“Come on guys,” Carrie shouted, “There’s still some wine in the cooler!” It was the dead of night, the after-party of Ruffington park, Oregon. Some high schoolers were making their way home like the dead of a Sunday night. Red cups and pieces of a shattered punch bowl scattered the forest, the plastic mat someone used for a dance-floor demolished.
Carrie shouted at the others. “Come on! Just a few more minutes!” She tried dragging people back to the park but all they did was wrench their hand away from hers. She scampered to the second most popular person in their school, Theodore, while she begged him to stay.
Theodore yawned and said “Jeez, Carrie, I got school tomorrow.”
“Exactly my point,” Carrie said, trying to give Theodore, the school quarterback, a drink with him refusing. “Gotta count the days right?” Carrie shrugged as she shoved the cup into his face, shaking it as to entice him to drink the infamous 15 dollar liquid.
“Sorry,” he said, shoving away the cup “I gotta go home.” Theodore made his way home like most of the students.
Carrie ran around trying to get someone, or anyone to stay, “come on! guys! There’s still time, we could have so much more fun!” But the students left the park all the same. Carrie hurled herself towards the one person she could get to stay. “Mary!” Carrie cried out to her while running up to her best friend, planting her hands onto Mary’s shoulders while she caught her breath. “Hey, one more drinking contest for the road alright?” Carrie asked.
Mary’s head and bodied swirled about drunkenly like she was using a hula-hoop in slow motion. “Carrie? I, gotta go home, don’t you?” she said as she looked down at the floor, catching herself with her foot. Carrie grabbed her arms and she stared into Mary.
“Look,” She said, “Who’s better? Parents? Or your best friend”
Mary looked at her, eyes blinking slowly, and slumped over Carrie’s shoulder.
“That’s what I thought,” she said as she walked to the cooler, “now let’s get drinking!”
There was a loud thud from behind her as Mary fell to the floor.
She backed away in shock, her heart raced as she had to come to terms with the idea that Mary might actually be dying because of her. She fumbled with her phone as she tried to call the hospital when she noticed the kids staring at Mary, they ran towards her to see if she was okay. As the people rushed at her, it felt like a mob heading straight at her. With the realization of her faults in her actions and the large crowd, Carrie ran in a panic, resting on the side of a tree trunk deep in the forest. Thoughts rushed in her head; the realization of how far she went to keep this party going, if Mary will be okay, and what is she going to do now.
Suddenly, Carrie then notices a spec of white come across her face. It was crisp white, and a couple like it drifted in the air like a dandelion. Next, she followed more of these specs to the source with interest, it led deeper into the park. The wind began to grow cooler, almost chilly, as she followed the trail of white. Then she saw it, the flakes billowed out like a slow streamer from a hole in the tree. It was not broken bark or bark formed in the shape of a hole. It was just a hole, a gaping, golden hole. Carrie just stood there in awe for a moment, thinking about what to do next. Suddenly she heard the sound of ambulance sirens, someone must have called the ambulance to help Mary, but to Carrie’s stress, it felt like the sirens of the police.
“She'll, be fine” Carrie said to herself, in order to reassure her friend’s safety. She took deep breaths, put her phone in her pocket, and stepped through the hole in the tree. A quick warmth spreading through her before vanishing as she stepped to the other side.
The park was dark, much darker and more murky than only a few moments earlier. The clouds were long and unending, the trees touched the sky. Cold air rushed behind her and back through her. The wind spun through her as if her body was not there, but she felt its chill. The pressure in the place was heavy, she could still stand but not without her organs dripping down before her skeleton stopped it. She felt her stomach get shoved downward from the pressure.
As Carrie adjusted to this new layer of darkness, she looked back, the hole was gone. She felt for it and the tree pushed away from her weight, until it breathed back. The tree could breath, its bark rose up and down on her hand. Realizing that this tree was obviously alive she shrieked and stumbled backwards, falling to the ground, breathing intensely. The ground was thick and squishy like a waterbed made of mud. Carrie could not tell how long she sat there, taking in these oddities, but she eventually stood up.
“Okay,” she said, “your in...whatever the heck this place is, just, gotta look at your options.” she looked to the north, the grass stretched for miles, to the west, an elongated hill; she looked south to where she had arrived from and she saw artificial light. The best path was south, she must have argued to herself, since it seemed to be the direction with the least forestry around it. She stepped forward to find herself in a park filled with black grass, dark crimson benches, and emptiness. There was no animal in sight.
She slowly tip-toed across the park, when she felt a sharp crack under her foot. She lifted it to see the broken shards of glass and a crushed black cup. She ignored these shards and walked along the road. She made her way quickly out of the park, only to find short black buildings to the right of her down the hill, the buildings rose and fell like a mountain range. It piqued her interest and she walked in that direction
Further along her travels, she made it to the city. The streets were quiet. A silence that reminded her of the early morning of her city. This city was so similar to the one she lived in, it was almost eerie, down to the very last brick. Carrie stopped. Next, she put her finger to her chin, thinking through her predicament.
“Ok, so,” she thought to herself, “there were the trees right where the park was, this is the street of apartments leading to the restaurant and store district, everything looks so similar, yet different.” Carrie leaned against the brick wall to the side of her and mumbled to herself “but how do I get home?”
“There’s got to be some way to get back,” Carrie said to herself, gripping her left hand to the wall in thought. Her left hand glowed gold, the same gold she had seen around that hole. The glow spread through the wall and straight in front of her. She followed the glow, it being her only lead home, running faster and faster with excitement.
, yet she found something completely different.
It was a fly, but it was the size of a car. Its compound eyes stared into her like a man wearing spectacles. Its hairy legs exited the door one by one. It’s bushy body traveled through the door as it took notice of Carrie.
Carrie was too stunned to move. Every instinct told her to run but she just could not stop staring at the beast. Her bones locked, her mouth held half-open. She couldn’t think of anything except whatever the creature was. Its mouth, a checkerboard of razor sharp teeth, opened up and emitted an echo like wrinkling paper.
The growl and the teeth were finally what gave Carrie the ability to burst off.
. She ducked through an alleyway and collapsed behind a trash can.
“Deep breathes, deep breathes” Carrie repeated to herself. She probably had run half a mile. Carrie slowed down her nitro-fueled breath at a steady pace. Suddenly, she heard a fierce roar from behind her. She flinched, her heart racing, but she was compelled to look behind her. In a window, she could see two monsters. One was a worm the size of a half a limo, it had a mouth on the front of the monster’s body with teeth hanging open, it was laying on a hospital chair. The other one was a large octopus-like creature, the size of a truck. The monster’s entire body was made of wood, and it had two hollow black sockets on its face. The monsters roared at each other, some sort of speech Carrie could not understand, but looking around, she could guess what it was about. On the floor to the right of Cassie was a small stack of papers, probably thrown from the bedside. Also on the bedside was, Mary’s backpack, and on the side of the door was Carrie’s backpack, both about the size of a cupboard. Carrie thought to herself, this must be some sort of world where everyone just looks like some, creepy monster. At least, that is what she could come up with. The monsters kept roaring and barking at each other. Finally, the worm monster bellowed for a long time, it was full of rises and degrades, it felt like the monster choked in the last parts.
Carrie thought to herself, “This must have been about the party last night, or this night since it isn’t tomorrow morning, I think,” before she noticed the octopus monster, who she would assume is the monster version of herself, made a slow series of low growls and clicks. None of it was intelligible, but Carrie could tell how remorseful those growls were. The Worm monster relaxed and made a solemn chirping noise. The octopus came over and hugged the worm.
“Oh Mary,” Carrie said to herself solemnly. The octopus creature looked to see Carrie, after a brief bit of shock she slid towards her to get a closer look. Carrie backed away but the monster’s tendril snatched her up, trying to take a good look at her. Carrie screamed as she was launched up in the air to meet the empty eyes of the monster.
Carrie did not know what was going on, maybe it was the blood rushing to her head, or maybe the fear in her blood, but she quickly felt for her pocket. “Thank God,” she thought as she took out her phone. But then it slipped out of her hand like soap. It looked like the world went into slow motion, as if her only connection to her life was falling to the cold, hard, ground. Then, a long squiggly arm caught the phone, and after noticing the case and started comparing the phones while letting Carrie fall down safely. Other than the exact color, the monster noted, that the cases were the same as well as the brand. Carrie and the worm monster were stunned all the same. To think that could have worked.
Carrie breathed and outreached her hand to push her luck. She curled her fingers back. The monster, with a shaken tentacle, understood, giving Carrie her phone. Carrie opened it up, showing her lock screen picture, a picture of her favorite rockstar, and the monster showed her picture on her phone, which was a skeleton with forest green meat filling him, but it was his same stance.
The two looked face to face. The beast tapped where its chest would be while making gurgling noises
Carrie at first just stood there, but then tapped her chest “Car-rie”. The monster just laid there. The worm watched this from a distance, making her own inferences and she seemed to be telling that to the worm monster.
After a while of contemplating what just happened, Carrie had an idea an open the drawing app on her phone. She never used it until this moment now that she thought about it. She drew a hand, an arrow, and a house; which should be simple enough to understand. The monster tilted its head though and pointed at the hand drawing. Carrie nodded, and pressed her hand on the wall next to her, from her hand and through the brick and onto the pavement was a steady stream of gold. The monster nodded but peaked out to see all the monsters strolling through the streets.
Carrie spoke to the monster aloud, “hey, so, what is this place, Karen?, Can I call you Karen?” The monster, now dubbed Karen, merely tilted its head, as did the worm. Carrie decided to try something, she took out her phone and typed what she said on an app, then she showed it to Karen. Karen made a low growl while typing on her phone, showing the same document but with symbols Carrie couldn’t understand.
“Damn,” Carrie mumbled to herself, then she came up with an idea. She typed in emojis, a globe of the earth and a question mark, then gave it to Karen while tapping on herself. Karen looked at her and went to her own phone, she simply showed Carrie a map of her town, which had different, un-readable, names but the layout was the same, honestly Carrie should have expected that. She went back to typing; several animal and bug emojis, an eye, and a picture of herself at a high school dance. Karen looked outside to see the other monsters walking around and made low grumbles to her friend, deep in discussion. Then Karen picked up her own backpack and zipped it open.
Carrie nodded in understanding before crawling in she tried to find an emoji to say thank you, but simply just gave a thumbs up after giving up. She heard the monsters bark speak in their monstrous growls, but like they were saying good-bye on good terms.
It was not too bad, the walk was short, and despite the uncomfortable tops of folders and binders she found a cloth, at least it felt like cloth, pencil case to hold on to. There was time for Cassie to think though. The hole she went through, it was obviously some sort of wormhole, but where did it come from was the question. She also thought about her hand and how it could do the whole, press on something and you get a light stream to follow, thing. She concluded it had something to do with the wormhole of the same color.
Carrie sighed and looked again at the monster version of Mary’s, test paper again. Such a low score, and this could possibly not be the first. The backpack opened up and Carrie got up to see her house, except it was darker. All of Karen’s legs were shaking, she looked to Carrie with her deep eyes. There were no pupils, but Carrie could tell that they were wide with fear. Carrie’s legs shook too, like she knew what was in there. She took out her phone, her homescreen was of a pizza party in the third grade.
“Deep breaths, deep breaths,” she said to herself and walked to the door. Karen stumbled to the door, trying to get her keys from the bag. Carrie looked up at Karen and tapped on one of her arms.
Karen looked at Carrie as she held up Worm Mary’s test paper. Karen shuffled through. Carrie then took out her phone and scrolled through all the parties she took Mary to. Karen drooped her eyes and Carrie stopped put her arm on Karen’s as she unlocked the door, then they walked inside.
It looked like Carrie’s house. Long dark hallways lined the corridor. She could see the paintings stare at her like at her home. The two kept walking, following the golden path. They had just gotten to the stairs when a loud roar is heard. It was long and deep, and it bellowed throughout the home. The two stood still, yet both of their hearts raced. Rising from the kitchen, dragging bottles of beer was the father of Karen.
All it was was a jumbled pile of dark green limbs, clumped together around one sphere. At the end of each tentacle/limb was a piercing red eye. One saw Carrie and the sphere bellowed loudly, the sphere split open with dozens of limbs decked with fangs climbed out of the monster’s mouth. Karen stood still, but Carrie grabbed the nearest weapon she could find, a potted plant. The vines of teeth launched forward at Carrie and she threw the pot into one of the eyes of the beast. It roared like thunder as the tendrils continued its assault as Carrie did her own running, she was running to the door of her room where the trail ran through the door.
She was five feet from her room, then four feet, then two feet. Suddenly, she had one foot torn off the ground by a tentacle. Yet again a long appendage dragged her from safety. The friends of this fanged tendril arrived towards her stomach to finish the job. That is when they were halted bay more dark wood tendrils. The Tendrils nearly choked the fanged ones to death if it was not for the beast’s strength. This did give Carrie an introduction to the ground though.
The Karen and the beast roared at each other, amber flowing in its eyes. Carrie could feel blood running down her ears as she sprinted to her room. She ran in and saw the hole in her bed and jumped. Everything at that moment was gold, heat, and living.
She looked around, she was in her room, and it was five minutes until midnight. She looked in her pockets, and there was not only her phone, but the paper. Carrie clutched it in her hand, then she took off her backpack and put it to the side. Carrie took one last long look at her hand, no evidence of glowing portal stuff anywhere, then put on her pajamas and took to the covers. As she drifted off to sleep, she swore to herself that she would not forget this experience and that she would not let her friends get hurt by her actions.