Bleak Winter -

Chapter 4: From Another Pair of Eyes

**TW: This Chapter contains depictions of Racism and Xenophobia. Viewer Discretion is Advised!**

Time is a funny thing when you really get down to it. Since the first living creature gained consciousness, we've all been measuring and trying to understand time, from the trajectory of the sun to the changing of the seasons, to the calculations of how it moves, there has been an ongoing effort by humans to figure out time, from it's very beginning to December 2001 and beyond. Yet despite how much of an effort humanity has made, there's still so much about time that doesn't make sense. It's an uncontrollable force of nature that marches forward whether we like it or not, and every single individual being with any form of sentience experiences it in unique and different ways from one another.

These aren't the exact thoughts running through Chloe's head, but it is how she feels. As she watches the snow fall around her, a clear indication that time is moving forward, her world seems to have stopped entirely, and she feels so alone. The last time a major disaster happened, the whole world seemed to stop, everyone from school, to home, or even out on the market had heard about what happened in New York, and all stopped what they were doing to watch it unfold together. Now, she's experiencing a personal tragedy, she just saw her best friend get impaled and carried away by some horrific monster, and yet nearly everyone else in the world, everyone else in the town it happened in, are all now continuing through their lives, none the wiser of everything that just happened.

Chloe closes her eyes, the sounds of the other people rushing towards her start to fade away, she's alone. She is trapped in an empty void where nothing else seems to exist, except her consciousness and the snow falling around her. Her senses seem almost to transform, her mind and memories warp, it's like she's a different person. A faint light begins to show into her pupils, and then it clears. Things suddenly start to feel warm and cozy. She's in a kitchen that she doesn't recognize, yet it all feels familiar. Hanging from the wall is a small calendar that reads December 18th, 2001, while the ticking clock above shows that the time is around 8 pm. It's all clear to her in that one moment, she's no longer in her own body and has entered that of someone else. She has no control over this person, be it their thoughts, movements, or what they say, all Chloe can do is sit back and simply watch how the world plays out from another pair of eyes.

The sounds of water pouring out of a faucet and onto dirty dishes filled the room, almost louder than the audio from the small tube television, playing a Mexican telenovela called Abrázame Muy Fuerte. Looking out the window above the sink, the person standing in the kitchen seemed to be watching for something, or someone in particular. But alas, with the sun completely down and the porch lights burnt out, all she really could see was her reflection. This was 14-year-old Xochitl Araceli, a young Chicana with dark brown hair that was worn down in French braids, dressed in a simple band tee and jeans.

The routine of this night was not unusual, wait for her little brother, Gilbert, to be done with school so she can take him home. bring in the mail, water the kitchen plants, prepare dinner for the two of them, and then clean up while Gilbert kicks the soccer ball around outside. With the last few dishes scrubbed and placed into the washer, all she had to do now was call her brother in and wait for her mother, Mireya, to get home and dump all of that day's troubles and traumas onto her. Once that was over, she'd try yet again to get some schoolwork done, shortly before her father, Benjamin, would get home in the evening. But it would probably play out the same way it always did, with her being too tired to put a lot of effort into or even finish whatever was due tomorrow, so she'd just resign herself to bed and try to get the rest of it done within the small bits of time between periods.

However, with daylight getting shorter and air getting colder, Xochitl only got more and more paranoid about letting Gilbert go out there unsupervised. Luckily, when her anxiety was getting a little too close for comfort, the kitchen door swung open as Gilbert stepped in with a yawn and tossed his soccer ball to the side in a random direction, which Xo quickly rushed to catch. Her quick jump to take the ball nearly caused her to slip, though she was only able to catch herself by slamming her other hand into the island and knocking off the front row of bills and envelopes.