The Fifth World

Bo: I sit in my bedroom, a smile on my face, it is small but it feels as if it is permanent. I like that feeling. I can feel the pink in my cheeks. The butterflies within me. My heart pounding. Still. Jonathan left twenty minutes ago and I'm still flustered.
There is a familiar sound at my window. I don't even bother to look as Cynric enters. He comes over towards me and sits on my bed. I smile at him.

"That good, huh?" he says with a toneless voice.

I nod my head, "I had a great time, Cynric. Can't you be happy for me?"

"How can I be happy?" he asks me bitterly. I think that's a rhetorical question. I don't dare answer it. I just sit with my mouth shut, my hands in my lap as he sits across from me with an unhappy expression on his beautiful face. "I'm quite furious to be honest."

"You can't be angry with me, Cynric, that's not fair."

"I'm not angry at you," he says sourly, "I'm angry with me, with the government and with the whole world - well, two worlds. I hate the fact that I can't look at you how a normal Angelican should. I want to protect you and watch over you and that's fine. But I want so much more too. I should be looking out for you and trying to figure out whether this Jonathan fellow is good enough for you. I can't help but feel that he's not simply because he's not me."

He has wiped the smile clean from my face. I look away fom him and down at my fingers that are now sweating.

I sigh, "but we can't, Cynric. It isn't allowed. We decided."

Well, he decided.

"And how will it work out? You're going to the Fifth World, Bo. It's going to happen and I don't think Jonathan will wait."

"What makes you say that?" I ask him. "You may have seen his past and everything but I trust him. I have faith. I'll be faithful and I'm sure he will too. He'll wait for me." I am tired. I yawn and it kind of destroys how angry and forceful I am trying to act.

Cynric sighs, clenches his fists angrily and moves towards my open window, "I'll be back here in the next few days to help you pack. Be ready."

The next morning I awoke quite angry but I made sure I wouldn't take it out on my mother who had just received a prize from the mail. I smiled when I saw her opening the thick envelope in the kitchen. Adam was beside her begging for her to pour him a glass of juice. I poured him one instead.

"Thanks," he said to me with his beautiful, angelic smile and then slurped away. I watched Theresa at the corner of my eye, waiting for her eyes to widen. They slid from left to right, reading each line of the perfectly typed letter Cynric and I had put together in the local library. She took a sharp breath as tears formed in her eyes.

"Are you okay, Mum?" I asked her as I tried to 'curiously' look at the letter she had read. She pulled it away before I could even read it properly.

"Oh my goodness," she whispered as a tear slid down her cheek. Adam looked up at her and pointed at her.

"Mummy, why are you crying?" he asked. I put my hand on Adam's head, brushed over his red hair and then reached for my mother.

"What is it, Mum?" I asked her.

She breathed out heavily, "we just won two return tickets to Australia." I faked a gasp and then an ecstatic smile. A true one. We did it. We really did it.

"What does that mean?" Adam asked. We both ignored him. I wrapped my arms around Mum and hugged her tightly.

"That's fantastic! But how?" I almost yelled. I'm excited. Genuinely. I'm excited for her. For Adam. I'm not faking it. I am so happy.

She let go of me and then looked back at the letter, "I must have entered a competition in the newspaper. And I won. I actually won. I've never won anything." The tears slid down her cheeks. "We can see Cal-" but she stopped herself, she wasn't going to say his name, it hurts her to say Callahan's name, "we can see the family." I nodded my head and I hugged her again and again. She pulled Adam into the hug too. He hugged us back but didn't really know what was going on.

"Do you want to go to Australia, sweetie? Do you want to see your aunties and uncles and cousins?" Mum asked Adam.

He grinned widely and nodded his head, his red curls bounced. I smiled at him and then back at Mum. The excitement of going to the Fifth World has suddenly vanished, all of the excitement I am feeling at this very moment is because of my mother. She is slowly getting better. She is going to get there. She is going to be healthy. She is going to return to the woman that my father, Callahan, fell in love with all those years ago.

"Oh no," she whispered and then looked up at me, "there are only two. We don't have enough money to buy a third." She thought about it for a moment and sighed, the smile was gone from her pale face, "what are we going to do? Maybe... maybe you kids should go. I can stay at home. Bo, you can take Adam. You'll have a great time." She is disappointed.

I touch her forearm, "Mum, no. You have to go. You love Australia. You need to go see Dad's family. They all love you. You and Adam go. I'll stay here. I'll be fine."

"Sweet heart," she sighs and touches my cheek, "I can't leave you here alone."

"But I won't be alone," I urge, "I'll have Jonathan over. I'll be at school. Everything will be fine."

Mum doesn't even bother asking me or giving me the talk on sex. She knows me. She knows that I won't let Jonathan sleep over at night or that we'll get up to anything that she won't approve of. She knows me. I wouldn't do that.

She nods her head, "sweet heart..."

"Mum," I say to her, "I will be fine."

And that was that. In the morning Adam and Theresa will leave. They will go to Australia believing that I will be at home. Believing that I will be safe. But who truly knows? What waits for me in the Fifth World? Or better yet, who waits for me in the Fifth World?