Chasing Imagination

Amy

I felt I should go and find Casper. I knew he was mad at me. What I had said seemed to have struck a chord within him, but I never meant it to be hurtful. It was just my opinion, but what Linzy had been telling me made me understand this sick, cold world more and more. I had no doubt that there was still so much more left to find out, and yet I didn’t feel ready. For the first time ever, I began to realise why so many people preferred ignorance.

I headed down the corridor, far into the depths of the unlit, unkempt tunnels lined with small sections used as bedrooms, before realising that I had no clue where his room actually was.

Reluctantly, I did a 180 degree turn, and retraced my steps back until I reached the main sort of area. I glanced into several of the rooms, coming across a room full of at least six computers which I hadn’t seen before, when I finally bumped into someone I recognised in there.

‘Have you seen Casper?’ I asked Felix as he sat at a computer, his bushy eyebrows set low over his eyes as he concentrated.

‘Uh, since when?’ he asked.

‘Well, in the last hour or something,’ I said.

‘Nope. Sorry. You could try our room?’

This was, at least, some sort of a lead.

‘Which one’s your room?’ I asked.

‘Well,’ Felix said, ‘it has a door and—‘ his face fell as he realised that, whilst I was indeed growing to like this place more, I wasn’t really in a joking mood.

‘I’m sorry,’ I said, ‘but it’s important that I find him.’

He cocked his head slightly to one side. ‘What, you had a row or something?’

Surprisingly, he was a lot closer to the truth than he believed himself to be.

He shook his head, tutting disapprovingly, as though he was a parent or a teacher. ‘You two are like an old married couple.’

I was about to leave when he added, more helpful than he’d ever been, ‘I’ll show you where to go.’ He stood up and followed me out of the room. ‘Y’know, if I were in charge around here, the first thing I would do would be to stick numbers on all the bedroom doors. We could be like a hotel.’

I laughed, in a friendly sort of way more than because I thought what he was saying was funny. ‘It would help I guess.’

We stopped outside of his room, which looked just like all the others that lined the various corridors. To be exact, it was on the second sub-tunnel from the left, and it was the fifth door down, but that was unnecessarily complicated if you asked me.

I knocked on the door and an answer came after a moment.

‘Good,’ Felix said brightly. ‘He’s in there. See ya.’ Without another word, or even waiting for Casper to come out, he dashed off, leaving me standing around awkwardly.

‘Who is it?’ Casper called. ‘If it’s you Felix, well you know now to just walk in unless it’s locked. I’m not getting dressed or anything.’

‘It’s...me,’ I called uncomfortably through the door. There was a moment of silence; clearly, I had upset him more than I had realised, even after he walked off.

‘Come in.’

I pushed the door open cautiously, peering round before I dared set foot inside.

The bedroom was much the same as I had seen before—individual, cluttered, and with posters, boards and writing covering the walls, only this room undoubtedly had a more masculine feel. Nevertheless, I could still tell which side was Casper’s. It was laid out the same as my room, with one bed—the equivalent to my bed—behind the door, and one on the opposite wall. Casper’s was obviously the one on the opposite wall. Taped up behind it were various posters of what must be rock stars, although I could have sworn some of them were modern day Vikings—they had long, straight hair and beards and tattoos and nearly all of them wore black. The bands seemed to all belong to similar genres—most of them dressed like Casper in one way or another, whether it was the black jeans or the graphic tops or the check shirts or the dyed, layered hair. There was the occasional woman, most with long, dark hair, though one’s was a vibrant, vivid orange, but they were nearly all men.

‘Hey,’ I said awkwardly. He currently sat on his bed, proving, if proof was needed, that that was his side of the room. Compared to Felix’s side, it was pretty tidy, though the bed was unmade due to the fact he was sitting on it, and there were a couple of shoes and magazines kicking around on the floor and that red and black jacket of his that had cost me my freedom was hanging from the bed post.

‘Hi,’ he said, a little glumly.

‘Casper,’ I blurted out, unable to let this uneasy conversation continue between us. ‘I’m sorry about earlier, I—‘

‘Don’t worry about it,’ he said, pulling a face to let me know I was off the hook. ‘I just took what you were saying the wrong way. In the end, I want to do what you were saying; I'd love to get out of here and start a war; it’s just impossible now. I wanted to turn around as soon as I left, but, well, that wouldn’t have looked too good, would it?’

I laughed, glad to know that he wasn’t still angry with me. I stood there, still in the doorway, until he invited me to sit down beside him. I was close to him, close enough to touch, certainly close enough to receive the full power of his incredible blue eyes, the colour of summer skies.

‘When are we going to London?’ I asked, only able to hold his gaze for so long, for fear of being hypnotised.

‘Tomorrow?’ he said it like a question. ‘I don’t really mind, but we shouldn’t leave it too late in the day. Evening rush hour, perhaps? That way we can take the trains most of the way, and we can blend into our surroundings a bit more; then we’ll return in the morning. Yeah?’

‘Yeah,’ I agreed, not really knowing enough about it to make any decisions.