Separian - Book 1

Chapter 1: Getting Started

MY ALARM CLOCK CRACKED as the pieces separated for the fifth consecutive day. The device was now more the glue I'd been using to keep it together than it was the plastic used to make it. I really should learn to stop silencing the alarm so quickly. Somehow I managed to reach the infernal device every day before the obnoxious buzzing forced its way into my head. I thought setting it up across the room might help the issue. But now that I knew how to make myself physically need sleep again, I never knew how much time I had left to react before the buzzer finally went off and rattled my eardrums. And because of that, I'd reflexively bolted from the bed and smashed it to pieces before it could wake me up, once again.

My mornings were nothing special. I got up, took care of my dog, dressed for the weather, and went for my run. The routine was so familiar to me now that I could do it blindfolded. So, like every other day, I proceeded with taking my dog to the bathroom. Jetta was a two and a half foot tall Labrador-cross-Australian Sheppard with splotches of black and white all over her body. She jumped from the bed and hurdled the objects scattered over the carpet as she raced around my room. The broken alarm clock had surprised her again.

Usually the alarm clock meant it was time to wake up, at least for her. If I wasn't up already, that sound meant I would be in a moment or two. Now that she was awake, there was no going back. It didn't matter if the alarm clock was about to go off, should have already gone off, or wasn't going off for another hour. If I was up, she was up. So now it was time for her to go to the bathroom. And right after the bathroom came food. The same routine, every morning. And if by chance I did manage to make it back into bed after shutting off the alarm, Jetta would jump on me until I was up and following her schedule. I hadn't had to worry about that since the beginning of the summer though.

I forced my eyes to focus finally and attempted to ignore the plastic shards sitting in a pile next to my dresser. I'd thought it many times before, but the forest green colour suffocating my walls needed to go; especially with the season changing just outside my window. I didn't want to wake up in gloom anymore.

My bedspread said otherwise. The two twin mattresses my mother had forced in through an unwilling door occupied the majority of the space I had. I'd insisted on a flat colour for the spread. Black, white, red, even yellow wasn't out of the question. But, of course, my mother knew what looked best in my room and changed the blankets while I was at school. So now I slept on an array of dark blues and greens splattered at random over the material.

And let's not forget the dresser she'd just "happened to pick up" at the second hand store. Don't get me wrong, I was, by no means, above shopping at a second hand store. But when the perfectly good dresser I already had was replaced with the solid red oak masterpiece staring me in the face, taking up what little personal space the bed left me, it took all I could not to toss it through the window. However, I was raised to be respectful and would never tell my mother I didn't like something she'd gotten me, so I kept quiet and found a way to fill the six oversized drawers it had come with.

I opened my bedroom door maybe two inches and Jetta was gone, down the hall and through the dog-flap on the back door. I had maybe 30 seconds before she came rushing back through and asking for breakfast so I needed to hurry. She'd taken a five second head start which meant I would have to move even faster than normal to be on time for her. If she came and sat in front of her bowl and her meal wasn't ready, she would run around until it was. Only out here, unlike my room, the floors were solid oak, not carpet, so the scratching and pounding of her claws would echo off every surface in the house. That usually led to someone yelling at me to keep it down.

Now, if it was because I'd opened up the cupboard door too slowly and let the squeak rattle its way upstairs, I would understand. No problem. But they all knew perfectly well that I wasn't the one bounding around on the kitchen floor because I wasn't getting my food fast enough.