To My Dearest Roseanne- Chapter 39
"Girl, for that much money, I could buy myself new tyres and a bunch of Japanese stickers for the Kawasaki," Emily remarked.
Roseanne adjusted the stack of money composed of one hundred Po bills and hid it in an envelope.
"Your parents are rich enough to buy you anything," she said.
"Hey, it's not like I was born in the Trump family. Just because they have money, it doesn't mean I get them."
"First World child."
It was Saturday. Roseanne packed her backpack and left her apartment in the company of Emily. Liz waved at them from a window, whereas Robert shouted goodbye as he was cleaning his truck.
"Have fun at the sleepover. See you tomorrow!"
However, Roseanne wasn't going for a sleepover at Emily's.
First off, she withdrew the scholarship money at a post office. Next, she went with Emily to a nearby supermarket. She put into a shopping cart a wide variety of canned food and bottled water. Then, at a military shop, she requested replacement shoes, work gloves, and a compass. Unfortunately, there was no Geiger counter in stock, so she got a regular dosimeter.
"Are you going to visit Chernobyl or what, lady? Ugh," the seller grunted.
Afterwards, Roseanne got rid of a blanket and pyjamas out of her backpack. She dressed in her military uniform, strapping away patches with her surname and school logo. After filling up the backpack with the bought supplies, she strapped the compass and the gloves to her belt, right beside a knife in a sheath.
"I need you to give me your service gun," Roseanne said to Emily.
"What for? I don't have it on me. We give back the guns to Warwick at the end of each class."
"Bullshit. I know you don't give your gun back and keep it in that silly bike of yours." Roseanne pointed at Kawasaki Ninja. "Now, give it to me."
With a loud sigh, Emily approached the bike, lifted the tiny compartment by the seat, and passed the Beretta M9 to Roseanne.
The girl checked the magazine inside. It had 15 rounds. She also placed the pistol behind the belt.
"If someone finds out you have my gun..."
"Relax. If everything goes according to plan, you will get your gun back tomorrow."
"I don't even know what your plan is. You dressed up like John Rambo ready to liberate Russia. Only a headband is missing."
"Will you shut up already? Mount your bike. We're going," Roseanne ordered.
"Where to, General Juzynski?"
"To a forgotten village riddled with electrical poles."
"Ah, shit."
Emily started the engine and off they went on a long journey across the national road.
***
It took them about two hours to reach their destination. Emily had to be careful because it was her first time riding outside the city. To avoid any risk of an accident, she didn't overtake any cars, maintaining a steady speed while sticking to the side of the road.
The bike rode into the field and Emily stopped the machine in bulky, tall grass. Her Kawasaki wasn't a motocross bike to deal with off-road terrain. Roseanne immediately dismounted and looked at the gargantuan poles stretching out from one side of the horizon to the other. They looked as if they suffered no damage whatsoever. The steel beams placed at sharp angles were reflecting the rays of afternoon sunlight. Indeed, it was a beautiful sight. Without hesitance, she put on the work gloves.
"What are you going to do?" Emily asked, but her friend ignored the question.
Roseanne started approaching the nearest pole.
"Girl, are you out of your freaking mind? What the hell are you doing?!"
Emily jumped at Roseanne and tried to stop her. A struggle ensued between the two. Roseanne, being taller, blocked Emily and shoved her on the ground.
"Look, I need to find her, okay?"
"You'll only wind up dead."
"I've got to try. I can't just erase her from my life. Before I met her, I thought I could ace anything and handle any problem, but reality proved me wrong. I don't feel complete without her. Besides, she would have done the same for me. I know it."
"Goddamit, I don't want to see your corpse falling from the sky. Think about your parents. Think about me. I'm your friend!"
"Oh, you're such a friend that would you climb up one of these poles if I went missing? You'll forget about me after graduation."
Shocked at hearing this, Emily clenched her fist and gave Roseanne a left hook right in the face.
"Why are you so damn pessimistic about everything?" Emily cried out. "You don't know what will happen next month or next year. You don't own the future! Wake up and appreciate the present moment. I don't know if our friendship stands the test of time, but I feel grateful I met you. Nobody talked to me in primary school, and here, in high school, I ended up at the same desk as you. Can't you appreciate it?"
Having said this Emily burst into tears. Roseanne stood motionlessly for a while until she put her arm around Emily's shoulder and hugged her tightly.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry, my friend. I got angry and didn't mean what I said."
She paused and hid her face in Emily's hair. She began whispering to her ear:
"You are such a brave, outgoing person. I couldn't have asked for a friend who is more loyal than you. You did so much for me and Cho and I can't thank you enough."
"Shut up," Emily mumbled. "I know I can be annoying at times."
"This quality only makes you the real sigma female."
Emily laughed. "Stop making lame jokes."
They patted each other on the back.
"Whether you like it or not. I'm still doing it," Roseanne said. "If I fail, then call an ambulance. If I make it, then wait till tomorrow evening. If I don't come back, call the cops and say I went missing."
"Jeez, Rosie. There are so many 'ifs'. I don't want to lose you."
Roseanne looked Emily in the eyes.
"You won't. I can feel it!"
***
Roseanne approached the nearest pole and looked upwards. The structure had the shape of a rectangular cone with a wide base that kept getting narrower till the top, which had two wings, underneath them six rows of wires were attached to giant spirals. She was in for a 20-metre climb. There was no ladder, and understandably so, because some drunk hillbillies would get a crazy idea to go up there and only hurt themselves. In consequence, Roseanne could rely only on the aforementioned beams as her footholds.
She turned away and looked at Emily standing in the distance by her bike. Roseanne hesitated for a while, but she looked up again at the rows of wires going through the massive top of the pole. Her hands grabbed the first beam.
She began her ascend.
***
It was difficult for her at the beginning because she had to place her feet at unnatural conjunctions of the beams, which looked as if they were drawn up by a stressed child in a geometry class. However, as Roseanne continued to move up, holding on to beams got easier because they were getting smaller and more compacted. After a few minutes, she reached the top.
The view from up there was definitely outstanding. She was able to see the vast green fields, individual dwellings in the middle of nowhere as well as the skyline of Złotniki Kujawskie in the distance.
"Now what?" Emily asked from below.
"I don't know," answered Roseanne and then added to herself, "I'm waiting for a miracle or something."
She looked carefully at the spirals carrying the wires on her left-hand and the right-hand side. Her ears picked up a delicate humming of the transmission lines. She heard a similar sound back in kindergarten next to an electrical switchgear booth. Her dad explained that wire connectors can emit corona discharge if the voltage is high enough to ionise the surrounding air. Hence, a noise can be heard.
For a second, a thought crossed her mind to touch the wires but decided against it. She was more likely to burn herself to charcoal that way than to travel across universes.
Is there a magic word or something? Or does it just work one way? Roseanne thought to herself.
"Open up, you bastard!" she screamed at the sky, but there was no response.
"It's no use. Come down," Emily advised.
But Roseanne remained where she was. From the ground, she must have looked like a scarecrow hung on beams to scare away not only birds but also airplanes.
She decided to clear her mind. Having closed her eyes, she focused entirely on Cho. She wished to be with her, to see that melancholic look on her face once more, to take her hand and reassure her everything is going to be alright, just like Cho did to her in a dream.
After Roseanne opened her eyes, nothing happened. There was no rain of sparks, no mystical portal to show her the way.
"Damn it," she said.
She started getting down. A few beams below the wires, she heard Emily shouting:
"Holy crap! Look at that!"
In an instant, the humming increased its intensity. Roseanne glanced at transmission lines and, within a split second, her mind was able to register a massive bolt of lighting heading her way.
Then the world swirled upside down and time began running in reverse.
***
Arriving at the field, buying supplies, talking to her mom, reading a note from Cho... Roseanne was re-experiencing the events in an inverted sequence. As she kept falling from the ground to the sky with increasing velocity, the events appeared adequately quicker.
Fighting Cho in the staircase, serving a disfigured woman in church, waking up for school...
Before Roseanne knew it, all of the childhood flashed in front of her, as if someone had broken the playback speed button on a YouTube video. Her memories were gone, the sky was no more, there was only darkness.
Roseanne was about to panic, but the stopover in a void was only temporary.
Soon, an explosion of light nearly blinded her. She noticed stars falling out of a glittering basket of luminescence. The stars looked like pearls shining in the moonlight, but before she could cherish her eyes with their sight, the light engulfed her altogether.
"Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!"
A shot of pain shook her body, she began choking until she spilled some fluid from her lungs. Then, she saw her mother and father tending to her as she was tucked in a blanket. The next thing she saw was a mountain of suitcases. Unexpectedly, a ball of fire blocked her view. From that ball of fire, a clothed monster emerged pointing and shouting at her.
You are a nobody and you'll never amount to anything!
You are a nobody and you'll never amount to anything!
You are a nobody and you'll never amount to anything!
The monster disappeared in a ball of fire and a pavement appeared. Roseanne hit against the solid surface so hard that the impact stirred the street dust.
"Aua!" Roseanne cried in pain and rolled on her side. The sky was back at its place.
Suddenly, a car honked. It stopped right in front of her. A driver, who was clearly Asian, got out of the car. There was a shade of perplexion on the man's face.
"Ige mwoya? Chimlyag?" he asked.
"Dude, I don't know what the hell you are talking about," Roseanne said, getting up.
Comments
Post a Comment