Friday, June 29, 2007

Decoherence

She had a strong opinion. Valedictorian and suspended from school. She was barred from giving the speech during graduation, but she was close friends with the girl who was giving the speech, so she was able to speak through her.

During the speech she bounced from parent to parent, introducing herself and her link to them. The auditorium was filled with kids in the black robes, solemn and festive. No one was really paying attention to anything until their row was called to walk behind the stage to be called one by one to receive their diploma.

When the row she was in was called, she excused herself from the conversation and followed her classmates to the stage. The speaker had spoke her speech word for word and she was pleased. Also the LSD she had taken started to kick in, that also elevated her mood.

"Kathrine Deek."

Kate stepped up and took the fake piece of paper from the dean and looked out onto the crowd of parents and loved ones. They were all touched by her words tonight. They didn't know it, but they all had her words in their minds.

She walked off stage but not where she was supposed to. Instead, she walked out of the building, unsure as to why. Kate thought she might have to throw up...because of the LSD, but that wasn't it. She just walked and walked. The California trees grew thicker and thicker the farther she walked away from the auditorium.

As the voice calling the names of her peers grew fainter and fainter she came upon a cabin. The twilight was turning to nightfall so it was the flicker of a candle in the cabin that caught her eye. Against her better judgment she walked up to the window of the cabin.

In the window she saw stacks and stacks of papers, all full of paragraph after paragraph. A man sitting next to a candle typed frantically pulling a sheet of freshly inked paper out of his typewriter every twenty seconds.

Kate tried to make out what he was writing, but couldn't from her vantage point. She started to turn to leave when a table caught her eye. There was stacks of papers on this closer table too. In fact the entire cabin was filled with stacks and stacks of typed on paper.

Upon closer inspection she could make out the text on the top paper of the one of the stacks. But as soon as she read the word "collapse" the cabin started creaking awfully loud. The loud creaking turned into the wall of the cabin collapsing over. Soon enough the entire cabin caved in on itself.

"What have you done?!" The writer asked.

"I didn't do anything, I was just standing here," Kate defended herself.

"You read my writing, didn't you?"

"Well.." Kate started. For once she wasn't sure what say. Usually Kate was great at talking her way in and out situations, but this was just too weird.

The cabin falling apart must have loosened some topsoil in the hillside, because the entire mountain started to slide from under her feet. She fell under the current of mud and leaves then questioned whether or not the land was really moving.

The mountain sliding sent loose a shock wave on the San Andres fault that was immeasurable on the richter scale. The movement of the earth was so drastic it could be seen from space. The light bouncing off the earth altered forever and was sent into the void of space, forever entangled with the earthquake caused by the reading of one word: Collapse.

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