Jemma
•••
It's quiet. So quiet. I open my eyes, and look around. I stand in the front pew of a church somewhere, and a man and a woman sit next to me. All black clothes. The woman was light skinned with light blond hair, and the man was tall with olive brown skin.
I reach up and touch my cheek, where salty tears fall down, trailing my jawline before dropping off my chin.
I'm crying, but why?
A box sits at the altar, surrounded by flowers.
It's a coffin.
A priest walks into the church, looking at the two people standing next to me.
"Excuse me, I know this is a terrible time for all of you, but everyone has head to the reception already. I just thought you'd like to know." He says.
The man and woman exchange glances, and nod to each other.
"Jemma, sweetheart; we'll be outside at the picnic with the others. Remember where we showed you?" The woman asks.
Little me nods. I don't have full control of my body; it's like my consciousness is fighting for it.
They leave, arm in arm. The woman takes one last look back, and I catch her eye color: green. The same emerald green as mine. My mother and father.
My skin color was a perfect combination of theirs, a light coffee brown. I am suddenly filled with the huge urge to run after them, to hug them, and tell them how much I've missed them.
But I can't. As much as I want to be with my parents, the other little girl wanted to see the person in the coffin just as much. So I walk over, and peek inside, bracing myself. There wasn't a body. There was a stuffed bear, more flowers, and a few Polaroid pictures. There was a framed picture that had me, my parents, and a little girl only a few years younger than me all sitting on a couch.
She had slightly lighter skin, and the same blond hair as my mother. Her cheeks were rosy, and she had dark green eyes. In a frame next to it, there was the same little girl in a white dress, and she looked like she was dancing. The frame had "In Loving Memory" written on it with neat cursive lettering.
"Your sister was a lively little girl, wasn't she?" The priest says.
"Um, yeah." I say, looking away from the coffin.
"Too bad you don't even remember her." He says.
"Excuse me?" I ask.
He snaps his fingers, and he suddenly turns into Charlie, and I'm back to my present self. We stand several feet apart, in a grassy plain that has overgrown up to my knees.
"It's time I start explaining some things." He says. Something in the way he looks has changed since I last saw him.
"I know what your thinking; something has changed with my appearance. I assure you, the only thing that has changed is the way you see me." He says. "You saw your father, and now you see him in me." He says.
I open my mouth to speak, but it closes when I can't think of anything.
"You have had many questions pop up in your head since you've entered Jaylemm. I'm here to answer them." He says, "So go ahead and ask."
"Okay, um, actually; why does it seem like Laye, Elle, and I come from different worlds? Elle says she comes from Gernaya, and I don't even know what that means." I say.
"Well, that's because you are. Well, I prefer the term dimensions. There's about fifteen thousand different dimensions in the multiverse, and you three come from three different ones." He says.
"Okay, wow. Um, what was that thing that just happened, I was at someone's funeral, and my parents were there, but I didn't even know who's funeral it was." I ask.
"That was a flashback in a form of a dream. It's your first time going through a portal, so all three of you have gotten knocked out. Next time you go through one, if there is a next time, your bodies should be able to remain conscious. Don't worry." He says.
"A flashback? But those weren't even my memories." I say.
"Of course they are. But you don't remember. All three of you, Layanne, Elianna, and you, you all suffered through some traumatizing event in your childhood. To cope, your own conscious teleported you to a different dimension, where you forgot about your life before you were teleported. For instance, your little sister, well let's just say she died, for the sake of this information settling in your head. You were so devastated, it was like you died too. At ten years old, you were so completely dead inside, you couldn't even move. That's when you were teleported to a mirror dimension, where your parents apparently died when you were a baby and your sister never existed." He explains. I crack my knuckles, ignoring the migraine starting to form.
"So I teleported myself at the age of ten to a different dimension where my parents are dead and I'm left practically on my own?" I ask.
"Yep." He says.
"That sounds like my brain. And this happened to Laye and Elle too?"
"Yes. Different traumatizing events at different ages, but same story." He says.
"Then I have one more question." I announce.
"Yes?"
"Jaylemm isn't just a video game, isn't it?"
He smiles, "Of course not."