Insolitis

IV

Jay walked through the wall into the room Family Day was being held in only a few minutes ago. Jay bit his lip and raised his eyebrow. Wasn’t I supposed to show up in Leann’s world? At the time she writes about Family Day? But if Family Day was burned out of the story, then maybe Family Day is never written, not even in the past. There was no one there. Kathy had burned Family Day out of the story. Leann hadn’t written about it, and never will, because it didn’t exist anymore.

                Jay ran back to the room at the heart of the story. Everyone was arguing. They all stopped midsentence when Jay walked into the room and turned to look at him.

                “You walked through the wall. Why are you still in the story?” Kathy confronted Jay.

                “You burned Family Day out of the story. I couldn’t go to the time Leann wrote about Family Day, because now she never did. I appeared in the only place the echo of Family Day could exist, in the conference room.” Jay was glaring at Kathy accusingly. “Why are you in this story? You want to destroy it but why?”

                “There’s something wrong with this story.” Kathy stooped down to Jay’s eye level. “Do you have thoughts, Jay?” Jay gave a confused nod. Where is she going with this? He thought.

                “No one in this story should have thoughts.” Kathy grinned. “But yet, you do.”

Jay narrowed his eyes. Okay, this is getting kind of surreal.

“‘Insolitis’ is written in third person. Not first. Even though you are the main character, you are not supposed to have thoughts. Everyone is simply supposed to play their written act like actors in a theater play. But you, Jay…. you have thoughts.”  Kathy kept looking in Jay’s eyes as if she could find the answer written on his pupil like words written on a page.

* * *

                Leann sat in her usual spot on the library floor. She wasn’t writing this time. Her back was on the wall which her own character had simply walked out of only a day ago. Leann’s mind was on the wall too. She wanted Jay to come back. She thought about what he had said before he disappeared, making a promise he didn’t keep to be back in a few minutes. I can forgive him for breaking that promise. He is my character. I just hope he comes back sometime. I want to get to know him some more. Him being my character, I should already know him. But he seemed different. Just like how I wrote him, but only slightly askew. Something inside him was different.

                Leann continued sitting there, staring off into space. She picked up her notebook, figuring she had better get at least some work done.

                “No! No, no, no, no!”

                Leann looked up. Jay was standing there, beating his fists against the wall.

                “Jay! You’re back!” Leann stood up, overjoyed. “Yesterday you said you’d be back in a few minutes, but you weren’t and I-”

 Jay turned to look at her. “That was yesterday?! Whoa…. But listen, Leann, you probably want me to stay, me being your character and all. But I really need to get back in the story. My life, literally, depends on it. And so does your story.” He looked a very shocked Leann in the eye. “There are pathways between your world and mine, connecting you, the author, to the story’s world and vice versa. This was the most common one, because you write here the most. There are others. One is in your future, after you become a highly successful author.”

“I become a-?” Leann was very happy about this fact, and didn’t seem to care how he knew this. She was interrupted by Jay continuing to make exclamations about pathways.

“There must be another pathway in this time! Where else do you usually write?”

“In my bedroom, during language class, and in here. That’s about it.”

“I can’t go through during your language class because I’m not too sure anyone but you would take kindly to a guy walking through walls. That leaves your bedroom. Unless you live right across the street, it will take me awhile to get there. And that will give them enough time to burn down the whole story! Not good! But I guess I don’t have any other choice but to try. Good bye, Leann.”

After giving him directions to her house and watching him run out of the library and out of the school, Leann leaned back against the wall and was once again alone. 

                                                                                         - - -

When Leann got home, she, as usual, went straight to her room. Neither of her parents was home yet, given that they both worked until five. As she set her backpack next to her desk, she noticed a piece of paper with messy handwriting on it. Though the handwriting was shockingly similar to Leann’s, upon reading the first word, Leann knew it wasn’t written by her.