My Backward Life (Sample Only)

FALLING SKY

A moment later, she threw aside the bed cover, exposing me to the arctic cold of our house. "Where were you last night?"

"My room is freezing." I yanked the duvet back and curled beneath it, knees pressed against my chest.

"I said where were you?"

"At the gig!"

"What gig?"

"Geez, Mum. The one I told you about at Jackson's Lane."

Her eyes narrowed with an odd expression. "You know perfectly well you're not allowed out on a school night. You're not skipping school because you've been out doing goodness knows what."

School? School! It was Saturday.

I felt shaken, almost feverish, but I had a motto for moments like this: If in doubt, act skeptical and carry on. It was a response mode I'd ingrained into myself when I was twelve. It worked when Leah, Toya, and Rana returned from the Christmas holidays with photos of themselves in bikinis against a backdrop of pine trees and a Caribbean blue sea. Yeah, right guys, I can see it's photoshopped. It worked when Ana Green told me she was dating a married man. In fact, it had been automatic for so long, I'd forgotten how to enforce it conscientiously. But I attempted to do so now.

Mum ranted about how she had enough to deal with without me going off the rails and was it too much to ask for a little support and ended with:

"You've got two minutes. I'll take you to school myself."

Once she'd gone, I switched on my bedside light and stumbled about searching for my phone. My school uniform sat neatly folded on the armchair. I ignored it because I distinctly remembered throwing it in my wash hamper when Chrissy, Rana, and I were getting ready for the gig.

I found my mobile under my pillow and switched it on. The home screen glowed, showing a photo of me standing in a field in a blue jumpsuit, a crash helmet under my arm, grinning at the camera. I had never seen the picture before in my life. Nor had I ever worn a crash helmet. It was when I saw the date though, that any hope of normality shattered.

Thursday 20th November.

Six days after the gig. Six days since Friday night.

SIX DAYS!

The phone slipped from my fingers. Hyperventilating, I staggered to the window, leaned across my workbench to open it wide, and stuck my head into the frosty winter air. Outside, a woman clicked past, coat buttoned up, scarf wrapped tight around her neck. She hurried along, not at all perturbed by the fact that today was Thursday!

I rubbed my face and realized tears were rolling down my cheeks.

Can you hear me? Can you hear me? said the boy's voice in my head.

"Louise!" Mum hollered up the stairs. The high-pitched warble shook me out of a semi-trance. I pulled off my pajama bottoms, grabbed panties from the drawer, and got dressed. I had to find out what had happened on Friday night. Right before leaving the gig, I'd drunk some of Rana's water. Maybe someone had drugged it, and this was a hallucinogenic flash-forward. I'd never smoked pot for exactly this reason. Well, not exactly—not because I thought I might wake up one day and it would be Thursday instead of Saturday—but because I had gone to a lot of effort to be well adjusted.

I buttoned my purple shirt and decided I wouldn't do anything until I'd spoken to Chrissy. My best friend would know how to handle this. She'd know if someone had spiked our drinks on Friday night, and why I couldn't remember.

* * *

A few minutes later, I sat huddled in the Renault with Mum driving. She cut through backstreets attempting to avoid the traffic, which despite four years of evidence to the contrary she still believed was possible. I watched her, fear rolling through me in tidal waves. I didn't dare say anything about what was happening, for the same reason I didn't argue with her when she took me to that psychologist several years ago for sleep deprivation: I was petrified there was something seriously wrong with me.