The Hollow-Harper's Journey

Part 1

I woke up to the sound of voices outside my room. I got off my bed, stretched my arms, and changed into a white shirt with multiple color stripes, like green, black, orange, etc, and blue jeans.

I walked out of my room and down the stairs, into the massive dining hall, where everyone was already eating breakfast. I grabbed some toast from the table, along with a glass of water. "Harper, can you buy some donuts for lunch?" Ms.Bee, the head supervisor, asked.

"Sure." I said, finishing up my toast. See, since I'm the oldest person here, I had to do somem more chores, like groceries. I didn't mind it. Ms.Bee was nice, and made sure to treat me the same as the other kids, along with some extra stuff, like a new phone for my last birthday.

I walked out of the building, and walked a few steps before looking at it. It was a brown colored building, with the words Sweet Children Orphanage in golden colored words at the top.

There are few places like Sweet Children Orphanage, or SCO, in the world. I found out about that at age 2, when I was abandoned by my parents for some reason.

Ms.Bee told me the story. "It was a rainy night." she would begin. "I was about to go to sleep when someone knocked on the front door."

"I opened it to find a man and woman. They wore thick coats and covered their faces with floppy hats. The man was carrying a child, who was asleep."

"They told me to take care of her, dropped her in my arms, and ran. I took the girl inside, and found a note on her. It said Her name is Harper. She's currently 2 years old. Please take care of her."

"And the what?" I would ask.

"And then I obeyed the instructions. I took care of her. I fell in love with her black silky hair, and soft brown eyes, and gave her the best life I could offer."

"But, I hope that she would find a good family to live with."

I loved Ms.Bee and Ms.Bee loved me, but she was never Mom for me. For that to happen, I needed to be adopted, but that never happened.

And now, I'm 15.

No one wants to adopt a fifteen year old, no matter how pretty or talented.

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I walked a few blocks down to Holy Donuts. They sold the best donuts and everyone at SCO loved them.

I walked in, and found the place almost empty except for the cashier. "I'll have 20 chocolate donuts, 10 with sprinkles and 10 without." I said.

There was 10 kids, including me, at the orphanage, along with 10 supervisors. We all loved chocolate donuts, but the supervisors hated the sprinkles, for some reason.

I paid the cashier, and took the two bags from him. I was halfway back to the orphanage when sometime weird happened.

I felt a spark in my head, and suddenly, nothing felt real. Like, I would look at a building, and feel as if it didn't exist, as if it was fake. But, when I reached out to touch it, I would feel lopsided. By head would tell me that it's fake, but my hand told me that it was there.

Probably nothing. I thought. Maybe I just need to drink more water.

I reached SCO, and entered, finding the cook, Mr.J, in the kitchen, and giving him the donuts. "Thank you Harper." he said, smiling.

I looked down at my watch, and saw that there was a lot of time before lunch. "I'm going to go for a walk." I said. "Can you tell Ms.Bee that?"

"M-Ms.Bee?" he asked. "Of-of course." I smiled while walking out of the kitchen. Everyone except Ms.Bee knew that Mr.J had a crush on her, but we didn't say anything.

"Make sure to be back by 12:00!" he called.

I was outside again, and walked across the street, and walked for some time. I had no destination. I just needed to clear my head.

That "Everything is not real" feeling was still lingering in my head. I walked for some time, trying to reason with my head, but I could not convince it.

Then, suddenly, something inside me snapped, and I felt a lot of memories fall over me. The memory of playing The Hollow.

The memory of practicing for years for a competition.

The memory of going through a portal, and then ending up at the orphanage.

How long was I in this place?

I thought hard. Two years.

I almost fell over. Two years. Two years in this virtual world.

What is this place?

I'm not sure, but it wasn't the real world.