Hiraeth: Blackout (I)

Chapter Twenty Eight

Over the course of a few weeks, the world began to re-adjust and learn the extent of Bexley's plot.

She had organized a system to keep trans-continental shipment, travel, and communication going strong.

For communication, she had many of the Taken working to keep answering telephones and mail. Shipments to and from every area went right on being shipped by the very workers and business-owners who were already in charge of them.

Any non-Idyllians that came to the continent were hidden away until their scheduled return, then memory-wiped before their flight home. (Of course, many beings admitted that they found return travelers not remembering anything about their trip to be pretty fishy.)

She chose smaller-ranking officials to oversee that everything stayed in order as if there were nothing wrong.

So the world was veiled twice: once with deception and once with darkness.

After everyone was informed of what had happened, a massive cleanup was in order. Floret got help from many communities in Wondryn. All of Idyll worked together to restore life as best as was possible, aided by other continents.

It wasn't easy, but Day by Day homes, businesses, environments, and cities rebuilt themselves. All of Hiraeth came together, even, to find help for those who were affected by what eventually became known as "The Upset." Counseling and mental health organizations started offering widely-available, more affordable help.

The Ragdolls, including myself, were awarded medals from Governor Stacey and Kassandra Green (who was still recovering). Governor Green insisted that any time we needed her, she would be there.

Karter became recognized as the commander of the Ragdoll Army, and she got the most commemoration all around the world. Even the governor of Drift, who rarely came to Idyll, went to visit her family with the other two continent leaders. He brought her several gifts, including the latest motion picture screen and telephone.

Strange, new, wonderful things were happening all throughout Hiraeth. Beings were coming together in ways they never had. For the first time in thousands of years, it seemed like the Divide didn't even matter.

The Upset, which lasted about twenty Days, left thousands of beings with scars and wounds that would take a lot of time and effort to heal, but there were more beings willing to help one another than history had ever seen.

#

The rest of school went by in the blink of an eye. It was very different from before.

First of all, no one bullied me, and there were half as many kids at the school. A lot of beings had died during The Upset, I knew that, but it still freaked me out to have missing faces in my classes. Some of those faces included Nelson, Alyssa, and Ms. Joy.

Secondly, all the teachers and staff that remained acted really nice.

I always got put into groups with my friends. I was offered extra dessert from the lunch servers every weekend. When I got sick at the start of Spring, I threw up in the restroom and arrived to Mr. Freeman's class ten minutes late. He was really concerned and insisted that those ten minutes didn't even matter. He sent me to the nurse, who gave me the rest of the Day off. At one point, it got so weird that I skipped homework assignments and got passes on them anyways.

It wasn't just me experiencing this, it was all of my Ragdoll friends as well.

Third, alternative band became a hit. Students in the other bands would give us standing ovations, and even non-band members began attending school concerts. That rarely ever happened before.

Fourth, I got a job working afterschool at a record shop in Bijou City. The owner, Miss Malachite, paid me for cleaning, organizing, and manning the store when she wasn't around. Although I only got minimum wage, she usually bought me dinner. The job made homework difficult sometimes, but I never had trouble staying up late before.

Fifth, and this one I didn't like at all, girls started acting... weird around me. Girls I didn't know. By the end of Spring, I was getting taller (which I also didn't like), and for whatever reason this meant that I was... Better-looking? At least, that's how Kira put it when I asked her why girls had become so scary.

"You're having your glow-up, Mike. It happens to all of us," she explained one Day during lunch.

Kira was the unspoken beauty guru of my friend group, and she knew a lot about romance, too.

"Just ignore those girls, they're the type who only like boys for their looks."

Roxie, who'd been listening next to me, glared at her food. "I wanna kick 'em."

I turned to her in confusion. She had been acting weird, too, but not like the other girls. She seemed upset whenever they'd twirl their hair or say something like, "Mike, is that a new shirt?" (It never was.)

"Why, Roxie?" I asked worriedly.

She shrugged.

"Y-You okay..?"

"Forget I said anything."

What? "O-Okay..."

After this conversation, I decided not to engage with the weird girls. Before, I'd just kind of stood there like an idiot while they "flirted" (another thing Kira had to inform me of). Now I either ignored them or found a way to politely say I had other things to do. Once I started doing that, Roxie stopped acting weird.

The school year ended right before the New Year, which was always the first Day of Summer and the start of Starscend.

My friends once again surprised me with a hang-out plan.

Since Parry was sixteen, his parents were allowing him to bring some friends with him to their vacation house on a beach near Melodymense. The final group consisted of Roxie, Derek, Kira, Karter, Aka, Serenity, Troy, Frances, and I. (The twins, Kat, Mallory, Liana, and Emmitt couldn't make it anyway, so there were no hard feelings.)

Parry's parents got the others' parents to let them come by insisting that strict gender-separated rooms would be enforced and bedtimes wouldn't be too late.

At first I hesitated to go. The beach involved a lot of Sun, and lately I'd been getting burnt more and more. But I figured that if I took the proper precautions, I'd be fine.

The preparation for the trip was extensive. I had to work overtime so I could buy beach clothes, which I'd never heard of in my life. I also had to stock up on Sunscreen, Sunglasses, and hats because I knew I'd otherwise get badly burnt. I even bought myself a really nice magenta water bottle.

Finally, on New Year's Eve, I joined my friends in Parry's limousine and we headed to the Southern coast.

As we flew through the Sunny skies with the dawn of the New Year over the horizon, I'd never felt better.

I was, finally, ready for anything.