Bubblegum Universe

Chapter 1

My eyes peered open as I shifted uncomfortably in the straining position I was in. My neck ached at the position it was turned while my head was relaxed on a very hard shoulder that surprisingly was comfortable, the only comfort I managed to feel in that period of discomfort.
"You finally woke up" Someone said from above. I jerked up in fear and hit my head on something hard above.
"Ouch!" Me and that familiar voice winced together in pain. I looked up to see him already staring down at me, Kenneth. The one person I had sworn to never interact with again, yet there I was with him in a tight space that very much felt like a box.
I tried thinking but I couldn't with the tall boy breathing down my neck and staring intently at me. He obviously had no idea what personal space was. "How did I get here?" I asked myself lowly but he heard me. "I am as baffled as you are" he said . I knew I fell asleep in my room, on my bed I knew I couldn't be wrong, I remembered it so very well. What if we had been kidnapped? Did they want ransom? Even worse maybe they wanted to use us for some kind of ritual. Oh no I didn't want to die, and even if I did, I wouldn't want to with Kenneth.
"Hey! Help me out! Let me out of here pleaseee" I screamed at the top of my lungs as I continually banged on the wooden door.
"Relax" He said before kicking the door open with his leg.
"Why didn't you do that before now? " I asked him
"I didn't want to wake you up"
I rolled my eyes at that "Touche"
As we crawled out of our box, i squinted my eyes, irritated by the bright ray of sunlight that found it's way into my tiny Iris.
Kenneth had already begun to scout the area as though to find out if he was a prey or predator in this new environment.
"Where are we?" I asked him but all he gave me was a shrug. We were standing at the edge of a very bad road. Everything that I looked at seemed familiar but yet very strange too. It was like knew it and also did not know it. I kept racking my brain, trying so hard to remember where we were.
"Let's ask around maybe we would know where this place is" Kenneth suggested.
"I know this place"
"Where are we then?" He raised his eyebrow
"I just can't remember."
He shook his head at me like I was some kind of crazy fellow before turning to his left all ready to ask someone. I turned with him only for us to be met with a not so high broken wall. In fact, it wasn't high at all just 60cm high and so we had to cross over it. We did what was necessary, and landed in a puddle of water, a pond. My night trouser I had on was now soaking wet and I couldn't help but grumble. This stupid pond wasn't even supposed to be here I thought to myself.
"Hey get out of my pond you rascals you are killing my fish." We quickly jumped out of the water before the crazy old man with a stick got to is and hit us with it.
"Those are some weird looking shops" he said pointing opposite us. I wanted to tell him that it wasn't right to point, that it was rude but I was overwhelmed by the different types of shops that were standing erect opposite us. The normal shops that I knew were either made of bricks or planks or even containers used to ship in goods but this ones were utterly different. Some were made of melted candle wax. Like they just stacked a million candles together and melted them in shape to form bricks. And then there the ones that were made of tiny little boxes but they didn't look fragile at all. They actually looked really strong and stable. And then there were the shops that were not there but were there. They looked like paint was just thrown to the air, and it stayed there to form a shop. Just as I looked at the shops in shock, a huge fowl flew past us. That white cock with a red comb elegantly placed on his past us and it all began to play in my memory.
That was the fowl I had seen everyday, and dreaded. The cock that would infiltrated my house and... My house.
"That's it." I said aloud in joy having finally found the missing puzzle piece, and put it in the right spot.
"That's what?" Kenneth asked me
"This is the area I live, my house is meant to be in this area."
"What now?" He didn't believe what I was telling him
"I'm being serious here" I dragged him to where we stood before when we had just stepped out of the box. Opposite where we had been standing, just across the bad road was exactly where my house was meant to be. But instead, in place of my house stood a company, Tenny's &Co. And in place of the other houses that were supposed to stand side by side with my house were complexes and malls and so on. What was happening?
"Are you sure?" Kenneth now seemed to be taking me seriously.
"Yes I am" I said. "My house is meant to be over there." I pointed at the front forgetting courtesy "Directly opposite the bank." I pointed at something behind my back. Kenneth turned around to look at the bank while I still tried to make sense of what was happening.
"You might want to see this" Kenneth called out. I turned around and staggered backwards. We had not noticed it at first but now there it was. Where the big white building of our fear Monetary Bank was supposed to be standing, was nothing. No, not nothing rather it was nothingness. It wasn't like nothing or no building was on the land and that behind the empty space, I could see another house or a person walking by. No, there was a white nothingness there. It was like those places you see in your dreams that when you fall over from the edge into them, you just keep on falling and never really land. I was scared. I turned to Kenneth who was as dumbstruck as I was.
"What is happening?" I asked him
"Where is this place?" I was shaking by now.
"Relax" he started "we'll think of something real soon" We began our journey then to nowhere in particular because even though I knew the route we were following, I had no idea where it led to in this world. The route had begun to follow, was the route that was supposed to lead to our school. I suddenly saw someone who in all of this unfamiliarity, finally looked familiar. Tobi. We went to the same school, and he was in a lower class but that really didn't stop them from being really close friends. "Tobi!!" I shouted so loud I got stares from the people around us but I didn't care. He looked at me, smiled and then ran toward me. I was relieved that at least in this world he recognised me.
"Hi!" He said as he came to an halt, his smile suddenly turning into a grimace. "What are you doing with him?" The stare he gave to Kenneth was that of disgust.
"Nothing, just hanging."
"Hanging? After what he did to you? After how he hurt you?"
I knew what he did to me was unforgivable, but I still went ahead to say
"Everyone deserves a second chance."
He looked at me weirdly "Just be careful."
It seemed like in this world, Kenneth was also an asshole.
"I have a question."
"Shoot." I was going to ask where exactly we were, but Kenneth rudely interrupted me.
"Man please tell her where my house is, she keeps arguing with me like she knows where I live."
Tobi looked at us really strangely and I opened my mouth to say something to him but he was ahead of me.
"It's in Salami street, very close to Chimamanda's house. You just walk like five houses, the first big house you see is his house."
"I told you Tonia, you just don't listen."
Tobi shook his head and bid me goodbye. A lot of people were beginning to think I was crazy today, I thought to myself hell I was beginning to think I was crazy, stuck somewhere that looked like home but wasn't.
"What was that all about?" I asked Kenneth. "Why did you have to interrupt me like that? What if he had no idea where you lived?"
"Well he did."
"Oh! So that's what you're gonna say, well he did. Just think of what would have happened if he didn't.?"
"Chillax girl if he didn't know, then we would have asked another question." That was in fact true. "Besides what were you going yo ask him? Where are we?" He said the last part in a tiny voice and I was just quiet. "Look you know the way to Amanda's house, lead us through." He finally said.
At home, Chimamanda and Ranti were my best friends, always together. So if the Salami Street I knew was the same Salami Street in this strange place, then I knew exactly where to go.

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