5

  CODY

  Susie was by the drink table, man, she looked good that night. Susie was the kind of girl that no one criticized for the obviously fake shade of red her hair was. She had it in a nice part, bangs going down the side of her face, her hair always looked good. When we were exploring Somewhere Else every girl from a humble milk maid to a duchess would beg her for the secret to such unique and becoming hair. She made a good bit of her share of the gold bringing dye over there as well, to think, a six-dollar bottle of dye netted her over ten grand worth of gold coins that those people would give away for the most menial of tasks. She even got accused of witchcraft for giving a duchess a blow out with a cordless hairdryer.

  We’ve gone back since middle school, but I never really had the confidence to pull the trigger though, been tempted countless times, but it just never felt like the right time.

  “I see some redbull, and I see some vodka, can I pour the lady a drink?” I thought I was so smooth back then, makes me cringe.

  “I think I’ll take a rum a coke, don’t want a headache tomorrow,” she said.

  “Coming right up,” I smiled mixing two rum and cokes.

  “Here, they have diet,” she said, handing me the gray bottle.

  “Drinks up, cheers,” I said, finishing the drinks and handing her one and clicking my cup to hers.

  “So, how’s your friend doing, Christian?” she asked, “Didn’t seem to be too comfortable, kind of janky and awkward, are you sure it was a good idea bringing him here?” she asked.

  “He’ll be fine, let me grab a beer,” I held up a bud lite, “Just need to get some of these in him, loosen him up, come on let’s go find him.

  “Are you looking for that Christian kid?” Brad said, coming up to the table and pouring a whiskey and Dr. Pepper, “I saw him by the lake, hasn’t talked to anyone since you split up from him,” he said.

  “Is he just going to try to wait out the party before trying to leave?” Susie asked.

  “Look, he probably doesn’t get out much,” I said, taking a deep breath, “Come on, let’s help him out, I owe him one,” the three of us took our drinks and made our way to the lake. Christian was standing in front of it, holding a rock in his hand.

  “Hey, Christian, hey buddy,” I came up behind him and patted his shoulder, “I got you a beer, come on man lets get back to the party, you know there’s a pretty cute girl from the band who’s here alone, I think her name is Cynthia, she’s a huge book worm from what I hear,” I didn’t hear that from anyone, I made it up, just trying to boost my new friend’s confidence enough to talk to a girl, “Christian,” I turned to him and saw a shocked look on his face, “Are you okay?” I asked again.

  “There’s something about this lake,” he said.

  “Yeah, it’s a lake, very solemn, very beautiful, great for contemplating next to. So, do you want to go fishing or do you want to hit the party again?” I asked.

  “I’m sorry, I told you, I’m not good at parties,” Christian sighed, “I’m shifty in crowds, makes me jumpy. I just don’t feel like I belong in a place like this, so I thought I would come here, I didn’t want to do something that would embarrass you so I thought I would just stay out of dodge for the rest of the night,” he said.

  “Hey, man, it’s a party, do you know how fast people forget someone doing something embarrassing at one of these things, I heard two people have already vomited, the world isn’t as judgmental as you think,” I patted his back to reassure him, “Come on, here I got you a beer, just take two and then call me in the morning, doctor’s orders,” I said, handing him one of the cans.

  Christian took the can and rolled it around in his hand, he looked over my shoulder to see if there was anyone else, Brad and Susie walked up to us, “Are you okay?” Susie asked, “No one’s going to bite you, come on, have some fun,” she said, trying to reassure him.

  “There’s something going on with this lake,” Christian said, lifting the rock in his other hand and tossing it into the lake, we all watched and were stunned as a glowing, haunting blue line of light came from the splash.

  “What the hell was that, I mean, I’ve had more then a few drinks, but that did not look normal,” Brad said.

  “Hold on,” I reached down and picked up a stone, throwing it into the lake as well, seeing the blue light radiate from the water and then slowly fade.

  “What is this, some kind of radiation, fuck, I think this farm makes wheat,” Brad said.

  “I don’t think it’s radiation, radiation doesn’t glow like that, this isn’t a movie,” Christian took another step toward the lake, “What is this?” he leaned over the edge and looked into the water, seeing his reflection, “Woah-whoa,” he lost his footing, and the edge of the lake gave way causing him to fall face first into the water. Radiating blue light splashed into the air as Christian sunk into the still water.

  “Christian! Christian!” I called out, but the water remained still, he wasn’t coming up. The Lake didn’t even look that deep, it looked like this close to the edge you could stand and be out of any danger of drowning.

  “Can he swim?” Susie asked me, grabbing at my arm.

  “I don’t know, I just met the guy,” I started to panic, “Shit, he’s not coming up,” I wrestled my Letterman’s jacket off my back, “I’m going in,” I said. I jumped into the water and the last thing I remember seeing was this warm, blue light enveloping me. It didn’t feel like I was sinking in the water, it didn’t even feel like water. I could breathe, didn’t even feel wet, I could even see, we never did figure out exactly how time worked in this place, but it wasn’t night, I drifted in this blue light for a moment, then fell about a foot out of the air, landing next to a lake. Not the lake we were just at, not the lake by the farm outside town, it was a different lake, bigger, much brighter and bluer with still water you could even see fish in. After I collected myself from the fall, I pushed myself up, eyes straining to the near sunset sun of the other world. “Brad? Susie?” I looked around as I pushed myself off the ground. I saw Christian, marveling just as much awe at this new world as I had confusion.

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  “Christian,” I ran up to him, “Are you okay, what the hell happened? Where are we? Why is it day?”

  “I don’t know! The last thing I remember is falling in the lake,” Christian said, looking up a great, and frankly quite beautiful, mountain range, snowy peaks, long bright faces slopping down to a great forest that was so green, greener then any woods I had ever seen growing up.

  “It’s beautiful,” Christian said, “We’re not in Kansas anymore,” he said, quoting what I learned was his favorite movie.

  “I don’t understand, it was just night, and this isn’t the farm, where the hell are we?” I asked again, franticly looking around to try to get bearings as to where we were. “Christian, Christian!” I tried to shake him, he enveloped by this place from the beginning, “Where are we?” I asked again.

  “It’s so beautiful,” he said again.

  “Yeah, purple mountains majesty, it’s great, where the hell are we!?”

  “I don’t know, but I like it,” he smiled, a wider smile then I had ever seen him have. Maybe the widest smile he had until- no, we’re not there yet.

  Thinking quickly, I picked up a rock and tossed it into the lake we landed by, sure enough, a line of blue light came from where it splashed.

  “Lake’s glowing, glowing just like the lake from the farm,” I turned to Christian, “I don’t know what the hell is going on, we’re obviously not by the farm, but this could be our way back home, let’s jump in, couldn’t hurt?”

  “If it doesn’t work, we’ll still be lost and we’ll be wet,” Christian said, still marveling at the amazing nature we were surrounded by.

  “Who cares if we’re wet, we’re are somewhere we’re not supposed to be, I don’t know what in God’s infinite design brought us to,” I looked around again, damn that world was beautiful, “Wherever the hell we are, but we should probably leave,” I said.

  Before Christian could respond, we were interrupted by Brad slamming into the ground next to us.

  “Damn, I think my head hit a pebble,” he said, rubbing his brow as he got up. “Why is it day? Did I black out again?” he asked.

  “Funny, we were just asking the same question, I don’t know if you’ve taken a look around, but we’re not at the damn farm anymore,” I held my hand out to show off the pristine, untouched natural wonders of the other world.

  “Susie’s coming, we got about ten seconds,” Brad said.

  “What?” I asked.

  “Well, when you two didn’t show up, I said I was going in, you know I got your back right, remember forth down with 2:47 left on the clock against Robinson, I told you, I got you back,” Brad said, “I told her if I’m not out in ten seconds, it’s all on her,” he said.

  “Step a foot to the right,” I said, already learning about how the crazy rules of this world worked.

  “Okay,” Brad stepped to the side, and sure enough, Susie slammed into the ground right next to him. “What the hell is this!” she said getting up, “I got dirt on my skirt,” she looked down and furiously dusted herself off as I came to her. “Okay, this is going to be hard to explain, mostly because I don’t know how to explain it,” I looked down, looked back to her, “We are, somewhere else,” that was the closest word I could find to describe this place, it was somewhere else.

  “Somewhere else? I thought you idiots were drowning I ruined my best top!” She said, putting her hands to her shirt, “Wait, why am I dry,” she said, then put her hand to Brad’s shirt, “You’re dry,” she lunged to Christian and I, feeling our shirts, “Why are we dry? We just jumped into a lake!” she said.

  “I don’t know!” I said, “We have to jump back in, who cares if we get wet, we have to get back home, this is, this is insane,” I said, looking around at the natural beauty around us, I picked up a rock and tossed it into the lake, another line of blue light came up, “See, glowing, like the lake before was, I’m not pretending I know anything about this world, this place, but I know this isn’t home and if there’s anyway to get home, this is it. Susie, we probably won’t even get wet, we didn’t get wet on our way here,” I said.

  “Okay,” Brad nodded, “I’m with Cody, jump back in the lake,” he said.

  “Yeah, jump in the lake, I’m on board,” Susie said.

  Christian looked like he wasn’t even listening to us, “Christian, come on man, we’re jumping in the lake,” I said, I grabbed his shoulder, I had to shake him, try to draw him away from the beauty of this world.

  “Okay,” Christian said, he still didn’t turn around, I shook him again, and he turned, “Okay,” he said, a bit of bite on the end of his voice as he turned to me.

  We all approached the lake, Susie spoke up, “What if someone sees us, sees us appear,” she said.

  I tried to reassure her, “The lake was pretty far from the party, if anyone’s wandered that far they’re drunk enough to take a piss in public, hopefully they’ll write it off,” I said, half trying to reassure myself as well.

  Then we jumped.

  The blue light enveloped us, no water, just light. We fell the distance and landed outside the lake, dry as a bone just like our first trip. We landed just at the bank of the lake, dry as a bone.

  “I think we all agree,” Brad said, “We don’t tell anyone about this right? If we tell someone it could get back to the government, I don’t want to mess the government,” Brad said as he pushed himself up.

  “Yeah, this didn’t happen, I agree with that,” Susie said, getting up and dusting off her dress.

  “Okay, didn’t happen, you know how to read a room, right?” I asked, turning to Christian.

  “Okay,” he nodded, “Didn’t happen,” he said, but I could tell from his wayward eyes there was no way he was going to forget this night. None of us wanted to remember this night, but God, did we remember this night.

  “I think I’m going to go home now,” Christian said, “Haven’t had anything to drink, I’m good to drive,” he said, leaving us there by the lake. I thought, at the time, that was probably the last time I would ever see Christian save for graduation. It wasn’t.

  “Yeah, home sounds good right about now,” Brad said, “Tomorrow morning, I’m just going to tell myself I had too much to drink,” he said before leaving.

  “Cody, if you want to talk about this, I will talk about this,” Susie said, damn her hair looked good that night, I shook those thoughts from my head, and turned to Christian. “Are you okay man?” I asked, grabbing his shoulder, “Listen, I like you, I got to know you’re okay before you head home, you seemed to be a bit more effected then the rest of us,” I looked to Susie and Brad, “I don’t feel comfortable sleeping tonight if I don’t know you’re okay,” I said to him.

  “I’m okay,” he said.

  “Okay, so we’re going to go home, and we’re going to forget this, right? We all had a bit too much to drink, I’ve heard of this before, shared hallucination, I think I saw something about it while my parents were watching 20/20, nothing happe ned tonight, the rest of us agree nothing happened tonight, right,” I turned to Brad and Susie, pulling Christian to turn to them as well.

  “We just had too much to drink,” Brad said.

  Susie didn’t say anything she just nodded her head in agreement.

  “Yeah, had too much,” Christian said, looking up at us. I wanted to believe him, but I saw this wide look in his eyes, I saw him take another quick look at the lake. I saw him shake his head, “Too much to drink, I can get home, my parents won’t give a damn,” he said as he started to make his way past us. I noticed that he looked over his shoulder back at the lake, more than once, as we made our way back to the clear field everyone parked their cars at, “So I guess I’ll see you Sunday, for tutoring?” I asked, biting my lip.

  “Maybe next Sunday, I just remembered I got something to do this weekend,” he said.

  I didn’t want to push the issue, I wanted to see him again though, I wanted to know he was okay, “Okay, next Sunday, so I’ll see you Monday in english I guess,” I said.

  “Yeah, I guess,” Christian said, his voice dimmed and without feeling as he got out, “Monday, English,” he said, his voice trailing off as he got in his car.

  I never wanted to go to that world again, I never wanted to think about it again. But then Christian showed me something.