Variable Deficiency

Stranded In Parallel [Chapter 4]

After managing to sate my hunger on some more cereal, I faced down the empty, dreary apartment once again. There was no TV hooked up yet, and sorting the books in search of one I wanted to read was a task for either several people or several days. And despite the possibility of making my mom feel guilty about me doing work instead of resting, I decided to unpack the stuff for the kitchen.

Mom came home that afternoon to all the drawers semi-neatly put away. She sighed and rolled her eyes as I expected, but I assured her that the unreachable upper cabinets were left for her. She forced a smile and set out the food she had brought from the store. “Well, I guess we can just dig in right away, then. Get some real food in us.”

The table we brought with us wasn’t the one from our dining room back at home, but it seemed to fit the space better. It had a few smaller boxes and packing material on it, but I had made sure to leave enough space for us to use. Mom and I still ate on paper plates for that early dinner, one of those pre-baked chickens and a bag of salad. “I hope you didn’t try to undertake all this unpacking on yourself. If I go up to your room and—“

“I didn’t. I was just bored,” I said with a roll of my eyes. “I wonder who lived here before,” I asked randomly, thinking back to the notebook still sitting up on my bed.

“Huh?” Mom said, looking up at me with a bit of worry. “Did you find something left behind?”

I shook my head even though I knew otherwise.

“Drugs or something?” Mom hissed and wiped her mouth, leaning across the corner of the table. “People hide things in weird places.”

“No, Mom,” I said with a huff. “Just… an old notebook. Way back in the closet, on the top shelf. Maybe someone really smart lived here before; it had some math or sciency stuff in it.”

Mom shrugged and leaned back, breathing out the weariness from her day at work. “Well, the landlord didn’t tell me about the people who lived here before. Hopefully, whoever it was won’t miss it. But that reminds me. We can’t go too long without getting you signed up for school.”

I bit my lip and shoved my hands into my lap. “Come on.”

She reached across the corner of the table and grabbed my arm. “Please don’t fight me. You need to go to school. I know a lot of things are different right now, but starting school this fall will get you back into a good habit. Especially now with you getting your treatments.”

“And I’ll be the strange new kid, hiding behind a creepy medical mask and missing class half of the time.”

Mom’s face twisted up before she sighed and sat back. “Everyone is the new kid starting their first year of high school.”

“Not back at home, between the two middle schools and the one high school.”

“We’re not there anymore,” Mom said with a shake of her head. “You used to love school.”

“I like school. I don’t want to deal with the people there. Other kids my age are heartless bastards. Especially to someone different.”

“That doesn’t go for everyone.”

I slapped my thigh. “All it takes is one or two to turn your life hell. But why even think about school at this point, either? I’m going to be sick my whole life. You heard them, there’s no cure. I’m going to either end up kicking the bucket before I graduate, or at best living my life cooped up in bed, plugged in to tubes and machines.”

“Natalie!” Mom hissed, hitting the table. “You know that’s not true. You are getting treatment so you can live a full, happy life just like any other person.”

“What kind of normal person has to live within five miles of a hospital for the rest of their life? Has to shield themselves from other people’s air? Has to take medicine every single day just so they can eat and breathe and get out of bed? How can I ever get a real job? How can I ever see the world? How can I ever find someone who would love me, someone who is perpetually getting sick? Dad certainly couldn’t handle that sort of life.”

“Don’t bring your father into this!” Mom shouted, standing up.

I stood right after her, stomping off into the hall and up the stairs. With a slam of my door, I dove onto my bed and buried my face into the ruffled sheets. I felt my throat narrowing as I huffed and suppressed the tears. Outside my door, I could hear my mom’s feet making their way up the stairs, only to stop just outside. I heard the carpet shuffling for a moment or two before the stairs began to creak again, more slowly.

When I finally caught my breath, I could feel something flat and solid resting uncomfortably beneath me. I tugged it out from underneath my chest and slid it across the bed. I blinked at the black and white splotches in the late afternoon light and remembered what that distinct pattern belonged to.

After getting up and flicking on the light, I returned to my bed, knees tucked to my chest, with the journal in front of me. I flipped through the pages again, simply hoping to distract myself. The drawings were still indecipherable, the text unreadable. Just the writing itself was strange, like it was a part of the paper and not written in pen or pencil. The lettering tapered from thick to thin and sometimes trailed off into splotchy lines.

Kids in my middle school classes would use their notebooks to pass messages or just to scribble on. My notebooks at the end of the year only contained disjointed notes and questions to ask the teacher, as well as religiously scribed due dates in case I was out sick.

I turned to the first of the unwritten pages before deciding on something to write. I rolled across the bed to the corner where my old backpack was hunched over. Inside the front pouch was a hardly-used pencil which I flipped daintily in my fingers. I found myself leaning over the notebook there on my bed with the lead to the paper.

“June… something. I am currently alive. But for how long?”