Mornings. They can be good or bad. Sometimes you wake up totally wide-eyed and ready for the day, not feeling an ounce of sleepiness. Others, your eyes refuse to open and you just know that you'll be tired all day long. This particular morning started off like one of the latter types.
When I woke up from another night of dreamless sleep, I found myself sitting hunched over with my head buried in my arms, my eyes crusted shut. I didn't bother trying to open them yet, knowing from experience that the sand in my eyes would try to attack my eyeballs. Waiting a few minutes to wake up a little more, eventually I lifted my head a little bit to start digging the sand from the corners of my eyes. Still groggy, I opened my eyes just a crack, only to pause.
Through my eyelash-shrouded vision I could make out something dark gray in front of me, the blurry object unfamiliar to me. As I lifted my face a little more I saw trees, only adding to my confusion. My brain was still a bit foggy from just waking up, but I was relatively sure this wasn't where I'd fallen sleep. Frowning, I rubbed my eyes one more time before opening them fully so I could take in my surroundings. Once I did, I quickly realized I was in the passenger seat of some car parked facing some woods.
Yeah, I definitely did not go to sleep here.
Confused about how I got here, I suddenly froze as I heard a small grunt next to me, my blood running cold. Slowly I turned my head to the side, my eyes widening as I saw a male figure sitting in the driver's seat next to me, head buried in his arms and leaning against a pillow on the wheel. Crap. Instincts kicked in and I grabbed the handle of the door, but despite tugging it wouldn't open. Panicking, I tried a couple more times before finally noticing the lock was down.
Just as I pulled the lock up, I heard the man grunt again followed by the intake of breath that accompanies yawns. "What the... where... whuh..." His voice was somewhat quiet, sounding groggy and slightly confused—kind of like how I felt. Not that I cared. I was just about to open the door when he spoke again. "What the—who are you!?" I froze as his voice suddenly rose in pitch, a chill running down my spine.
Every instinct in my body screamed at me to run away now, but for some reason I didn't. Gulping, I instead slowly turned my head to face him and locked gazes with a pair of brown eyes. Within seconds they quickly widened in surprise, the man's face instantly mirroring my own expression of disbelief. "(N-Name)?" he whispered, his voice coming out as a stutter.
"Tim...?" I whispered back.
For a moment we just stared at each other, too stunned to speak. Maybe it was just the grogginess, but the whole scene felt surreal. It felt like just a few days ago we'd agreed to never meet again—in fact, I knew it was—but now here we were, sitting in a car staring at each other. Tim's face, slightly more rugged than I remembered, reflected my current confusion at this turn of events. As we sat there the pillow which had been resting on the steering wheel slid onto Tim's lap, the gentle thud apparently the perfect catalyst to break the spell of silence.
"What the hell is going on?" he blurted, his voice quickly rising in pitch. "Where are we? Didn't we promise to never meet again!?"
"How should I know!?" I snapped back, my own voice quickly rising as well. "I've never seen this place before! You're the one in the driver seat, isn't this your car?!"
"Hell no! I've never even seen this kind of car before!" I frowned and turned to face him more fully, only to feel some sort of weight shift against my thigh. Automatically my gaze snapped downwards, and I froze as I saw I was wearing a plain (f/c) t-shirt and khaki shorts, both clean and new-looking.
"What the—this isn't what I was wearing when I went to sleep! I don't even own any clothes like this! When did I—" Snapping my head upwards, my eyes narrowed as I glared at Tim. "Tim, I swear to god, you better not have—"
"Hey, don't look at me!" he interrupted, quickly raising his hands. "I'm just as confused as you are!" Frowning, I kept a wary eye on him as I reached into the pocket of my shorts to see what was in it, only to freeze as I recognized the familiar shape in my hand. My heart skipped a beat as I pulled out a smart phone, unable to believe my eyes.
"When the hell did I get a cell phone!?"
"How the heck would I know!? Is it even yours?" Given I didn't even have the money to buy a cell phone I felt he had a point, so I pressed the button on the side to rouse it from sleep mode. The screen lit up with a locked screen requiring a four-digit code... with a photo of me as the background. Well. That answered that.
"...What the hell is going on!?" I yelled, getting more freaked out by the second. We were in totally unfamiliar surroundings, I was wearing clothes I didn't even remember owning, neither of us knew where this car came from, and now to top it all off I apparently owned a cell phone. That or the phone belonged to a stalker, but something told me that wasn't the case.
"Okay, calm down," Tim muttered to himself as I stared at the phone, clutching at his hair. "Just calm down, deep breaths, don't freak out, there's no reason to panic..." He trailed off and took a few deep breaths, clearly trying to calm himself so he could assess the situation.
Then we heard a grunt from the back seat.
Immediately we twirled our heads around to look behind us, and my heart skipped a beat as I saw a familiar figure in a faded golden sweatshirt sprawled across the seat. Hoody. As we watched in shock he slowly sat up, rubbing his head with a small groan, only to freeze and slowly turn to look at us. For a moment, none of us moved and just sat in silence, staring at each other.
Then all hell broke loose.
"WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON!?" Tim shouted while Hoody scrambled to sit up. Flinging open the back door, he barreled out of the car while Tim fumbled with his own door. Since mine was already unlocked I quickly threw it open and ran out, chasing after Hoody as he ran into the woods. However, I only got three steps before sharp pain shot up the soles of my feet, making me yelp and stop.
"SON OF A—" I cursed at the top of my lungs as I looked down to see we were parked in a rocky lot, small gray rocks substituting pavement that usually accompanied this place. And of course, I just happened to be barefoot. Cursing, I looked up just in time to see Hoody disappear into the trees. At this point Tim finally got the door open and ran towards the woods, chasing after him. Unlike me, he was lucky enough to be wearing boots.
Hobbling back to the car, I slid into the seat and quickly looked around for shoes I could wear. None on the floor in front of the seat, and a glance at the back revealed none there either. Great. More than a little desperate, I quickly tried the glove box only to find it locked because of course it was, this was just one of those days. Groaning, I sank back into the seat and just stared at the roof in pure silence until Tim eventually returned.
"Any luck?" I muttered, not glancing at him. His sigh was all the answer I needed. Grim silence fell over us as we each fell deep into thought, staring out at the unfamiliar expanse of trees in front of us. All of this was so sudden, giving an unreal edge to what was undoubtedly reality. There was no point questioning if this was a dream, the pain from trying to run on the gravel was proof enough for me. Eventually, I got tired of thinking about it and spoke up. "Tim?"
"Yeah?"
"Do you have any idea why Hoody was in the back seat?"
"Not a damn clue."
"Good, 'cause I don't either." We both sighed and sunk further into our seats, growing more dismal by the second.
"What time is it even, anyway?" Tim mumbled, getting out his phone, only to pause. "...Okay, (Name), what day was it when you went to sleep?"
"I don't know, I don't exactly keep track of time," I grumbled. "May, I guess? Why?"
"According to my phone, it's now July." I froze, staring at him in shock.
"...July?" I repeated dumbly, and he nodded.
"Yep. July 17th." I didn't respond, just stared at him with my jaw hanging open. I may not keep track of dates that much, but I knew for a fact that it was not July when I last went to sleep. I also knew I was not sleeping in a car with Tim, and that Hoody was not there, and that I didn't have a freaking cell phone.
"...Okay, what the hell happened?" Tim just groaned and set down his phone on the dashboard, pressing his fingers between his eyes.
"Wish I could claim I was just as confused as you, but... I think I have an idea. Something similar happened to Jay before."
"Jay..." I trailed off, gears turning in my head. "Wait, are you talking about the 'missing seven months'?"
"Yep, pretty much." Marble Hornets was divided into three "seasons", and between the first two was a seven-month gap which Jay couldn't remember. The second season kicked off with him waking up in a hotel he didn't recognize wearing a camera strapped to his chest, and the season mostly followed searching for tapes from that time so he could figure out what happened.
"And you're saying... the same thing happened to us?" I asked slowly, my stomach sinking.
"Hey, the last I remember, it was early May," Tim pointed out. "There's a two-and-a-half month gap in my memory now—and clearly yours, too—and given the circumstances, well..." He trailed off, letting my imagination finish for him. I knew where he was going. If it were just one of us, I could have written it off as normal amnesia, but both of us? And in this situation?
"We didn't get away, did we?" I asked grimly, and he shook his head.
"We've been pulled back into Marble Hornets."