Wednesday, September 17, 2014

Timewave

Leslie jumped from the table, a mouse scuttling past her legs as she made the drastic dive. Her head hitting the edge of the blue cupboard and knocking her unconscious. The television blared in the background about the first black president of the United States being elected.

Waking up a few hours later, at least to Leslie's perception, she found herself with a massive headache and in a cold and dark meadow. Looking around, she wondered if someone had thought she were dead, and decided to just dump her body somewhere instead of calling the cops. Rubbing her head and getting to her feet, she made her way through the woods, hoping to find a hiking trail, a bike path, or even a road that would take her back to civilization.

After almost two hours, Leslie started to panic. What if there was no road for more miles than she could walk? What if she had been going in the wrong direction? Should she have waited for daybreak? Shaking her head, she knew that freaking out would do her absolutely no good, and she sat down on a nearby boulder. And that's when she heard the shuffling footsteps coming from the direction she had been coming from.

originally she had thought that it had been the wind, or her own fears lurking in the back of her mind coming out to hound her at the worst possible time. But as she slowly turned her head towards the sound, she realized that her prayers might be answered. A warm and hazy light was permeating through the darkness of the entangled tree limbs that she had been fighting tooth and nail to get through. Standing, she called out, a nervous and hopeful smile splayed across her lips as she did so.

The smile dissolved, however, when she saw a lithe and muscular man step through the trees, wearing a loincloth. Fumbled words passed her lips as grunts passed his. Stepping away, she bumped into another man who had stepped up from behind her as silently as a spider climbs its way onto a hand. Turning abruptly to face him, she found a club hitting her head and an enveloping blackness welcoming her back.

The next time Leslie awoke, she was in a barn. Hay stuck to her hair and clothes as if she were a human scarecrow. Climbing out, she made her way out of the hay and the barn, slowly, remembering the men from the woods. Finding a farmhouse outside, she instantly recognized it as her great-great-grandparents farm. Meaning the the barn she had woken up in was the house her parents had remodeled before she was born after the farmhouse had been eaten by termites. Leslie only recognized the house from pictures, and as she continued to stare in disbelief, she saw her ancestors come out of the house and head towards the barn. their hands together and a bucket of something in each hand, she felt light-hearted to see the couple so happy.

And then she realized that she had possibly gone insane, or somehow traveled through time. Either way, the last time she had interacted with someone, it had ended with her getting knocked unconscious. Stepping backwards and attempting to turn and run, she tripped over herself and hit her head against a wooden fence that kept the pigs in during the winter.

Hearing sirens, Leslie awoke and felt her eyes water from the bright light in the ambulance. She didn't move or speak, afraid that if she tried to do anything, she would be sent hurtling through time to just get knocked out over and over again through all of eternity. The ambulance driver asked the other EMT if they were going to vote for Barack Obama the next day. The EMT shrugged and said it would be interesting to be a part of history. The first black president of the United States of America was a pretty big part of history, according to him.

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