A Walk Through Dimensions

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Chapter 1

Emily was happy. 

At least that's the word that she used when asked.

 And she was asked. 

Constantly. 

At least once a day.

 Whether it be by her neighbor, Dan, who she regularly passed in the hallway, or by the insanely chippy girl at Starbucks who always seemed to be jovial whenever she announced her name to the crowd of sluggish coffee drinkers. 

Coworkers. 

Friends. 

Family. 

It just went on and on. 

She answered the exact same way every time. So much that it had simply become instinct. 

An instant response of yes, insert random name here, I am happy.

It got old rather quickly. 

She knew that she was depressed. It hadn't manifested itself into a more physical form yet. Just the occasional mood swing. The occasional shitty day. The occasional week of not wanting to leave her apartment. 

She knew that it wasn't severe though. Severe would be constant thoughts of harming herself. 

She was not at severe yet. 

She seemed to be getting closer to the idea of taking a pill for it. However being chained to an orange prescription bottle didn't appeal to her in the slightest. 

She had the freedom to do anything she wanted right  now. If she admitted defeat and got a pill, she would always be thinking about it. I know the bottle says "Take one",  but today feels like it might require two.  Maybe three. She could fall into the abyss. Couldn’t she? Emily didn't want to think about it. So she didn't take pills. 

Instead she tried going for walks. Every day after work. Just a brisk walk around the nearest park. About one and a half miles. Emily liked to believe that it worked. That was where she found herself today. Walking at the equivalent of a slow snail's pace, while studying the intricacies of the park fountain. It was one of those pointlessly complicated ones. The kind designed to take your mind off of things. Streams of water would shoot upwards and towards the center in upwards then colliding, and as one, slowly descending into the large pool of water at the base. She spent a few minutes staring at it until subconsciously she had memorized the timing. Emily sighed and continued her laborious trek back.  Closer to the building, she noticed a mother playing with her son. He appeared to be about four years old, too young to be in school. He was laughing as his mother chased him around just a few feet behind him with her hands extended towards him, as if she was about to grab him at any second. Emily sighed once more and continued the now agonizing trip back to work. She patiently waited at the crosswalk with what looked like seemingly lost tourists. She quickly took out her phone and started playing a game, so that no one engaged her in conversation. A confused looking man in a fisherman's boonie hat suddenly turned towards her. Emily immediately faked a coughing fit until he looked away. About that time the cross signal lit up, and she half-jogged, half-walked to the other side of the intersection. She walked into a seven-story building with bricks the color of desert sand. Emily hurriedly dug for her I.D. badge before she made it to the security desk on the first floor. She contemplated why it was that after six years of working for this law firm, she still had to show her I.D. badge to whatever rent a cop happened to be sitting behind a mahogany desk that particular day. The blue uniforms seemed to be on a different muscle bound former high school quarterback every other week. Most likely because it was a different jackass every other week. Well, that wasn't fair. She didn't know any of them. However, looking at the current wavy hair, glowing teeth Adonis sitting behind the desk, she was instantly convinced that he was, in fact, a jackass. As she drew closer to him, she saw that his name was Jack. Definitely a jackass. Stifling a laugh, she handed him her I.D. The guard studied it for a few seconds, going from the image on the badge to her face, then back to her badge. He seemed to be convinced, because a few seconds later, he slid it in the little RFID card scanner on his desk. She smiled a false cheery smile and walked through the large oak door leading to the upper floors. She walked on what appeared to be a granite walkway, but from the way her  shoes clicked on the surface, it was definitely stained concrete. It led her to a wide waiting area with six elevators. She pushed the single button that had a black illuminated arrow going up. She waited about thirty-five seconds, and started moving towards the nearest one when it made a noise indicating it was arriving on that floor next. She waited for the door to open, and put on a false smile as several lawyers in dark blue and tan suits got off the elevator accompanied by a man with a very large grin on his face. She stepped into the elevator and immediately hit the close button. Normally she waited a few seconds for people to get onto the elevator, but Emily was not in the mood today. She jabbed the fourth floor button with her middle finger, as a subtle FU to the day. She slowly made her way uninterrupted to the correct floor.  The elevator dinged and the large metallic doors slowly edged to the respective sides. She walked out into what she would consider a lobby, this one a slightly different shade of stained concrete. Emily immediately turned to her left and then left once more, so she was about ten feet behind the elevator. She found herself in a corridor, about 100 feet, which was intermittently dispersed with large oak doors that lead to the various lawyers in the building's offices. Emily walked about forty five feet, and turned to the right, where the name Emily Rodgers was engraved on a golden plate about four inches by one and a half. She got her keys out of her purse and unlocked the door. She stepped into an office and was immediately greeted by a gust of cold air. She always made a point to leave her desk fan turned on over lunch. Although she suddenly realized that it wasn't really colder air. Just more recently disturbed air. She immediately regretted thinking that thought. She made her way over to her desk and sat down in a brown leather office chair. Emily sat her purse underneath her desk, and took the time to get her cell phone out and place it next to her computer. She opened her laptop and hit the power button. She proceeded to straighten her desk a bit, while she waited for the password screen to light up the room. The familiar vibration from her phone interrupted the otherwise minute long silence. She glanced at it, and seeing that it was a picture from one of her friends, Kara, she opened it to see a large diamond ring on a platinum band was staring back at her.