Janá woke up as she had for the past several months now, in bed, curled up with two others. She'd expected not to. But it was early and she wasn't processing everything clearly. But in the darkness she already knew things weren't… right. Or, no… Wait. They were right, in a way she'd never imagined.
She reached over in the bed and found a small warm body there with her, asleep. She reached further.
"Cam," she whispered, pushing on the shoulder of her partner. "Cameron!"
"What…" the man whispered back. "Janá, is that you?"
"Yes," she answered in disbelief.
The two pulled the covers back between them. Cam went for the lights, but they weren't working. Janá pulled up the small person between them, a child no older than five. Her arms were around the boy in a tear-filled hug as she wept loudly enough to wake him from sleep. It overwhelmed her. Was she mistaken? Was it not what was supposed to be?
She didn't know what happened or why… How many times had she stupidly decided to raise a child, knowing what would happen at the end of the decade, at the end of the turn. But they had to know if their child was meant to be, meant to remain and come back each time. They'd mourned the last three turns, wept so terribly hard. Losing a child like that was perhaps worse. They weren't just dead, they ceased to exist. All pictures, all videos, all refrigerator art just gone.
"Cam- He- he…" she choked on her words. "Dean, he's…"
"Mommy…" the child groaned, slow to wake up.
"I know," Cam said with arms grasped around the both of them.
"The sun's not up," young Dean offered in confusion and a complaining moan, trying to push away the onslaught of kisses and embraces, surely not understanding the sudden joy that overwhelmed his parents that early morning.
Ruby woke up in her bed. The previous night had been… well, it had been like all the nights in the past few months. The elderly woman spent most of them just getting ready for the turn. She'd come to dread the New Year's Day… New Decade's day, as it were. She'd wake up and find that…
But no, he wasn't there. She was alone in her bed just as she was when she fell asleep the previous night.
A hand went to her lips, tears filled her eyes. She smiled tenderly as she patted the place she'd left empty for the past couple years. Her husband's spot. She sniffed as she realized what this meant. He was dead, and he was going to stay that way.
No more would he wake up somehow alive again. No more would he spend six years in pain always pushing away everything, losing his mind as a disease that they could still not cure after nearly a hundred years of learning about it over and over. Well, at least not anything as advanced as Joel's. He'd spend six years just dying again and again. Each time waking up in pain, at the start of the worst years… and she'd have to live with it, treat him, try her best to change the outcome each time.
But not this time. This time he was finally gone. Finally at peace. She cried then, as well, the loss of him. As she had so many turns ago when he died the first time. She just sat there and wept, prayed to God, thanked him for the life she'd had with her husband, for the mercy of him finally remaining at rest. Every time the turn came around, she'd prepare herself to wake up next to him again. But not this time.
She stood and went to the window, looking outside to the still-dark streets of her neighborhood. She heard people outside, likely just now realizing what had happened. And she smiled as she looked upon a world that was finally without her husband
Jordan woke up in his car with a bit of a sore neck. Wait… that wasn't right. He looked down at himself in his car. The sun was rising… he was still in his car… he felt a little crappy but then after drinking last night he expected to. Still… wait.
He went for his phone and saw the date.
He was still a guy.
"Oh, god… yes!"
Jordan's muffled voice was heard across the parking deck's top floor in a triumphant, exuberant cheer. The twenty-something year old man shook in excitement, jumping in the driver's seat before pulling himself out and opening the car door to continue his dance of victory outside.
He was still a guy.
"Oh, my fucking god…" he said, hearing his voice, his deep voice. He looked into the reflection of the car window to see him, his face, his hair… he looked at his arms. He shouted loudly in celebration as he banged on the doorframe. "Yeah! Look's who's still wreckin it! Look at these!"
No one was around. The parking deck was empty as his joyful proclamations echoed off nearby buildings. The sky above him at the top of it was cloudless, almost too perfect. The wind was chilly, and He brushed his fingers through his short hair. Gripped it and tugged at it a little, jumping a bit for joy before the tears came to him and he leaned against the car.
It wasn't like he hadn't been living this way for the past seven years already. As soon as he turned eighteen, he got on stuff as soon as possible. Even if he could be considered a hundred and five years old, every turn he'd have to wait until he was legally eighteen before getting on drugs his parents didn't approve. And they didn't approve at all. Fuck them. They couldn't stand each other anyway after all those turns, and they usually were divorced before the end of the day anyway.
Express treatment for those things post-turn.
No, his excitement was from the fact that he didn't wake up as Diane with long black hair in a room so overcompensating that it was monochromatically pink. He was overjoyed that he didn't experience that again, didn't go through even that short hour it took for him shave his head and to walk out of his parent's house leaving everything behind. Didn't have to hear his mother ask 'Are you going to go become a man again?'
Always was one, mom… just going to look like one now.
Oh, shit. He had just come out to everyone that didn't know. But, like, that wasn't super uncommon that people did before the end of the decade. He'd never done it before. In all these years and turns, he'd never just come out and told everyone that didn't know.
He'd always just rebuilt his life from the moment he woke up in the new turn. But it was hard to do that… harder. People knew who they wanted to be around, knew who was supposed to be where and stuff. Anyone that changed up the way they did their decade was suspicious, but he still managed to get by, to get his stuff, to get on T and…
"Shit, I gotta tell…" he started talking to himself as he went for his phone. "Of course it would be…"
"Phones are still fuckin' out," Liz groaned, kicking some party debris across the rented apartment. It clattered across to the large floor-to-ceiling window that overlooked a darkened city without power in the early morning.
Charles sat on the sofa with a cigarette, his head in his hands trying to push back the incredible hangover he'd earned himself after a night of trashing everything. He was, in a way, surprised he was even alive.
"God, what about all those jumpers?" he pondered suddenly, shock coming to his voice.
"Fuck them, Char… you know what I did last night?" his girlfriend shot back angrily.
"Liz! Steph was one of the jumpers last night."
"Fuck Steph! I'm going to be so fucked. Shit, I'm still not…"
Jumpers were people who killed themselves at the end, right before the turn. Usually doing something glorious and stupid, except everyone expected to wake up the next morning. To wake up as they had done for ninety years already. Even those that committed suicide, were executed, died in any war or from any disease… Sure, the first couple times it had happened most were overjoyed. Some people weren't, like those that had thought everything was over. But the last few times people took advantage of the turn and this sense of immortality to take themselves out in a blaze of glory.
"Can you sit down? You've giving me a headache…"
"I can't, fuck, Char, you know what this means?"
"I can't even think…"
He didn't want to think about it. Finances were going to be out of whack. The power was out. How many people screwed themselves over in the last few months, the last day even? Like he did, drinking himself into a near coma, thinking all was going to be turned back.
"Guys," Morgan started from somewhere else in the apartment. "K's not waking up. I- I can't get him to wake up."
"Someone wake up these fuckers," Liz grumbled, nudging one of the two strangers passed out on the floor.
Charles looked at them and lowered his head again. He'd already checked them. "They're dead."
"Fuck…"
Liz sat down next to Char, her head falling to his shoulder. He put an arm around her. She switched from complaining about everything to weeping about it. He pulled her closed as she curled up into his lap. Yeah, the shock wasn't over… How many more people would not wake up like they thought they would, like they had been doing for the past ninety years? What other mess was there that they weren't thinking about.
Jumpers had been a thing. Hell, no one had worked since Christmas. No one was harvesting, growing any food, planting anything, stocking any stores. Everyone expecting the turn...
His phone went off and he looked at it. An emergency message from the sound of the tones from his and the other phones scattered around the apartment. There must have been more people there than he realized.
"What… what's is say?" Liz asked looking for some good news.
He absently repeated the message for her, but all Charles could truly focus on was the date on the screen. A date that he thought he'd never see: January 1st, 2020/-. The '10s, a decade that wouldn't end, that turned itself back over and over… it was finally gone. The world was free from this cycle. It ended just as suddenly and mysterious as it appeared and no one would likely know why. But he was sure most everyone, despite jumpers or glory hogs, would be glad.
EDIT: some words and a couple typos
She reached over in the bed and found a small warm body there with her, asleep. She reached further.
"Cam," she whispered, pushing on the shoulder of her partner. "Cameron!"
"What…" the man whispered back. "Janá, is that you?"
"Yes," she answered in disbelief.
The two pulled the covers back between them. Cam went for the lights, but they weren't working. Janá pulled up the small person between them, a child no older than five. Her arms were around the boy in a tear-filled hug as she wept loudly enough to wake him from sleep. It overwhelmed her. Was she mistaken? Was it not what was supposed to be?
She didn't know what happened or why… How many times had she stupidly decided to raise a child, knowing what would happen at the end of the decade, at the end of the turn. But they had to know if their child was meant to be, meant to remain and come back each time. They'd mourned the last three turns, wept so terribly hard. Losing a child like that was perhaps worse. They weren't just dead, they ceased to exist. All pictures, all videos, all refrigerator art just gone.
"Cam- He- he…" she choked on her words. "Dean, he's…"
"Mommy…" the child groaned, slow to wake up.
"I know," Cam said with arms grasped around the both of them.
"The sun's not up," young Dean offered in confusion and a complaining moan, trying to push away the onslaught of kisses and embraces, surely not understanding the sudden joy that overwhelmed his parents that early morning.
Ruby woke up in her bed. The previous night had been… well, it had been like all the nights in the past few months. The elderly woman spent most of them just getting ready for the turn. She'd come to dread the New Year's Day… New Decade's day, as it were. She'd wake up and find that…
But no, he wasn't there. She was alone in her bed just as she was when she fell asleep the previous night.
A hand went to her lips, tears filled her eyes. She smiled tenderly as she patted the place she'd left empty for the past couple years. Her husband's spot. She sniffed as she realized what this meant. He was dead, and he was going to stay that way.
No more would he wake up somehow alive again. No more would he spend six years in pain always pushing away everything, losing his mind as a disease that they could still not cure after nearly a hundred years of learning about it over and over. Well, at least not anything as advanced as Joel's. He'd spend six years just dying again and again. Each time waking up in pain, at the start of the worst years… and she'd have to live with it, treat him, try her best to change the outcome each time.
But not this time. This time he was finally gone. Finally at peace. She cried then, as well, the loss of him. As she had so many turns ago when he died the first time. She just sat there and wept, prayed to God, thanked him for the life she'd had with her husband, for the mercy of him finally remaining at rest. Every time the turn came around, she'd prepare herself to wake up next to him again. But not this time.
She stood and went to the window, looking outside to the still-dark streets of her neighborhood. She heard people outside, likely just now realizing what had happened. And she smiled as she looked upon a world that was finally without her husband
Jordan woke up in his car with a bit of a sore neck. Wait… that wasn't right. He looked down at himself in his car. The sun was rising… he was still in his car… he felt a little crappy but then after drinking last night he expected to. Still… wait.
He went for his phone and saw the date.
He was still a guy.
"Oh, god… yes!"
Jordan's muffled voice was heard across the parking deck's top floor in a triumphant, exuberant cheer. The twenty-something year old man shook in excitement, jumping in the driver's seat before pulling himself out and opening the car door to continue his dance of victory outside.
He was still a guy.
"Oh, my fucking god…" he said, hearing his voice, his deep voice. He looked into the reflection of the car window to see him, his face, his hair… he looked at his arms. He shouted loudly in celebration as he banged on the doorframe. "Yeah! Look's who's still wreckin it! Look at these!"
No one was around. The parking deck was empty as his joyful proclamations echoed off nearby buildings. The sky above him at the top of it was cloudless, almost too perfect. The wind was chilly, and He brushed his fingers through his short hair. Gripped it and tugged at it a little, jumping a bit for joy before the tears came to him and he leaned against the car.
It wasn't like he hadn't been living this way for the past seven years already. As soon as he turned eighteen, he got on stuff as soon as possible. Even if he could be considered a hundred and five years old, every turn he'd have to wait until he was legally eighteen before getting on drugs his parents didn't approve. And they didn't approve at all. Fuck them. They couldn't stand each other anyway after all those turns, and they usually were divorced before the end of the day anyway.
Express treatment for those things post-turn.
No, his excitement was from the fact that he didn't wake up as Diane with long black hair in a room so overcompensating that it was monochromatically pink. He was overjoyed that he didn't experience that again, didn't go through even that short hour it took for him shave his head and to walk out of his parent's house leaving everything behind. Didn't have to hear his mother ask 'Are you going to go become a man again?'
Always was one, mom… just going to look like one now.
Oh, shit. He had just come out to everyone that didn't know. But, like, that wasn't super uncommon that people did before the end of the decade. He'd never done it before. In all these years and turns, he'd never just come out and told everyone that didn't know.
He'd always just rebuilt his life from the moment he woke up in the new turn. But it was hard to do that… harder. People knew who they wanted to be around, knew who was supposed to be where and stuff. Anyone that changed up the way they did their decade was suspicious, but he still managed to get by, to get his stuff, to get on T and…
"Shit, I gotta tell…" he started talking to himself as he went for his phone. "Of course it would be…"
"Phones are still fuckin' out," Liz groaned, kicking some party debris across the rented apartment. It clattered across to the large floor-to-ceiling window that overlooked a darkened city without power in the early morning.
Charles sat on the sofa with a cigarette, his head in his hands trying to push back the incredible hangover he'd earned himself after a night of trashing everything. He was, in a way, surprised he was even alive.
"God, what about all those jumpers?" he pondered suddenly, shock coming to his voice.
"Fuck them, Char… you know what I did last night?" his girlfriend shot back angrily.
"Liz! Steph was one of the jumpers last night."
"Fuck Steph! I'm going to be so fucked. Shit, I'm still not…"
Jumpers were people who killed themselves at the end, right before the turn. Usually doing something glorious and stupid, except everyone expected to wake up the next morning. To wake up as they had done for ninety years already. Even those that committed suicide, were executed, died in any war or from any disease… Sure, the first couple times it had happened most were overjoyed. Some people weren't, like those that had thought everything was over. But the last few times people took advantage of the turn and this sense of immortality to take themselves out in a blaze of glory.
"Can you sit down? You've giving me a headache…"
"I can't, fuck, Char, you know what this means?"
"I can't even think…"
He didn't want to think about it. Finances were going to be out of whack. The power was out. How many people screwed themselves over in the last few months, the last day even? Like he did, drinking himself into a near coma, thinking all was going to be turned back.
"Guys," Morgan started from somewhere else in the apartment. "K's not waking up. I- I can't get him to wake up."
"Someone wake up these fuckers," Liz grumbled, nudging one of the two strangers passed out on the floor.
Charles looked at them and lowered his head again. He'd already checked them. "They're dead."
"Fuck…"
Liz sat down next to Char, her head falling to his shoulder. He put an arm around her. She switched from complaining about everything to weeping about it. He pulled her closed as she curled up into his lap. Yeah, the shock wasn't over… How many more people would not wake up like they thought they would, like they had been doing for the past ninety years? What other mess was there that they weren't thinking about.
Jumpers had been a thing. Hell, no one had worked since Christmas. No one was harvesting, growing any food, planting anything, stocking any stores. Everyone expecting the turn...
His phone went off and he looked at it. An emergency message from the sound of the tones from his and the other phones scattered around the apartment. There must have been more people there than he realized.
"What… what's is say?" Liz asked looking for some good news.
He absently repeated the message for her, but all Charles could truly focus on was the date on the screen. A date that he thought he'd never see: January 1st, 2020/-. The '10s, a decade that wouldn't end, that turned itself back over and over… it was finally gone. The world was free from this cycle. It ended just as suddenly and mysterious as it appeared and no one would likely know why. But he was sure most everyone, despite jumpers or glory hogs, would be glad.
EDIT: some words and a couple typos
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