The Door to Tomorrow

The Otherworldly Misfit

Rather than immediately sitting on my bed and secluding myself in my room for the day, I remembered something important and headed back to the Library for a short while. The others still hadn't left from their rooms. I thought maybe they were all ignoring each other or hiding from me, and I couldn't blame them.

As I walked back to the Library, I kept replaying Trevor's words in my head. Out of everything he said,one word bothered me the most.

"...Auxiliary..."

I had likely heard that term before, but I was totally clueless about its meaning. Well, I had heard the word used in different ways just like everyone else, but the way Trevor used it made it seem like a name, or rather, a title. I wasn't sure what kind of title it was supposed to be, however.

I didn't plan to spend much time in the Library the second time, mostly because I didn't know what to search for. I looked around for anything containing the word "Auxiliary" used in that way, but I found nothing. I concluded that I needed more information, so I headed back to the Lobby disappointed.

Trevor knew more than the rest of us did, and I could tell he was going to be uncommunicative about his knowledge. Asking him directly would likely have been an impossible task, so I decided to wait until either he mentioned it on his own again, or until I found some information by chance. Asking Mr. Peterson and Narrator was an option I considered, as well.

I stopped at the Pantry room to grab a cup of chamomile tea, but no food. My appetite had vanished early that morning once I inhaled the heavy stench of iron from Shiloh's body.

Once I was in my room, I took one more glance of the man in the sketchbook before tucking it away in the messenger bag, which had stayed in my room that day. I did the same with the portrait of myself, then I grabbed the journal. I anxiously read the entries in hopes of forgetting about the day's distressing events. The first notable passages I found mentioned Joseph's dad's friend once again.

"I spent a decent amount of time with Dad's friend, who was very kind. He was good with kids despite not having any of his own, and he naturally had a warm, nurturing personality."

"Oh. He didn't have any kids. Maybe he thought of Joseph as his own, then?" I spoke to myself.

Joseph had provided more questions than answers. Every time I read about his friend or his dad, I wanted to know more about them, but anything resembling an answer seemed ambiguous and unfinished. Such was the case with the next sentence.

"Every once in a while, I remember something about my dad's friend that upsets me..."

He didn't specify. I wanted to ask Joseph about it in my dreams, but I doubted he would answer, considering how vague he typically was when speaking. I moved on to the next page, and immediately noticed the sorrowful tone of the entries.

"Today was the anniversary of my adopted sister's death, and my parents took it hard like always. This year was a bit worse, however. Seems I am not the only one getting tired of living without her. It's been 7 whole years, now...almost a decade since I lost someone who could have been a close friend. She was a rarity like me and Coco; one of us. I finally told my parents about that, and they really had no idea this whole time. Even though her name told the world exactly what she was..."

"...The fuck?" I noticed the odd impression the entry gave off toward the end. Apparently, Joseph knew something about his sister that their parents did not. The whole thing was strange to me. I mean, Joseph had never even mentioned having a sister before that entry. To make things worse, the bottom of the page had a frightening, eerie feel to it.