The Dream Machine

Two

I decided to ignore the subject and walk to my locker. My feet shuffled down the bland linoleum floor as I passed through various rows of pasty green metal. I had left Lizzie behind and told her that I'd see her in Band. The comment has sounded like a joke. I was trying to hold in her news as much as possible. Lizzie couldn't know that I cared, couldn't know that I was waiting to make my move.

I found my locker at the end of the hallway, number 5078. I turned the dial to the left, to the right, and then back to the left, realizing that if I had a bottom locker, my life would be terrible.

"Hey," said a voice behind me. It belonged to the person I mostly didn't wanna see right now. Lloyd.

"Hi," I sputtered, trying to act nonchalant, "So, when did you expect on telling me?"

"What are you talking about, Sandler?" he asked me, obviously trying to hide the fact that he just happened to be dating the girl of my dreams.

I hesitated, but then added, "Oh, I don't know, that you and Lizzie are practically down by the schoolyard."

"If you keep using those old song lyrics to communicate with people, you're gonna lose some friends, but yeah, it's true. Lizzie and I are going out. Officially."

"Oh, well I hope you guys are happy together," I slammed my locker shut, rattling the remainder of my books inside.

"Look, I know you're a little upset...:"

"Oh no, I'm not upset. I just wish you would've told me sooner."

"Lizzie and I were trying to find the right time to..."

"Oh my gosh! Are you hearing yourself right now? You and my crush just started dating like what? Last week? And you're already acting like you guys are an old married couple! But, I'm gonna let it be. You won her, and there's nothing I can do about it."

"Thanks for understanding." he paraded towards me and placed his hand on my shoulder. I quickly shoved it off, obviously annoyed.

He sighed and walked away. His outline getting blurrier as he got farther away. I sinked against the lockers onto the floor, placing my stack of books in my lap. Everything had changed. My deduction was correct, and things would never go back to the way things were. It won't last, I thought. It won't.

My vision blackened.

Suddenly, I was back in the alley, but this time I was standing up. My heart was racing. What had just happened? I had fallen asleep in the hallway, again. Someone would find my unconcious body and call me mentally insane. While I was here, though, I decided to make the most of it. If I could find out where I was, I wouldn't be so scared.

I walked to the front of the alley. The sidewalk that my feet were planted on was right across from a school. It was the school where my snoozing body lay against the locker wall. My feet skidded across the street before I even realized what I was doing. The road was marked with a single yellow line, dividing the lanes for differing cars, including one that was heading directly towards me.

I tried to move out of the way, but my shoes seemed to be super-glued to the black ground. The red minivan was getting closer. I knew that my time was up.

The car collided with my body by going right through it. My body's image flashing like a hologram. My thoughts were shrieking, what the heck was going on? The soles of my Converses unglued themselves, my adrenaline level rising as I ran towards the front gate of the school. I needed to know what in the world was going on.

The sun in my dream was setting as I walked through those huge, maroon double doors. The interior of the school looked the same as when I had left it. I walked into the library and noticed that Lizzie was still in there. She had told me earlier that she was gonna stay in there until Band. Weird. Then I decided to prance back to my locker. I started up the steps. Strangely, no one was around, all gone into various classes, but when I reached the hallway with my locker, though, it was chock-ful of teens. No one noticed me. It didn't feel all too different.

I continued until I reached my locker. People were surrounding it. I tried pulling some out of the way, but whenever i did, my body flickered and went right through them. I stuck my head through some random guy to see what was going on. The kids were laughing at me, well, not me. The me that was lying on the ground trapped in a living dream. My heart stopped. Could it really be me? I heard a yell and backed off.

"Hey! What are you kids doing?" yelled Mr. Sanchez, our 8th grade science and athletic teacher.

Many kids uttered a mumble or just ran away. Mr. Sanchez bended over my unconcious body. He shook my body. Soon, however my vision was getting blurrier. Blurrier, blurrier, and blurrier still. Gray marks at the edge of my vision. Someone was waking me up. I closed my eyes.

Next thing I knew, Mr. Sanchez was standing in front of me, his fat hands shaking me to existence. My eyes widened.

"Sandler, please don't fall asleep during school. I know being an 8th grader is hard, but your good, just try not to."

"I will," I uttered, my mind melting at my recent discovery.

I was able to be fully awake in my dreams, so that I could become a ghost and watch everything that is going on around me. Possibly, everything that is going on anywhere.

I could get Lizzie.