Unreal City
UNREAL CITY
Copyright © 2014 A.R. Meyering
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without prior written permission of the publisher.
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Published by
INNISFREE PRESS
Print edition ISBNs
ISBN-13: 978-0692313688
ISBN-10: 0692313680
THE DAWN MIRROR CHRONICLES
BOOK 1
NOW AVAILABLE
BOOK 2
EDEN UNDONE
RELEASING 2015
BOOK 3
NELVIRNA SLEEPS
RELEASING 2015
OTHER NOVELS
THE RESURRECTIONIST
RELEASING 2015
MULTI-AUTHOR COLLECTIONS
FEATURING THE STORY
THE DANDELION CHILD
TO MY BROTHER,
FOR SHOWING ME THE WAY
“That corpse you planted last year in your garden,
Has it begun to sprout? Will it bloom this year?
Or has the sudden frost disturbed its bed?”
~ Eliot, The Waste Land ~
FOR THE REST
of my life, no matter how I tried, I could not erase the image of that bed from my memory. There was nothing so terrible about the bed itself; the sheets were clean and neatly tucked under the sides of the mattress, and God knows I went on to see things that would haunt even the most hardened of souls, but it was that bed that always disturbed me the most. To me, the first time I opened the door to reveal it waiting in the gray confines of what was to become my dorm room, it represented everything I had lost. It was the space Lea had left behind after she died.
I dropped my suitcase when I saw it. I could almost hear her voice as I touched the fabric, a lump rising in my throat.
“I want the bottom bunk, Sarah. It’ll be a pain to climb down every morning. Please?”
“Of course,” I mumbled, talking to her even now, months after she’d faded from the world. Dutifully I made the choice that I would never sleep there. That I
could
never sleep there.
It was move in day on campus. The sound of excited college freshman, their voices shrill with nerves, roused me from my grief-induced stupor. Peering back, I received careful glances, weak smiles, and looks of panic hidden behind veils of composure. I knew it was just my imagination, but I couldn’t find a single approachable face among all of them. I shut the door and hid.
In the space of a few hours I transformed the room. A homey touch here, a memory posted there. My familiar possessions were re-arranged into uncanny patterns, and by the time the cloud-shielded sun had sunk low behind the silhouettes of the pines, I was home—or inside some semblance of it. Yet even in the patchwork comfort that was my dorm room, the empty bed nagged at me. It was like Lea had been sitting there watching me unpack the whole time, quiet and smiling.
Looking around the filled-in living space, I took in my new territory. There were two desks pushed against opposite walls, one bare and one with a photograph of Lea and me with our parents beside my laptop. I straightened it, examining the image of our family before it had been fractured by death. My sister’s face had been the mirror image of mine, our hair the exact same shade of pale blonde. In the photo my hair was its usual mess, hanging around my shoulders in unkempt waves, while Lea’s was thick, straightened, and reached down almost to her waist. We had the same fair complexion, the same blue eyes—round and almost too big for our faces. Our noses matched perfectly, sharp and pointed above a square jaw. We had so obviously been twins. Even now, when I catch a quick glimpse of myself in a reflective surface, I think I’m seeing her.
A knock at the door disturbed me from my musing. I opened it to see another freshman girl with frizzy brown hair tied back into a ponytail and thick-framed black glasses staring at me. She flashed that same timorous smile we all wore.
“Hey,” she greeted me. “We’re having a little party. Just getting to know some of the people on our floor. You can—you can come if you like. I’m Kelly, by the way, um, what’s—”
“Sarah.” I anticipated her question and faced her blankly for a moment, deliberating whether I wanted to go and meet the other kids on my floor. It was an opportunity which seemed as harrowing as it did imperative. And I was afraid. I didn’t like meeting new people on principle. I don’t trust myself around them—I’m never sure what might slip out of my mouth.
Moving into college alone had seemed like a risk today, especially in light of what it had meant to Lea and I. But since the theme of the day seemed to be taking risks, I decided this was a promising idea. “Sure,” I said. “Sounds like fun.”
“Good! This way. We’re over here…I think.” Kelly led me uncertainly down the hall and into a room.
The college I had been placed in was called Merrill, one of many that made up the vast campus. According to the website they’re a “close-knit bunch.” As we stepped into the smoky dorm room to see it packed full of strangers getting better acquainted with one another, I knew the website was spot-on. I saw all the usual suspects: three boys with shaggy hair passing around a pipe that was choking the room with a heady, skunk-like odor, a girl with short-cropped hair engaged in vigorous conversation about her strict vegan diet, a pockmarked young man joking loudly about obscene subjects for a girl’s attention. They all looked over as Kelly and I entered the room. Some of them put up their hands in a half-hearted wave. Names were exchanged, and I only caught a few of them. Jason, Samantha, Claire, Dean.
We recycled the same tired topics. Favorite bands. Hometowns. What made us
special
. I tried to relax as I made conversation, still watching myself closely, keeping my answers safe. After only an hour we were all laughing together like old buddies. The loud boy—Dean—actually had a pretty sharp sense of humor underneath his token vulgarities, and I suppose I inhaled enough of the smoke floating around in the air to make even those seem hysterical.
Unfortunately we arrived at the unavoidable question: “So what’s everyone’s major?”
Though my smile didn’t fade, I felt my heart sink. I was still undecided. Hell, most freshmen are, but something about admitting it always made me uncomfortable.
Undefined.
The world expects direction from us at this age, I suppose. Pressure always made it hard for me to commit to anything. I lied and said photojournalism, which was something I was a part of in high school. I knew enough to bullshit about it. Tennis and photography were what had consumed most of my life in my last year of high school. I’d made a bunch of close friends through those activities. Before summer, anyway. The only friend I had left now—and to call her that was stretching it—had driven me here today on her way up to San Francisco. She’d left me in front of my dorm with a dispassionate farewell, as if we were only acquaintances.
Best friends forever.
It never ceases to amaze me how fragile those forevers turn out to be.