Oct. 29, 11:30 a.m.
When I opened my eyes, a thick fog had settled around me, obstructing my view of what was happening. I could hear sounds—scuffling feet, laughter, lockers slamming—that told me I was at school. But what was happening?
I squinted hard at the objects slowly coming into view as the fog dissipated, and soon I realized I was standing in my chemistry classroom. Mr. Albert was sitting alone at his desk, grading papers. The clock above his head said 11:30. I sighed, knowing what this meant: it was lunchtime, and I was having another dream/vision of what my clone was doing.
"Mr. Albert?" I watched myself smile and enter the classroom. "I'm here to retake my test."
"Of course, Jeannie, come on in," Mr. Albert said. "I hope you feel more prepared for the test today."
I smile at him and sit down at my desk, where a copy of the test already lay waiting for me.
"La, la, la!" I sang absentmindedly, writing my name in big, loopy letters at the top of the paper. I added a few hearts and stars around the border of the test. Mr. Albert looked up at me strangely, then went back to grading.
I stared down at the first problem.
Calculate DH for the following reaction:
8 Al(s) + 3 Fe3O4(s) -- 4 Al2O3(s) + 9 Fe(s)
"DHnot as hot a reaction as JN+CD!!!" I wrote, adding some more hearts before going on to the next problem.
"What?!" I gasped in horror. I couldn't believe this. I had watched myself ruin my friendship with Kellie, destroy my relationship with Anthony, and now completely screw up any chance I had of passing my chemistry test, all in one day. These clones were ME, but I didn't have any more control than if they were totally different people. And what was this JN+CD? Did I mean Chad Donaghy?! My god. I thought only Clone 1 had a thing for him. Did this mean I liked him more than I was letting my conscious mind admit? What about Anthony?
Knowing I was completely helpless in what was going on, I stood and watched myself give similarly brainless answers for every question on the test. I wanted to just blink and force myself to wake up like last time, but I knew that if I didn't keep watching, I would have no chance of figuring out how to fix everything when I woke up.
"Thank you, Mr. Albert!" I said, getting up and handing him the test. "I just know I did so much better this time!" I turned and skipped merrily out of the room, leaving him staring after me, shaking his head in disbelief.
The rest of the school day was pretty much the same. Kellie and Anthony refused to speak to me in English class, and I continued to act like a total idiot. Ms. Harrison called on me to answer a question about Othello, and I replied, "Um...I don't know! But it's super sunny outside, and I wish I was out there with Chad. This class is really boring, sorry!" I giggled and leaned into Chad, who had this big grin on his face and put his arm around me. In fact, Chad was the only one who liked me more the way I was acting.
Things got worse when I went to cheer practice after school. While most of the girls didn't notice that I was intellectually lacking, they all got mad when I kept screwing up the routine, stopping abruptly to wave or blow a kiss to Chad, who came along to "support" me, but as the real me noticed, was watching the other girls just as much.
"Jeannie!" my coach frowned at me. "Competition is coming up fast. You need to get serious and pay attention to this routine!"
"Sorry, Coach!" I replied, putting on a fake expression of seriousness. The minute she turned around to talk to someone else, I turned to wink at Chad and giggle.
"Alright, girls, I want you to go through it again, full out this time! Go through all your stunting sequences just as if we were at the competition right now."
We all ran to our formations, and coach started up the music. I danced and cheered through the first part of the routine, then ran to be a side base for the first stunt, a basket toss.
I grabbed Jessica, the Flyer's, ankle and helped lift her up high overhead. That's when I saw Chad get up towards the door. Just as we threw Jessica up into the air, I turned and yelled after Chad, "Hey! Where are you going?" He turned to me to reply, his eyes widening as he saw what was about to happen.
"No! NO!" I screamed, watching in horror. "You have to catch her! You have to—"
The crash resounded through the gym as all the other girls gasped and Jessica cried out in pain, rocking back and forth on the floor and holding her ankle.
"Jeannie!" Coach yelled furiously. "How could you do this?! How could you forget to catch her?!" Her attention turned to Jessica, who had started crying from the pain. "Jessica, let's try and get you up." With the help of my coach and another girl, Jessica tried to put weight on her ankle, but immediately sank back to the floor in even greater pain.
"Alright, I think it's broken. I'm going to go call for an ambulance," Coach said. "Jeannie, you come with me."
Following Coach in absolute embarrassment and guilt, I risked a glance back at the other girls, who all glared after me in hatred. They knew as well as I did that I was about to get kicked off the squad, and with Jessica's broken ankle, there was no chance that they could go to the competition. All their hard work was for nothing...because of me.
"Oh. My. God." Tears streamed down my face as I folded my arms to blink. I had seen enough. All I had wanted was a little time for myself to relax. I never meant for this to happen. I had to escape this nightmare. Amid the sounds of Jessica crying in pain and the other girls saying horrible things about me, I blinked hard.
I awoke to find Clones #3 and #4 staring at me in worry. Clone #1 looked disturbed but not particularly worried, too concerned with filing her nails to care about me. The wetness on my cheeks told me I'd been crying in my sleep.
"What's wrong?!" Clone #4 asked.
"Clone #2! She failed my test and broke Jessica's ankle and—" unable to continue, I burst into fresh tears.
"You need to blink her back here, now!" Clone #4 said urgently.
"Why? She can't r-ruin my life any more than she has!" I sobbed.
"Because! She's going to come back here all upset over what happened, and Mom will find out about everything!"
"Oh god, you're right," I said, wiping away my tears. Sniffling, I held hands with my clones and we blinked Clone #2 back into my bottle. She did look upset, though not as much as me.
"I'm sorry," she said when she saw me. "I don't know what happened."
"I do!" I screamed at her in anger. "I saw what happened! You failed my test and you dropped Jessica and you ruined my life! All because of Chad! I don't even like Chad that much!"
"You must," said Clone #4 hesitantly. "Remember? We can't be any different than you."
"But... I like Anthony," I said quietly.
"I know... but when you get really boy-crazy, which doesn't happen that much...you tend to wish you were with Chad. Even though you know he's a jerk. It's really hard to explain," said Clone #4.
"So you're my boy-crazy side. And my stupid side!" I said to Clone #2 accusingly.
"I guess," she said blankly. "But I am sorry. Um... just so you know...Coach kicked you off the cheer squad."
"I figured," I replied sadly. "And I guess it had to happen, somehow... oh my god!" I said suddenly, remembering something. "Clone #3... blink outside and come in, pretending you just got back from school. Mom's going to be wondering where I am."
Clone #3 nodded and blinked away. Moments later, she was back with a panicked look on her face.
"Mom just said Hadji wants to meet with you—now!"
"What?! We don't have a meeting today... what if he found out what I did?"
"He can't know!" Clone #4 said. "It's only been a few hours...he probably just wants to make up for the meeting you missed yesterday. But you'll have to go to the meeting yourself."
"I can't," I said, my eyes widening at the thought. "I barely have any powers...I'm like a mortal! And I'm so weak... he'll know something's up."
"Well we can't go," Clone #4 replied. "Remember? Hadji is the best aura reader of all djinn. And clones don't have auras. He will know immediately what you have done."
Knowing the truth in this, I struggled to my feet. "I'll just have to have Mom blink me over. Maybe I can convince her and Hadji that I'm sick or something. This is just getting so complicated! I need time to figure out how to fix everything."
"Are you ready to smoke out?" asked Clone #4, folding her arms.
I nodded uncertainly, and soon I felt myself being smoked out of my bottle. I wondered if I'd have the strength to hide what I'd done, from my mom, who knows me so well, and from Hadji, who knows everything about magic and djinn. The next hour would determine everything.
