Billies Seasonal Weather Anomalies

|| Four ||

I stare at the painting in front of me. It's Friday. Exactly one week since Bradley promised to take me to Arth. He fiddles with the back of the painting now. A part of me is waiting for him to admit he's forgotten how to turn to the jolly thing on.

               "Almost got it," he mutters. He doesn't look at me but I still nod encouragingly at him anyway. No point angering your one ally in the universe if we do manage to make it to Arth. "There. Got it."

               He flips the large canvas back over and hangs it on the wall. I take another good look at it. Nothing. It looks the exact same as it always has. "Um, how exactly do we, you know, get to the other side?" I say awkwardly.

               Bradley fashions his pearly white teeth into a broad grin, "you touch it."

               "Okay. When we're there, how do we get back?"

               "Arth has a painting too. One just like this one but it's a picture of earth. It's in another company founded by Billy. It's called Billies Dust Suckers. They sell vacuum cleaners. When Billy first went to Arth, vacuum cleaners were an invention their world had never seen before. He made a good fortune in both worlds."

                "Oh. Sounds nice. So that's where we'll come out after touching this, then? What happens if another customer that comes in here and touches this painting despite that no touching sign over there?" I nod towards the bright orange tape with the words firmly printed on in bold. "Wouldn't they come through too?"

               "No. Only one portal needs to be open to go through. When you enter the code to open it on the back as I've just done, you set how long you want to have it open for. I set it for five minutes so you'd better hurry up and touch it soon. If in the unlikely scenario someone goes running up to place their grimy hands on the painting before the five minutes are up, then Watson, Clay Watson, will stop them."

               I slowly turn around until I'm staring straight at him. "Clay knows?! Why in the world would you tell that old—"

               "Mister Phillip," my boss's voice is stern. Note to self: no Clay-ranting in front of Bradley. "Now that we've got that sorted, could you go through now?"

               "What? Oh, right. Yeah." And then I touch it.

               Falling. I'm free falling into the unknown. I can't see anything, but that might just be because there's no much wind my eyes are sealed shut. Maybe I should ask Bradley on our way back if I could bring a pair of goggles? I'm falling so fast that I'm worried about injuries when I finally touch down again. Why didn't I ask Bradley about the safety of this thing? Surely it's not good for my mental state if not me physically? Too much stress and adrenaline, or something? At least those chocolate bars will of well and truly taken off my weight next time I hop on the scales.

               It feels like hours but it can't be more than seconds when my summer-saluting stomach comes to a stop. When my feet touch the ground again, I stumble and crash into a nearby table. An ugly table. An ugly table that most definitely wasn't there before.

               "You'll get used to it. Re-entry balance will improve soon." I look up from where I'm hunched over the repulsive table. Bradley stands next to an oil painting of the park outside Billies Seasonal Weather Anomalies. In the corner of the painting you can just see the distinctive bright yellow building.

               I feel like I should probably respond. Keep my pride from dropping any lower than it already has and give him a funny statement proving that I believed him about this whole ordeal in the first place. Unfortunately, my facial expressions haven't quite gotten the memo that my brain just posted. Typical.