worlds away || les miserables

▸ prologue

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celie's pov

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A figure stands in a dark room, his silhouette only made apparent by the dim lighting that occasionally flickers over his head. He hovers above his invention, a massive contraption primarily constructed of inconel metals, handling nuts and bolts with almost insane precaution. His contraption— a machine, if you will— is so complex that it's nearly impossible to envision.

He opens the door, struggling for a moment: it's heavy, because it's made of the strongest materials and must be durable if it's going to do its job. He enters and is greeted by flashing lights and buttons and levers— how could he possibly know what to push? Never fear, he knows exactly what to do (it is his machine, after all). With the press of a few buttons and the ecstatic yank of a lever, time is thrown completely off of its tracks and off the Time Traveller goes.

I wish my story had been quite as thrilling. I had no fancy machine or mad scientist to escort me; just a foot-eating pothole and a pretty bad hit to the head. My story was more along the lines of Hank's in Twain's A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court.

If somebody had asked yesterday, "Celie, what do you think of time travel?" I would have responded with certainty, "It's interesting, but it's impossible. It can't exist."

Apparently, a lot can change in a day.

In the 21st century, we're practically surrounded by stories of time travel. It's not anything new and it's not anything beyond modern thinking. In cartoons, Mr. Peabody and Sherman wander through time and visit Marie Antoinette at the guillotines or observed the first horses who ran in the Kentucky Derby. On television, Doctor Who and his companions could enter into a police box and travel wherever (whenever?) they pleased. With the DeLorean, Marty McFly and Doc Brown repaired events that were thirty years behind them.

But they were all fictional characters doing fictional things, whereas I was very real and doing everything a real person tended to do: attending college, working an undesirable job, visiting my family and friends whenever I had spare time. I was nobody special: how had I been the one to travel to 1832?

Most details prior to hitting my head are a blur. I had been walking back to my dorm from work: I was a waitress at a restaurant on campus, and while it was a miserable experience, it paid enough to where I could grin and bear it. It had been a long day and I had wanted nothing more except to shut off completely and go to bed—  and then, my phone rang. My mom was on the other end, which, of course, meant that ignoring her call determined that the cops would be at my door in half an hour to make sure I was alive. She had called to remind me about my sister's birthday party, and in my sudden moment of panic and distraction, my unsuspecting foot landed in a hole in the ground and I landed face-first on the lawn of the University of Liverpool.

I was beyond unconsciousness— I was dead. I was sure of it. Films always represent death as heading towards 'the light,' whatever that's meant to symbolize, but it only felt like I was fading away. Yesterday came in a quick image, then the day before that, and even the one before that. I was reliving my entire life. I was graduating high school, I was attending school dances, I was running around with my sister and standing with my mom in the hospital, waiting for her to be born. I watched my life, every year winding down until eventually, there was nothing left. Just complete blackness that absorbed all of my surroundings.

And then, I woke up.

But it was not in Liverpool, and not in 2019.

Toto, I've a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore.

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and... we're off!!

i've had the first draft of this story written for a year and then suddenly decided that today, july 1st, 2019, i hate it all and whipped this up in a span of 5 hours. bear with me, but i know that my new plan is gonna be soooo much better ;)

let's see what celie can get herself into next, shall we?

love u guys <3

- anna