Eight Minutes

Steve’s car was parked right in front of the school building. Ambling across the grass she had a flash of this happening later in the year. Of Steve maybe shouting, “Come on kiddo! We’re going to be late!” or whatever father’s were supposed to shout. The next shot was of her rushing across the lawn and as she got into the car he would ask about her day and all that junk. She had never had anyone do that for her. She would’ve liked growing up with a fatherly figure doing that. Or even her mother in that case.

Instead Emily got into the car, a navy Subaru that had seen better days, buckled her seat-belt and drove off with Steve in silence.

After about five minutes in the car Steve attempted to make a conversation, “So…what do you think of this weather? Crazy stuff, everyone down at the studio is going berserk because they can’t keep up with the changes.”

She decided it wouldn’t be a good idea to tell him that the world was possibly ending…not yet at least, “Yeah it’s pretty crazy.”

He glanced over at her. Obviously he was hoping that she would make an effort but she wouldn’t give in. Her other step-dads had been the same way too the first few weeks. They would try and make conversation, fail and then proceed to make asses of themselves trying to impress her. It was as if they were all trying to say ‘Look, I’m married to your mother kid. Whether you like it or not I’m your new daddy. Now we can live in the same house and not talk but I’d prefer if we were on speaking terms.’

Steve was doing better than most of the others though. Harold was always awkward, trying to bring up religious “fun” facts at the most random points in time, and Jerry would just keep talking until he realized that he wasn’t the only person in the room. Steve had the give and take theory down to an art. He would give a little bit of something and then expect the same from the other person.

“So,” he tried again, “what’s new in school?”

She could tell him about a number of things. How the bathroom’s toilets were continually clogged, how her locker wouldn’t open with her combination or the fact that she had almost fallen asleep in the middle of science class. She considered telling him about her teacher but vetoed that idea as well, “I think I made some friends today.”

He brightened at the statement, “Did you? I remember I had about, oh what was it, three maybe four best friends in high school. They were the best of course I’m only still in contact with Dawson but that’s only barely.”

“Wait a minute,” Emily got her thoughts together, “do you mean Mr. Dawson? As in my gym teacher Mr. Dawson?”

Emily just couldn’t imagine buff Mr. Dawson being friends with Steve. Steve who was somewhat lanky and contained only two real muscles in his entire body, who had crystal clear eyes and mousy brown hair. That Steve, the Steve she knew, could not have been friends with Mr. Dawson.

“Small world,” she said and turned to stare out the window. They were driving right beside the ocean. Her mind was pulled along different variations of how the sea related to the world. It covered nearly seventy percent of the earth and yet it did nothing but sit. What was truly fascinating about the ocean were the living organisms inside of it. The fish, the coral and the larger inhabitants took only a quarter of the portion. Underwater diving had only recently been discovered. To think that all of this vast knowledge would be lost in only a certain amount of time…it was unfair.

She sighed while staring at the scribbling on her hand. Amaryllis’ number was written down carelessly, just a bunch of numbers put together, while Robert’s looked like he had to physically concentrate to put it down. It was strange. She had only been in Seaside for almost three weeks and it felt more like a home than any other place she’d lived. Even the house, for how cold and distant it was, was starting to grow on her. She would’ve been content to just stay here her whole life…admittedly she would likely get tired of living here but it was a pleasant thought.

“We have about thirty minutes until lunch,” Steve continued. He had been talking about his high school experience the whole time she had been spacing, “What do you want?”

“Surprise me.”

“You sure?” he looked at her out of the corner of his eyes, “Because I can cook pretty much…well,” he added as an afterthought, “I can cook quite a bit of things. You name it and I’ll try.”

She shrugged, “I don’t have anything specific on my mind. I want to meet a couple of people later though.”

“Does your mother know about this?”

“No, it just happened,” she knew her mother wouldn’t be bothered though. Being the successful lawyer that she was she often used to bring home clients or coworkers. They would generally only be there for business but they were the closest thing that her mother had to friends…or at least as close as Emily was aware of.

Steve nodded like he understood, “Would they be coming over to the house?”

She shook her head, “No. I think we’re just going to meet up somewhere in town. Not a lot of places to go you know.”

The rest of the car ride was completed in silence and as they pulled up into the driveway Emily had the feeling of homesickness. She wasn’t ready to meet up with Robert and Amaryllis yet. A lunch with Steve actually sounded pretty good at the moment. Picking up her backpack she got out of the car and entered the house. Taking a left from the garage door she went straight up the staircase and took a right into the closest door…her bedroom.

Since she had only been living inside of the house for a few weeks it didn’t have many furnishing. It probably would stay that way anyhow though. She never was the kind of person to litter her walls with posters or even paint them to add color. All she required was her desk in the corner with her laptop on top of that. She had one bookcase, which was stuffed full from top to bottom, and bedside table that was bursting with even more. The ones on the bedside table were the ones that she read…as for the ones on the bookcase they just sat and collected dust. Things like Jane Eyre were on her table and looked quite well with her turquoise queen bed. Her mother always had a problem with her back and so the mattress had a history. But when she married Steve she’d let Emily have it.

She wasn’t particularly fond of her bedroom, the mattress was her favorite part, and there weren’t any truly personal items in sight. Going to her closet put her backpack in and closed the doors, checking that her cell phone was in her pocket.

“Hello Tink,” she muttered as she patted the worn out koala bear sitting on the edge of her desk. She’d had her for as long as she could remember. Pulling out her cell phone she applied Robert’s and Amaryllis’ numbers to her contact list and set a personal ringtone for each. Opening her laptop she clicked on iTunes and set it on shuffle. Some classical notes escaped the speakers before she heard Steve calling her downstairs. Turning it off she followed the smell of chicken into the kitchen.

“I made Ramon noodles,” Steve said shyly as he set everything up on the table, “I hope you don’t mind. They were fast and easy,” glancing at his watch he muttered, “Where is she?”

Apparently he was waiting for her mom to get home from work. It was funny…but sweet in that dorky kind of serious way.

Emily sat down and at her Ramon noodles. Steve waited patiently for five minutes but then hunger got the best of him. A couple bites into his lunch and the garage door made a banging sound as her mother walked in. She was slightly flushed from the heat, but other than that she was immaculate. “Melissa,” Steve said as a smile of relief passed over his face, “I’m sorry I couldn’t wait any longer.”

She smiled, a tight-lipped smile, and replied, “It’s alright. You said you had to tell me something?”

“Emily here wants to meet a few friends.” By now she was finished eating and looking at her mother expectantly.

“That’s fine. Just make sure that you’re home before five.”

“Ok,” Emily said.

Leaving the room she glanced back at Steve and her mom one more time. She wasn’t surprised to see that he had gotten out of his chair and was kissing her on the lips. She was happy for her mom. Steve was a great guy…he just wasn’t the kind of guy that you would expect to fall in love with Melissa Staton.

Walking down the sidewalk she started towards the one place that the town seemed to center itself around…the boardwalk. It was a continuous street of shops and even a miniature fair. Boutiques, bumper cars, candy shops that street had it all. At the end was a long pier that was usually filled with bikers and groups of families. Today it was vacant, however, besides the occasional couple walking from their house to the ice cream shop. It looked like it wouldn’t be hot for very much longer. A few drops escaped from the clouds and Emily found herself in a boutique that she didn’t even know existed. She brought out her cell phone and texted Amaryllis and Robert that she was at some store at the very end of the boardwalk and she’d meet them outside. Robert arrived within the next few minutes and while they were waiting for Amaryllis they decided sit on the curb.

“So do your parents suspect anything?” Emily asked quietly, “About the weather?”

“My mom has always been a fearful lady. I remember when we were kids, my brother decided that the tree down at the end of our block looked like it needed someone to climb it. He was maybe six and I was twelve. We didn’t tell our mom about our expedition but she caught us as we were going outside. Being the blabbermouth he was he told my mom what we were planning to do. She,” he smiled and laughed at the memory, “of course gave us a long and descriptive speech about what could happen to us. A couple of days later I was walking home from school and the tree was right there so I…” a faint blush grew on his cheeks.

Emily couldn’t help it. She smiled at his growing embarrassment, “You climbed the tree didn’t you?”

His face was near the color of a tomato, “I couldn’t help myself. Anyway, I fell out of it and broke my arm. The cast was blue. I had about a million signatures on it.”

“I’ve never broken a bone.”

He stared at her, “Really?”

“Why is it so hard for you to believe?”

He struggled for words, “Maybe because it’s kind of an experience. Like your first sleepover.”

“I’ve never been to a sleepover.”

He looked at her with incredibility, “You serious? Jeez woman, what have you been doing your whole life?”

She knew he meant it as a rhetorical question but she couldn’t help but take it seriously. Her whole life had been kept to itself. The best friend she’d probably ever had was the person sitting next to her and she’d only known him for about a day. It just never occurred to her to make an actual friend in her life. Well, it did, but the people had never really stuck with her.

“I don’t know,” she murmured.
“Listen I didn’t mean to-,” he was cut off with the appearance of Amaryllis.

“Hey!” she shouted.

Emily focused her attention on Amaryllis, getting up in the process, “Hi!”

“So,” Amaryllis paused, “let’s take a walk.” And with that she headed off towards the steps in the pier. Robert followed her, but first glancing at Emily. Emily’s body finally caught up with her head and started moving behind the both of them. Once all of them could feel the sand beneath their feet Amaryllis sat down. Following suit, Emily sat down next to her and Robert on the other side. “Well, you guys are sure talkative.”

“Yeah well I haven’t exactly wrapped my head around the inevitability quite yet so,” Robert said tensely from her other side.

“I’ve accepted it.” Emily said suddenly.

Amaryllis just nodded her head, “Me too.”

There was silence, different from the kind in the car, but it was still heavy and seemed to consume Emily. She was thankful when Robert finally broke it saying, “I just don’t understand why it had to happen now.”

Amaryllis jumped at the chance to explain, “Well, like we were talking about. Global warming has been worse than ever and-.”

“No I understand all of that,” Robert cut her off; “I just don’t understand why God decided it should be now.”

Amaryllis’ eyebrows shot up, “You believe in God?”

“I believe that there’s a higher being than all of us yes,” he explained, “and if his name happens to be God then so be it.”

“I don’t believe in God.” Emily said.

“I think the theory is interesting enough,” Amaryllis continued, “but I’m not sure I believe in only one creator. I think the Greeks got it right when they said there was a god for everything. But that’s not why I wanted to talk,” pulling out her cell phone Emily saw it was the newest edition to the blackberry family. Logging on to the internet, Amaryllis pulled up Google and typed in eight minute sun theory, “I heard from my science teacher last year that the sun’s light takes eight minutes and nineteen seconds to reach the earth. So I did some research.” Clicking on the second link she pulled up a page from Wikipedia.

“Is that supposed to be the sun?” Robert said pointing to the picture in the corner.

Amaryllis sighed, “Yes. The great big ball of fire in the corner is supposed to be the sun although I continue to believe that it is scientifically impossible to get close enough to the sun to get an accurate picture. But that’s not what I wanted you guys to look at.” Pointing at maybe the second or third sentence she said, “It takes, depending on the month, roughly eight minutes for the light to reach us here. I think that the weather may be strange because the sun, which is composed of mostly hydrogen and a mixture of other gases, is imploding.”

“So,” Emily said trying to catch up, “the sun is exploding from the inside out?”

“Exactly, a chemical reaction within its very core. And if it continues, at the rate the weather is changing, then the moon should be falling out of orbit soon.”

“Meaning…?” Robert said bobbing his head slowly.

“Meaning that we have roughly ten hours before the ocean envelops the entire town. And then the world is gone.”

“And you figured all of this out from Wikipedia?” Robert stated.

Amaryllis shook her head, “No I used a fair amount of equations and mental math which brought me to the conclusion that-.”

“We know the conclusion,” Emily said frustrated, “What I want to know is how this could be happening and not even NASA knows about it. I mean, no offense, but we’re only teenagers.”

“I’m sure they have already come to this conclusion,” Amaryllis said angrily, “But the frustrating part is that they haven’t told the news crews to publicize it. For some reason they want to keep it and mull over the theory. The only problem is I think it’s beyond the theory phase. Everyone on the entire earth is experiencing the consequences. The moon should go out in about nine hours though and by that time the world should know for sure that they’re…I mean,” she caught herself, “We’re doomed.”

“What if I’m not ready to be doomed?” Emily burst out. She looked frantically at Robert when Amaryllis wouldn’t meet her eyes, “What if I want to live?”

“We don’t have a choice,” Robert said numbly.

It finally hit her. Before she just had the knowledge the world could end. And all of a sudden, she had the facts. And it wasn’t only realistic…it was reality.

“I have to go home,” Emily said bluntly. Walking past Amaryllis she felt someone grab her hand. Looking down she saw Robert looking at her with scared eyes, “I’ll call both of you later.” And with that she felt the pressure leave her hand and she ran home.

Upon coming to her front door she heard shouts inside. Opening the door and stepping inside she was struck by how odd it was that the house was dark. With the house being mostly glass there was usually a fair amount of light everywhere. But now with the sudden changes in the weather no lights were on inside of the house. She heard a door slam and her mother let out a final scream before there was a shattering.

Rushing to the kitchen she saw her mother, standing in a navy suit, with a broken wine glass at her feet. “I didn’t….” she trailed off.

For the first time in a long time she didn’t want to say anything. Emily went up and hugged her mom. It was a death grip and after a couple seconds she gripped back just as tightly. Emily could feel her sobs as her mother finally let out so many years of anger and frustration and hurt out. All that time Emily had thought that her mother was a rock, cold and distant. It finally dawned on her that she had gotten together with Harold, and Jerry and now Steve not only for another source of income but for security also. Just the fact that there was another person at home who you could talk to and vent out to was enough for anyone to be thankful.

Carefully guiding her mom so that she didn’t step on the glass, she managed to reach the bedroom where she put her mom on the bed. Checking to make sure there were tissues on the bedside table, she went back to the kitchen to clean up the glass. Distributing the big pieces in the trash, she went to go and get a broom and quietly cleaned up all of the rest of it.

Going back to the master bedroom she found her mom asleep and making soft snoring noises. Shifting a blanket over the top of her, she slowly crept into the bed next to her. The last time she had done something like that was when she was seven and there was a giant lightning storm. She couldn’t remember what city they had been living in, but she remembered waking up and crawling into her mom’s bed. She had snuggled up to her while her mom whispered words of comfort. She had fallen asleep then, just as she did now, and had woken up feeling better than ever.

This time she awoke and her mom was nowhere to be seen. Scared she took a look at the clock. It was almost nine o’clock. Checking her phone she found a missed message from Robert.

Brushing away the drool from the corner of her mouth she hit talk as she walked into the master bathroom. Turning the knob for the tub she found that nothing happened. Furrowing her eyebrows she didn’t hear Robert pick up until the second time he said hello.

“Hello,” she said back.

“Hello,” he said again.

“It’s Emily,” she said dumbly.

“I know,” he said. “I called you earlier.”

“I know,” she couldn’t find any other words. Just knowing that he would listen to her was enough to say anything. And she couldn’t get his face out of her mind from earlier. His eyes just looked so…dead. “What happened to the water?”

“They shut it off a while ago. The electricity’s been a little wonky too,” he added just as the lights began to flicker. She couldn’t hear what he was saying it was all static.

“I’m sorry what were you saying?”

“I said that everything is going downhill,” he laughed.

“Yeah,” she laughed nervously, “I guess everybody’s pretty scared by now.”

“Well if Amaryllis is right, and I know she is,” he paused for a moment to collect his thoughts, “then we only have about two hours until the world ends. It’s actually kind of hysterical,” he said trying to make the tone lighter, “in about two hours I don’t have to worry about math homework.”

“Yeah,” she said attempting to laugh, “And just when I was starting to understand it.”

They both laughed awkwardly, “Hey are you watching the news?” he asked.

“Not at the moment. Hold on,” she walked into the living room. Once she’d located the remote she turned it to channel twelve. The news lady, Kate, was failing miserably at an attempt to make the whole thing better than it was. Saying that it still might possibly blow over, “I’m watching it.”

“My dad says that they’re going to call a town meeting any second now.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that we may very well see each other very soon,” there was a sound on the other side of the line and Robert said, “Listen I have to go. Watch the news.” And then he hung up.

Pressing end she sat and faintly heard Kate go on about how everything would be fine. She was alone, she didn’t know where her mother was and Steve had stormed out of the house hours ago. Just as she was having these thoughts she heard a door slam. Her mom came into the room with Steve.

“Get a coat,” Steve directed before heading into the master bedroom to, she expected, to grab his and her mother’s coats.

“Where are we going?” Emily asked as she quickly slipped on a coat from the hall closet.

“To the boardwalk, everyone will be.” She looked nervously around the house, “They’re going to be setting up a projection Steve says,” she said almost robotically, “The news will be playing. Everyone will be safe once we’re closer together.”

Her mother looked terrified, who could blame her. Steve had probably already told her what the news had not…that there was not possibility anymore that she would survive. That anyone would survive. Steve came out of the bedroom and ushered both of them to the car.

The car ride was silent. Not one sound from any of the living beings inside. The only noise heard was from the radio and it was a news broadcast.

Somewhere in those five minutes it took to get to the boardwalk, Steve had reached over and taken her mom’s hand. Her knuckles were white from how hard she was gripping him. He, likewise, had a firm grip on her. It was sort of brave in Emily’s mind. That even though they knew what was happening they weren’t give up on each other. Her mom was definitely considering running…but she hadn’t yet.

Once they arrived to the boardwalk Emily saw that already more than half of the town had congregated there. The projection was already set up and running and everyone was huddled together. She thought she saw Robert’s face somewhere but there were just too many people to tell.

Abandoning the car, she walked behind Steve and her mom and found a spot with them some thirty feet away from the screen. It was then that she did see Robert…and his family.

She noticed that Robert looked more like his dad than his mom. His father was a tall figure with brown hair and a sharp bone structure. He looked like the kind of man who went on jogs regularly. His mother was only a few inches shorter with fiery red hair and a heart shaped face. His little brother was a mixture between his parents but with slightly darker red hair. They were all huddled together and his mom was holding on tightly to…was his little brother’s name Thomas?

“Robert!” she shouted. His head whipped around, “Robert!” he saw her, said something to his parents before they started following him. She guessed that they didn’t want him to be too far away from them. It seemed like nobody wanted anyone further away than a few feet.

“Hey,” he said as he got up. He immediately took Emily in for a hug and when he pulled away she caught a glimpse of his face. If anything he looked like he was going through immense pain. But there was this new emotion in his eyes…it almost looked like courage. Before she could ask why he hugged her he motioned towards his family, “Emily, this are my parents, Georgia and Michael Gates, and my little brother, Thomas.”

She smiled weakly before turning to introduce her own, “This is my mom, Melissa, and my st-,” she shook her head, “I mean my dad, Steve.”

Robert looked at her funny before going to shake hands with both of them, “It’s nice to meet you,” he muttered before stepping back so personal introductions could be made. Taking Emily aside he asked in a hushed tone, “Where’s Amaryllis?”

“I don’t know. The last time I heard anything from her was when we were all together.”

His eyebrows scrunched together as he worriedly searched the surrounding crowd for any possibility of a chocolate haired girl. Emily took his lead and was just about to say she hadn’t seen her when Robert grabbed her arm and pointed towards the middle of the peanut gallery. There stood Amaryllis and a girl that looked strikingly similar to her. It took a couple of seconds for Emily to jump to a rather astounding conclusion.

“Amaryllis has a twin?” she asked Robert.

“Yeah. We had chemistry last period so when the class ended they would always meet up…I would never have been able to tell them apart if they were in the same class.

She nodded understandably. It must suck to have your identity constantly under suspicion. Especially when after the day is over, you still have to go home and look at that person. But then again….

“Amaryllis!” Robert yelled unexpectedly. Unlike him, she turned her head after the first time and waved. Looking at her sister she made motions with her hand. They both didn’t look too happy but they didn’t seem to have much of a choice. Amaryllis stalked off, angry with her sister by the looks of it. after a few feet her sister glanced reluctantly behind her before following.

“Hey I need to talk to you,” she said pointing to Emily. Grabbing her by the arm she pulled her a few feet away.

“What are you-.”

“I wanted to apologize.”

Emily’s eyebrows scrunched together, “Why?”

“Because I could tell you were getting upset by what I was saying but I just kept on pressing the facts.”

“Thank you,” she said slowly, as if she couldn’t wrap her tongue around the words.

“No problem,” Amaryllis smiled before saying in a hushed tone, “I made a miscalculation.”

Emily’s eyes widened before saying, “What do you mean by ‘miscalculation’?”

“Well you see, I set up an alarm to go off when the earth would end,” she made a funny face while she said this, “But when I was setting it I realized that people closer to the ocean would have a destruction at least an hour before the ones on the mainland. What I mean is that instead of a couple of hours left we only have about…” she pulled her cell phone out and turned it around so Emily could see the screen.

“Eight minutes.”