Society Dysfunctional

2. Note to Self

Chapter 2 - Note to Self

Emma

When I wake up, it looks like fall has arrived too early for a summer morning. Crawling across the tangled sheets to the only source of light in the room—the window—I gaze outside to find the trees already shedding their leaves and people in thick coats taking their dogs for walks. Judging by how the branches shiver, the wind outside must be howling. I wonder if Dad had moved us into a different hotel room while I was asleep, because I don’t remember being here.

Rolling off the bed, I stretch in the barely-illuminated darkness, trying to remain as quiet as I can so as to not wake my father. But as soon as I begin to change, pulling my baggy blue shirt over my head, the door flies open and the light flicks on.

I scream instinctively, clutching the shirt to my chest and thinking it’s Dad, but it’s only a girl. Flaming red hair that cascades down to her shoulders, narrowed eyes that go up at the corners like crooked smiles, and a smattering of freckles dancing across her nose. Presently her expression is surprised, eyebrows raised nearly to her hairline. It’s almost comical—I would have laughed if she weren’t a stranger intruding our room.

“Emma!” the girl laughs and I wonder how she knows my name, “You’re up early.”

“Do I know you?” I ask, still pressing the soft material of my top close to me.

She frowns now, then sighs. “Crap, you’re forgetting again.”

“Forgetting what?”

She ignores my question. “Do you know your name?”

“Of course I do. My name is Emmeline Holt. But my friends call me Emma.”

“Good. What’s the date?”

I bit my lip, thinking. “July 17,.”

“Wrong,” Redhead leans against the doorframe, crossing her arms and one leg over another at the ankle. “It’s November 21.”

“No, it isn’t. When I fell asleep last night, it was July 16. I checked my phone.”

“And where is this phone?”

I look around, searching for the little bedside table, where I had placed the phone next to the alarm clock. But I’m in a completely different room. It doesn’t even look like a hotel room. Just two twin beds pushed against two opposite walls. I see posters of Hollywood stars on the wall of the other bed. I recognize almost all of them. Brad Pitt. Sarah Jessica Parker. Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Susan Sarandon. Natalie Portman. Where’s Dad? Did he leave me here? Was he getting sick of having to take care of me so left me here with this strange girl?

Realizing the phone is not here, my hands instinctively reach into my pockets, but come up with nothing.

“I thought so,” the girl at the door says a little smugly, stepping in. I skitter backwards nervously. “This is my room, too, you know. I’m not invading any privacy. Sheesh.” She kicks the door behind her closed before moving over to her bed. “There. You can change in peace now.”

Still, I make sure that her back is fully turned to me—digging through her huge Nike bag—before I tug the shirt back on again. It would just be awkward, having to change into other clothes, which I also have no idea where they are, in front of someone I don’t know. My mind’s still spinning, trying to piece together everything. How can it be July yesterday and November today? How can I fall asleep in a car one moment, and the next wake up in a room shared with some crazy girl who somehow knows me?