It must be weird,” Roe said, while attempting to juggle three sugar cubes (and failing terribly) “waking up in a whole different world. Without mailboxes…which, I’m not too sure is what she should be so confused about, a lot has been changing lately. She might be a coma victim or something… I’ve heard that some coma victims have woken up as completely different people. This guy on TV had been in a coma for 20 years, and when he woke up his sister was there, and so were three or four members of his family. She said, ‘Hello…Robert? Is that really you? Are you really back? I’m so glad to see you!’ and guess what he said… you’ll laugh. He said: ‘I wanna have sex!’”
“Hahaha, bollocks. That’s great.” Eden said. The coffee machine rang in notification. Just then, May walked back into the room, sat down, and snatched a nearby magazine. Her eyes widened.
“It really is 2020. Guys, I went to bed 11 years ago.”
“The hell? 2009? Did you live in a cave? Man, I was like, 12 back then. Those were the good old days…” Roe said.
“I still don’t believe you. There really is no possible way for you to sleep through nine years, or even go forward in time. Even though we may have seen something amazing today, it doesn’t prove you’re from 2009… Is there any way you can prove your origin?” Eden questioned. Her story was one in a million.

“…I guess I can, let me think.” May said, trying to remember anything that would prove her right. “Okay. I can tell you the release dates of any metal album around 2008.”

“Linkin Park’s minutes to midnight.”

“May 15, 2007.”

“Saw 4.”

“August 25, 2010.”

“This isn’t going to get us anywhere. For all I know, you’re a professional at remembering those kinds of things or you may have just plotted this all along. What say you?” Eden challenged.

“Look, I don’t care about whether or not you believe me. I wouldn’t believe me. There’s no such thing as time travel, we’re all sure of it. But as you can see, I’m confused and helpless. All I want is a hand to hold… At least long enough to figure out what’s happening. Please, stand by my side for some time. Just for a little while…” May said. She was distressed. She shot a curious glance at Eden.

“Well, that’s a cerebral slap. I don’t think I have any other choice but to help you, not that I’d choose any other choice. Roe, what’d you say? Can we stay at your place for the night, if even longer?”

“Sure thing, just put the toilet seat down after you use the bathroom.”