Sara woke with bleary eyes and a foggy head, slumped over something hard. She slapped her hands down, and sure enough, they landed atop her desk. She sat upright in her chair, sucking in gasps of air as if resurfacing from a pool where she’d been on the cusp of drowning.

  She felt her torso, running her hands beneath her blazer and over her shirt. It was fine. Perfectly fine. No road sign thrust through it or her stomach. No cold piece of metal stuck in place, refusing to move as the life drained out of her. Her fall during the earthquake had been instant. One quick bash to the head. But the aluminum pole, it had lingered, and she could still feel it, a phantom clone jammed right through her.

  Sara doubled over, legs curled to the bottom of her chair, groaning as she hugged her healthy, whole, completely mad body.

  ‘Sara? Is everything alright?’

  Sara lifted her head. Mr Graham had paused his chalk on the board, staring with a slightly put-off look. He wasn’t the only one. The whole class was looking at her.

  ‘Do you need to see the nurse?’ Graham asked.

  ‘She needs to see a psychiatrist.’

  Sara stood, curling her fingers against the desk. She didn’t care about Tracy’s bitchy comment, or the girls sniggering at it. Here she was, waking up for the third time that day after dying, twice, and everyone was acting as if all was completely normal. Oblivious to the inevitable chaos heading their way. Why was she the only one who had to put up with this crap?

  Sara stormed towards the exit, shooting a glare at Kyle as she passed, who gave her a condescending smirk.

  ‘Sara, you have to ask for permission to leave,’ Graham called, bored by his own admonishment as Sara opened the door. It was amazing how different he was when calm. ‘There’ll be trouble if you go.’

  There’d be trouble no matter what she did. That was the problem. Sitting in class waiting to die wasn’t going to solve anything.

  Sara walked down the corridor and out the front door, ignoring the receptionist’s shouts as she stepped into the courtyard. She shielded her eyes under the full assault of the sun’s rays, squinting at the blue void above with not a single cloud in sight.

  The weather had changed again. Was it back to normal, the same spring day before all of this started? Could she even recall what that day had been like? The whole morning before waking at her desk still felt fuzzy to her, an extra piece of a puzzle that didn’t quite fit.

  The rumble of cars outside the school carried on as normal. The panicked drivers and standstill traffic she’d seen twice before weren’t here yet. No one was freaking out. It really was just her, waking like this over and over again. Sara glanced at the road sign outside the school gates, the couple in their triangle reattached to the ground via the wicked pole. Seeing that pissed Sara off even more.

  She marched across the road, ignoring the honk of a taxi, and arrived at the park opposite her school. Calling it a park was generous. It was basically an overgrown square of grass with a disused fountain in the middle. She strode to the middle of the grass, scuffing her black leather shoes on the dirt. Looked around the park, feeling the anger begin to ebb out of her.

  There was no cloaked figure lurking in the shadows. He’d said to come find him, but where was she meant to look? Did she have to wait until a quarter past twelve for the chaos to resume? Sara was rather keen to meet him and end all this before she was dropped, impaled, crushed, or whatever fresh end awaited her. Just thinking about it got her all riled up in a way she hadn’t felt for months.

  ‘Well?’ Sara shouted, stomping her foot on the grass. ‘Here I am! So why don’t you come out and tell me why you’re putting me through this crap?’

  Her words echoed around the empty space, fading with the weak spring breeze. Sara stood there, feeling petulant and stupid for having yelled at a bunch of bushes. The sun continued to beat down on her raised shoulders, making her skin hot under the uniform’s layers.

  What was she meant to do? Go hang out with old man Ben and wait for the cloaked weirdo to appear? Hopefully Ben wouldn’t bring up his mortgage again.

  Sara turned back towards the road.

  ‘I was starting to think you would never ask for me.’

  Sara stopped mid-step. The words had come from directly behind her, but there had been no one there a second ago. And that voice. It wasn’t the other-worldly echo that belonged to the cloaked man.

  Sara turned. Raised her eyebrow. There was a young woman, a similar age to herself, standing by the dry fountain. A strange sight at this time of day. Sara scanned the woman’s baggy grey hoodie and indigo jeans. Maybe she was an unemployed drifter, sulking around public parks until something interesting happened.

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  The woman smiled at her, a sly, knowing grin, that made Sara automatically back up a little. Why did she look so familiar?

  ‘Hello, Sara,’ the woman said. Sara suddenly felt cold despite the fierce sun, although she had no idea why. She’d obviously met this woman before. Still, she found the voice upsetting. A grating octave too high for her liking.

  ‘Hi,’ Sara awkwardly replied. ‘Sorry, have we met before?’

  The woman scoffed. ‘Of course not. But you asked for me, so, here I am.’

  Sara narrowed her eyes. Those clothes. They reminded her of something. ‘Do you have anything to do with these…these disasters?’

  The woman rolled her eyes. ‘Duh.’ She stuffed her hands into the hoodie’s pockets, rocking back and forth on her heels. Sara stared at the stain on top of the pocket. She recognised it, from the time she’d been sitting on her sofa at home and had spilt a glass of cola over herself. And those jeans, they had the exact same rips as the pair sitting in her bedroom.

  ‘Oi,’ Sara said, pointing at the woman. ‘Those are my clothes. Did you rob me?’

  The woman stopped her rocking, staring at Sara with a baffled look. Then she giggled. ‘Oh, Sara. You’re funny, you know? Here we are, the world about to end, again, and all you care about are some clothes. And no, I didn’t steal them. I made them.’

  Sara resisted the urge to take another step back. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but there was something wrong with this woman, just like the cloaked man. ‘Are you with him?’

  ‘Me? I’m not with anyone. I’m all alone.’ The woman raised her hand, making a sweeping gesture towards Sara. ‘Just like you.’

  Sara shook her head. ‘You don’t know anything about me.’

  The woman finally stopped smiling. ‘I know everything about you. How could I not?’

  She took her other hand out of her pocket. Raised both arms.

  Sara gasped, stumbling and falling backwards onto her bum as the woman’s clothes began to move, cuts of denim and cotton unravelling from the jeans and hoodie. They slithered and writhed over one another, like a colony of snakes entwining themselves together. Sara squinted, unable to look away, as light shimmered from the gaps in the fabric stitching itself back into one piece over the woman’s body. The light spread as the material morphed from blue and grey, to white and gold, until everything settled down again.

  Sara stayed motionless on the ground. Stared up at the woman now dressed in white robes with a golden belt and cuffs. Even her hair had changed, the dark blonde locks twisted into a braid that draped over one shoulder.

  The woman twirled in her new robes. ‘Ta-da! I made that a little more dramatic than it needed to be. What do you think?’ she asked, adjusting the laurel wreath in her hair. ‘A little tacky?’

  ‘W-w,’ Sara stuttered, unable to finish the word.

  ‘Come on Sara. That’s not much of an answer.’

  ‘Who…who are you?’

  ‘Jeez, is it not clear yet? I’m a god.’

  No. No, she couldn't be.

  ‘What’s this?’ The woman asked, placing a hand on her hip. ‘Why are you shaking your head?’

  ‘You might be a really, really good magician, but you’re not a god,’ Sara said, lifting herself from the dirt. ‘I don't even know if there is a god, but if there was, they wouldn't look like…like…’

  ‘Like you?’

  That was right. The woman did look a lot like her, except not quite the same.

  ‘If it makes you feel easier, you can call me Rara.’

  ‘Rara?’

  ‘Yep. I already took your appearance and made a few improvements. Might as well do the same with your name.’

  Improvements? Now that the robed woman, Rara, had pointed it out, Sara couldn’t unsee it. She scanned Rara’s body again, the tight-fitting toga revealing a lot more than the casual wear of before.

  She took in Rara’s slimmer frame, shorter height, and larger chest. Even the hips were wider, her muscles more toned, and cheekbones higher than Sara’s. The more she looked, the more Sara realised Rara hadn’t missed a single aspect that she had always hated about herself, after countless nights spent in front of the mirror. The fuller lips and smaller forehead she’d always wished for. The flawless, tanned skin and blonde hair she’d secretly craved, this bitch had gone ahead and taken everything. Transformed all of Sara’s deepest insecurities into a gift for herself.

  ‘Well?’ Rara asked, placing her hands behind her back and leaning forward. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘How did you know? Did Tracy put you up to this?’

  ‘Tracy? Give me a break, Sara. My goodness, you have no appreciation for the work I did. It took me ages to perfect you.’

  That stung.

  ‘Screw you.’

  Rara’s smile tightened, her eyes narrowing ever so slightly.

  ‘Careful Sara. That's no way to speak to your owner.’

  Sara laughed in disbelief. ‘My owner? You are one delusional cow.’

  ‘Am I really?’ Rara frowned. ‘You've been naughty Sara, and now it’s time for some punishment.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Oh, I see. You don't remember.’

  ‘Remember what?’

  Rara started to walk towards her, raising her hand. Sara’s legs suddenly felt weak as she approached. The woman was clearly not right in the head, making up stuff like this, but Sara refused to run from this nutjob.

  ‘I’m not scared of you.’

  Rara paused mid-step, only a metre or so from Sara. At this distance, Sara could see a strange movement in Rara’s eyes, as if her irises were slowly rotating around her pupils. Rara cocked her head, the movement unnervingly slow.

  Sara gasped as Rara’s clothes started to change again. She’d convinced herself the first time had been a fancy trick, but was anyone capable of doing that twice?

  As the new clothes started to weave and form a crisscross pattern across Rara’s body, Sara realised things were even worse than she’d imagined. She felt an icicle stab its way through her heart as she recognised the red tartan of her pyjamas. The same from yesterday evening. The night she’d dismissed as an out-of-control nightmare.

  Rara lifted her hand and Sara’s gaze followed the movement. She barely registered the sound of screeching tyres behind her as Rara’s hand gripped the object wrapped around her neck. The icicle in Sara’s heart melted, its freezing water coursing through her veins. She tried to pull away, but her body wouldn’t move.

  The world seemed to tilt, her vision shrinking as Rara leaned in, her breath warm against Sara’s ear. ‘I’m not the one you should be scared of,’ she whispered, her voice soft, almost kind. ‘The only person to be scared of, is you.’

  And with that, Sara’s mind wound back to where this had all started. Three days ago.