Chapter Text
Everything was fine, normal even.
“Have a good day at school, hunny,” Dad said, kissing my forehead with a smile, handing me my lunch while walking me to the garage so I could ride my bike to school. Mom was at work already, but she’d be home later. I thought I had all the time in the world. “Yep, bye dad!” The pedals on my bicycle made a sound as I slung myself over top of it, and then I was off.
See, I lived in Arcadia Oaks. The town mom and dad never seemed to leave even after they graduated. Like their hearts were here or whatever they said. Dad had this best friend, Toby, He came around a lot. Especially when mom and dad went out for their date nights, but he always seemed to leave at night and not come back until early morning. I watched him last week walk through the door in some suit of armor before he took it off in our doorway. It was whatever, honestly.Now that I’m old enough to be home alone, I think it’ll make life easier for mom and dad when they go to renew vows or go on some retreat. (They went every year since they got married). They were always back in time before my birthday (September 1st).
But like I said, everything was normal. Why should I be skeptical over Toby? He was my sweet uncle who always seemed to have everything under control. Mom and dad had this other friend who worked in a bookstore too, his name was Douxie. Or that’s what he says his name is. I frequent the bookstore a lot, so I’ve spoken to him a fair amount. And honestly? I just checked out manga or spent my time studying there when I knew my grandma and grandpa were over, saved me the cheek pinching and cooing for another time. Douxie helped me with homework sometimes when the shop was slow, but lately it’s been picking up with the school season just starting up again, and everyone needing their books. Mom’s parents came over often too, just her mom was busy being a council woman sometimes.
I was a freshman in high school this year, and it was your average day of school. Palchuk Jr shoving people into lockers like mom and dad said their father, Steve, did in their years of school. The popular girls grouping, waiting to choose which new freshman they wanted to kidnap for their clique, and everyone else spanning out. I didn’t really talk much, mom and dad spoke enough for me, and yet the Palchuk kid kept following me around, he had been since we first went to the same school. Dad said Palchuk spent a while in a different country so his kids sound different, all of them were the same age for some reason, but I never really tried to understand because it’ll confuse me more than I really want to be. I think his name was Eli or something, I don’t know because again, I never cared to learn. He tried to stalk me when I wandered around the school, and every time I noticed him out of the corner of my eye he’d run away.
It was a ritual at this point, he found all the spots he could “hide” and I find him. He was cute, I’ll give him that, but he’s your standard everyday bully. To fit in or something. Sometimes I think it’s endearing when I’m stressed over grades, but he never stays long enough for me to ask if he understands the math homework. So then I ask Douxie.
I sit down in math, my teacher jittering on some strange coffee she’d drank before, writing her name on the board for all of us freshman entering Algebra I. “Hello everyone! After Ms. Janeth’s sad retirement, I’ve come in her place! My name is Ms. Unn. Anyhow! Let’s get started with the syllabus!” She was overly excited to be teaching a group of unhygienic, idiotic and loud freshmen at 8 AM. I was personally an artsy person, I preferred English anyhow.
And here is when my normal day started to come to an… awkward halt. There were glitches happening around Arcadia, why? I don’t know, it was just some fun thing our weird town threw at us. We did have a history of trolls back in the day.
I was half asleep, leaning against my hand, blinking hard to stay awake as I tried to fight the glare I was about to give to Eli. He was extra annoying this morning, of course he was, it was a new school year. And I hadn’t seen him all summer, which I’d spent in my cool house, watching TV or helping Douxie for a favor from all the times he helped me with homework last year. And then my eyes caught something. Eli was… slightly blue. In hindsight, yes, he was an “alien” by my peabrain standards. But I didn’t really keep my eyes on him, they darted to the teacher, and the board, the glitches starting to get worse. And then I fell out of my desk, hitting some old gravel road.
The sun was out, bright and blinding as I looked up, delirious as I tried to look around– but the sun hurt. It burned. Badly. I had all but two seconds before I was whisked into the dark woods, my sunburn glowing slightly as I looked at it, and then I looked up to whoever saved me and– I was back at my desk, jolting harshly. The burns were gone, and everyone was looking at me. “Now, Miss Lake, if you’re going to fall asleep in my class on the first day, maybe I should assign you a slip.” I blinked, confused and overly delirious as I blinked. Then I felt a hand over my own. “Ms. Unn..? I think she needs to see the nurse. Synthia is feeling really warm.” It was Eli. He’d… never done that for me before. I looked at him, surprised, the teacher cleared her throat and allowed him to take me down to nurse. I just followed, let him hold my hand, my lips quivering as we made it down the hall enough for me to just pull him into the gym. Nobody had classes just yet, it was empty.
“Woah! Are you okay?” He was inspecting me, finally taking initiative. His siblings would definitely make fun of him if they saw us together, and the mental war of me telling him what I saw was… deafening. But would I be called insane? Sent to the psych ward? I swallowed hard, before huffing out a sigh. “Yeah, I’m alright, I just.. Sorry. And thank you.” My voice was hoarse, and soft. But Eli matched it as he took my hands. “You saw it too, didn’t you?” My head snapped up as I looked at him. “Saw what?” “The teacher looks like Ms. Janeth and Mr. Uhl.” His voice was so sure, so distracting it made me pause. For a second I thought he’d been talking about the glitch, but I just snorted. “You’re an idiot.” “It gets me out of trouble sometimes. We should head back though, or to the nurse.” Of course Eli didn’t want to get detention, his dad was kind of ruthless with his punishment systems. I felt the tips of my ears heating up as I looked at him, and then I nodded.
This day would only get weirder, because that’s what always happened in Arcadia Oaks.
By the end of 3rd period, Eli had actually started to talk to me more. We were partners for our beginning project of Biology, which was weird, because who would assign a project on the first day of school? What teacher in their right mind? I couldn’t even say no because Eli sat RIGHT NEXT TO ME before I could go to the one girl that actually let me just finish everything right away and just let us scrape by. Eli sat next to me during lunch, instead of by his siblings, which he used to stalk me from that vantage point. And the glitches had been pretty… still since that morning. Honestly I was just trying to get our project started while he blabbered on about some stupid football thing. Him and his dad weren’t too far from one another. The others were in sports too, taking all of the advantages and such they could get from their father.
Of course Steve Palchuk would fund his children and their sporty nature. But the glare that Eli’s siblings sent us made a chill run down my spine. Why were they so mad? I just rolled my eyes and typed on my computer, trying to start the research, before another glitch tore through the school, my computer zapping from existence underneath my… blue hands? They felt like stone, and the burns from earlier were there. Eli turned to me, his eyebrows furrowing as he watched the slight glitch, his skin turning a vibrant, electronic blue. Another pair of arms sprouted from his body, and then everything went back to normal. “What just… happened?” Eli asked, his voice weary as he looked down, investigating his body with a look that said something over betrayal. I blinked, eyes narrowing at the computer that had just disappeared, then reappeared. “Maybe some idiot magician is joking around with us. Or the town’s supernatural history catching up.” Eli just shrugged, opening the small lunch bag I brought with me. “Why aren’t you eating, Synthia? Your dad packed.. Oh my god can I try some?”
It was just a new recipe dad tried, he really likes to bake and cook. And he always packed me too much, I never finish it and he just doesn’t care and makes me more the next day. “Sure, my dad always makes too much.” Eli split the portion, handing me half and scooting the computer away so I’d have no choice but to eat (which was kind of endearing. But why now was he just becoming like this?), and then took a bite of his own portion. He always had this endless pit of a stomach, honestly. “This is GOOD! Tell your dad it’s amazing.” Great, another person to gush over dad’s food, and it was his old bully’s kid.
The day went by smoothly after that, or as smooth as I could remember. The glitches didn’t happen anymore for a while. Mom and dad were home, yeah, but I needed to work on my homework and I figured, hey, wouldn’t Douxie know a lot about animals? He said something about how he used to capture some in his prime. (It was just a routine for me, and sometimes I don’t want to admit it.)
The bell chimed as I walked in, computer underneath my arm, the rain pouring down. Of course it was raining, why wouldn’t it rain in Arcadia? I took a seat at my normal booth, Douxie coming over to check in, like always. “It’s pouring, Synth. Not a good idea to carry around a computer with you in the water.” He started, sitting down across from me with some books he had yet to put away. “Eh, this place is closer than home is.” “Fair enough, what’s on the books today?”
I made a split decision, from both boredom and exhaustion, to spill to Douxie after I finished at least a slide of the presentation I had to give on Friday. “A stupid presentation about Dolphins.” Douxie just hummed, shrugged, and patted my shoulder when someone walked in. He slid out of the booth, and pointed to the stairs, a signal for me to go wait for him up there so he could help the customer, and so I could be more comfortable. I complied, bringing my things with me as I mentally prepared. How would he take to me saying anything about the glitches happening? Would he be upset? Call me crazy?
“Looking for an additional copy of.. Oh that one just came in. Pregaming the series?” Douxie was sarcastic at the end of that, funnily enough. “Yeah, the uh… girl I like didn’t have it yet, she likes the series, so.. I thought maybe I should get it for her.” I tuned it out when I realized whose voice that was. It was Eli’s. And I’d spent my allowance money already on the manga that Douxie had pulled out. Why would he get that? He didn’t read manga and I’ve never seen him talk to anyone else. I mean, he looked at me like I hung the moon sometimes but there’s no way he LIKES me. I just turned back to our project, Douxie checking him out, and then he came back up to join me at his small chair circle. My computer was on my lap, the slide half done, just needing photos and a little more information, but I took a pause and set it on the foot rest in the middle of the chairs. “...Hey, uhm..” Douxie turned his attention to me, pausing mid-sit as my voice fanned out softly. “Did you see anything… weird… today?” I asked, voice going softer. I wasn’t sure if he’d understand, but Douxie seemed to narrow his eyes. Archie hopped onto the back of the chair, stretching, and then plopping down.
“Weird… how, Synth?” Douxie started, flopping into his chair with a huff, legs going to a manspread. “I mean, this town is always full of surprises. Some even say they saw trolls a few years back.” He finished, accent as British as ever. “I mean… I swore I got sunburnt earlier. Saw an old gravel road where the school was,” My voice got a little louder as I tried to project what I’d seen, what I felt. “Eli saw it too, the school disappeared during lunch again, like some… glitch in time or something,” He paused, blinking, hand hovering over his bracelet. An old nervous habit I noticed he had. “A glitch in time.. Huh?” Douxie exchanged a glance with… his cat… wait did Archie glance back? “That sounds like a pickle, Synth.” He stated smoothly, tapping his chin, eyebrows furrowing. He seemed really… startled. Rattled. Like I’d dropped some huge issue onto him and he didn’t know what to do with the information. I checked the time, it was only 6:10, the bookstore closes at 8. My house is a 30 minute bike ride, and my bicycle is parked in the rack by the alleyway. It was still pouring out, and my phone was almost dead. So, I was in a pickle. Mom and dad let me stay out quite late, really, but that didn’t mean they didn’t worry.
“Hm.” Douxie stood, grabbed some thick book I never knew he had, and began to look through it. There was a huge clock on the front of it, the cover going from a bright golden down to a twilight blue. Stars littering it around the binding and the darkness at the end. And then the book disappeared, a giant earthquake took over the shop, and what seemed to be the whole town… books fell from the shelves around us, ripples in the ground started getting worse and worse. The outside got brighter, older. Half of the town turned to some old village, powerlines disappearing. Like time itself was resetting.
“Shit… Synth! Synthia stay with us!” Douxie exclaimed, my eyes growing heavy. Did his bracelet just light up? Was that magic? I didn’t have time to think, the quakes getting worse, heavier, and then I was gone. My vision going blurry, ears getting a high pitched ringing, before I passed out.
Everything was gone. And I didn’t know how to get myself back awake.