Hellions of Arcadia

Chapter 27: Alternation

When I wake up, the sun blinds me.

I look down, trying to get away from the sun's burning stare, but I'm met with a blinding white coat of snow that makes it all worse.

"Whoa Max, don't look into the snow."

All of my nerves acted at once. I jumped from my spot to found a circle of 4 other kids around me. I have snow pants on because I'm sitting in the snow. What the hell?

One of the kids around me, a boy, tilts his head at me. "You good Max? Looks like you smoked a whole joint."

Another kid, this one was a girl, laughed. "Right. As if. Max wouldn't take a single puff of weed to save her life."

What just happened? Last thing I knew, I was in my apartment with Chloe, throwing my guts up. My head still hurts.

"W... where am I?" I ask, rubbing my gloved hands on my face. The rough material against my skin made me flinch.

"Yup. Totally baked." The first boy said, blowing dreadlocks out of his face.

"No way." The girl shouted, laughing afterwards. While those two are making fun of me, the other two kids- two boys -were making out.

I look down at my feet. An area of grass is exposed among he snow from where I sat. I slowly return to my seating position to figure things out.

When I sit down, my hair brushes my cheeks, and it catches me off guard. My hair hasn't been long enough to brush my face in years. But sure enough, I grab a fistful of jaw length brown hair.

This... this isn't right. Do I have some sort of phone, or something? I need to find out when and were I am, but these two assholes won't help. I start scrambling in my pockets, trying to find a cell phone. But I don't have any pockets. Who the hell doesn't have pockets?

"Phone... phone..." I mumble, searching more.

Dreadlocks gives me a look. "You don't have a phone, Max."

Scratch the pockets, who doesn't have a phone? It's 2017. Or, uh, is it?

I curse, "then can I borrow yours?"

Dreadlocks grabs his cell phone from his pocket, and reaches over to hand it to me. "In all seriousness, Max. Are you okay?"

"I don't know." I reply, and turn the phone on.

November 3rd 2012

What happened? How did I go back in time 5 years? My powers... they must have acted out on their own while I was praying to get out of that apartment room. I wasn't being serious, I just wanted all that pain to stop.

  Ẁe̡l̨l̨,͟ h͠ow̸ ̷ẁa҉s ̶I͜ ̴s̶upp̕o͟s̷ed͏ t͢o k̷n͡ow ̵that͞?  

'Oh, real funny. Send me back.'

  I̛ ͘c̸an'̷t̶. I ͞u͟s҉èd҉ ͠a̧ll҉ m͟ỳ enȩrgy.̛  

"Dustin, we might have to take her to the hospital." The stoner girl says to Dreadlocks. I can see him frowning from the corner of my vision. Maybe if I call Chloe, or even my parents, I can figure this out. I go to Dustin's keypad and start typing in Dad's number. No answer.

Chloe's number is out of service, too.

Ugh, I guess I'm just stuck here.

I look around at the group of kids around me a second time. There's Dustin, and the stoner girl who I've heard Dustin call Ally a few times.  The two kissing boys are here too, but they don't seem to be engaged on what's happening here. I'll leave them to their fun.