This Time Around

one

M adison Pierce thought something might be a tiny bit wrong.

Secondly, a quick perusal of her duvet revealed a colorful and, admittedly, fantastic Sailor Moon pattern, with black Lunas everywhere and brooches from all five seasons of the show.

God, she had loved the crap out of those brooches.

And finally, and most importantly, this was not her bedroom.

Or better yet, not what her current bedroom was supposed to be.

There were no cream, muted hues, and slick lines, and modern, minimalist undertones. This was Maddy’s childhood bedroom in all its flowery galore, its pinkish gray bed and nightstand set, its dozens of Asterix comics and fantasy books, and its plushies and figurines that she had kept even later on.

She hadn’t put on her glasses yet so everything was a bit blurry to her, but everything looked exactly the same. Shockingly so.

She had dreamed of this particular bedroom many times. In her life, she had moved house on several occasions, but in her dreams, this one was the only one that she had found herself going back to. Which, of course, had to be the perfect explanation of what was going on.

Maddy felt herself go weak with relief.

This was a dream. It had to be. It was probably also why she couldn’t see very well. It had nothing to do with her glasses. She had read somewhere that in dreams, things might appear out of focus, and also that the dreamer couldn’t taste or smell anything.

She took a deep breath and let herself relax and snuggle into her warm comforter. Now that she had come up with the perfect answer to her conundrum, she could take some time to appreciate how wonderful it felt to be in this room, surrounded by the things she’d always loved. She felt calm.

And if it weren’t for an imperceptible, irregular flutter of her heart, and a nagging feeling that she was forgetting something, something that perhaps she shouldn’t be forgetting, she would have been able to let herself fully enjoy this.

Except. That flutter seemed to be growing stronger and stronger, her body trying to tell her something, waiting for her brain to catch up.

Her eyes went wide and she sat up so fast she got dizzy enough to slowly lie back down.

Oh no , she thought.

“Oh no,” she said out loud. “No, no, no,” she repeated for good measure.

Her brain was catching up, alright. A dawning realization was creeping up on her, along with the vague memory of a flash of crippling terror, a pair of strong arms enveloping her in a warm embrace, and then... nothing. A black void and then, well, her childhood bedroom.

This was crazy, right? It had to be. Totally crazy.

So crazy in fact that she started laughing silently like a lunatic in, what looked like, very early in the morning.

She knew that at some point all the fantasy novels she had been reading would catch up with her.

Because, come on, the alternative was enough to make her think she should be committed somewhere.

Time travel?

Seriously?

And to where?

Her old bedroom?

Shouldn’t time travel happen somewhere exotic or really ancient, somewhere with an air of mystery maybe, like to a murky forest, with thick fog wrapping around her ankles, where she would come across a gorgeous, tall, red-headed Highlander that would scrutinize her suspiciously and call her lass ?

Or if she was to really go all out, why time travel at all?

Why not, full-on, materialization to some magical fey land, where quests would await her, brooding men with wings would protect her from the sidelines, ready to save her from herself, while she donned excellent form-fitting leathers and mastered all kinds of martial arts?

She sighed, shaking her head. Still down-to-earth and practical as always.

Okay, perhaps it would be more sensible to return to her original assessment. Perhaps she was, in fact, dreaming.

This was all a very vivid dream. Where everything around her felt surprisingly real. A beautiful display of everything good, and soft, and bright, plucked from the deepest recesses of her mind.

And just like that, Maddy felt more grounded than she’d felt in a long time.

Grounded in the softness of her duvet beneath the tips of her fingers.

Grounded in that discreet smell of vanilla and flowers that had always seemed to seep through her clothes, and shampoos, and candles.

Grounded in the realization that she was somewhere she’d always felt happy.

A wave of nostalgia hit her like a brick to the chest. But before she’d had more time to sink further into her wistfulness, a quiet knock sounded at her bedroom door, just before the curly, magenta-haired head of her mother appeared through the sliver she had cracked open.

“Maddy?” she whispered. “It’s time to get up, sweetheart. It’s seven already.”

Realizing Maddy was already awake, her mom smiled and walked in fully, heading straight to her bedroom window and opening the shutters. Early morning light shone through the curtains and bathed the room in the shadowy figures of its patterns.

Ellie Pierce had always been a ball of energy trapped in the body of a very compact woman. Always on the move, always on the lookout for things to do and never one to slow down and take a breather.

Maddy really loved that woman. Probably because she was her exact opposite.

Maddy had always found her comfort in the quiet moments, even as a child.

Being tucked in the corner of a room with her nose buried in a story or picture book was practically an oasis among the chaos that her classmates created in school, or during play-dates she’d really had very little interest in.

But watching Ellie sweep inside the room, ready to kick-start Maddy’s day made her lips tilt up in a fond smile.

Maddy and her mom had always been very different, which meant they both engaged constantly in epic bouts of bickering, snarking at one another, always good-heartedly. They were like two mules butting heads.

Seeing her mom’s reddish hair was startling. She didn’t remember when her mother had stopped dyeing it red and had reverted to her original blonde highlights but it still took her by surprise seeing it again. With time, she had forgotten that detail.

Maddy felt her pulse speed up. She was noticing too many details.

What on God’s green Earth was going on?

Was this deja-vu?

Did deja-vu even happen in dreams?

“Is everything alright, Maddy?” her mom asked, interrupting her spinning thoughts.

“Of course, Mom,” she blurted out, a little too quickly perhaps. “Why wouldn’t it be?”

Yes, why wouldn’t it be, indeed, she mused.

Maybe because she was a 35-year-old woman experiencing a trip to the past in not just the metaphorical sense, but also literally? Waking up in what felt like velvet pajamas and what looked like her favorite cartoon characters?

Maddy looked over to her bedside table, and spotting her glasses–her roundish, metal-frame glasses she was sure she had sat on and broken at some point in her life–she put them on.

Her mom now came into sharp definition, and Maddy struggled to reconcile the image of Ellie in her late 40s in front of her, with what her mom’s current image and age was supposed to be.

“I don’t know, you just seem a bit distracted,” her mom said, looking troubled.

“Nope, just sleepy, that’s all,” Maddy rushed to reassure her, in the hopes that she would also reassure herself.

Yes, she was doing a stellar job at that. Maddy only hoped that she had summoned some sort of poker face because she was seconds away from a spectacular freak-out.

A beat passed before her mom relented saying, “Okay, baby, come eat your breakfast then or you’re going to be late for school,” she said, smiling.

And she left, just like that, with not a single care in the world about the absolute bomb she had just dropped on the thunderstruck child she had left behind.

Maybe Maddy’s hearing was also malfunctioning, along with her vision that had never been the best.

Because she could swear that it had sounded like her mom had said that Maddy was supposed to go to school.

What kind of fresh hell was this? Because Maddy was sure that going back to school when you were already a fully-grown adult must feature in the top three of recurring nightmares.

Along with being stuck in an elevator that’s falling with no breaks, and having to pee while there are only toilets with no doors around.

Maddy sighed loudly and rubbed the frown that was beginning to form between her eyebrows. So early in the morning and she was already mentally exhausted.

Since there was no way out of it for now, she threw the covers off her.

She was going to school.