Chapter 44: Deadlines
The next morning, Sarah awoke to the sun shining brightly in the windows. She'd slept here all night? She swung her feet to the floor and ran for the door.
Still locked.
"Damn," she muttered. Then, "Sure wish there was a bathroom up here somewhere." She pounded on the door and shouted, but still could hear nothing. She turned around.
"What the…?" There was a door on the opposite wall that hadn't been there before. She went over and pushed it open.
It was a bathroom.
Sarah started to laugh, and she didn't stop laughing until she had finished using it. She got a drink from the tap and then went back to the outer door. She banged on it. Still no answer.
The bathroom door had disappeared again.
She shouted and pounded until her fists were sore and her voice was rough, and then gave up and sat back down on the bench.
"Double damn," she muttered as she realized something. It was the twelfth day. Today was the day when Jareth would make his proposal to her, and she'd have to give him an answer one way or another. And she still didn't know what her answer would be!
Sarah lost track of how long she spent in the room, alternating between pacing the room, beating on the door, and just sitting on the bench and brooding about her answer.
Of course, if she didn't get out of here, then she'd be too late to give her answer and Jareth would get Arien by default. She wandered over to the desk and re-read her account of what had happened the night before. She added a couple of lines to it, but for the most part it told the whole story.
She was hungry, too. She wished for the bathroom a few more times, and was able to get some water from the tap, but she wished for some real food. The real food, unlike the bathroom, didn't show up. Alas.
She spent a long, boring day up there. She studied the landscape, the sky, and the room, but there was no way out and no way to reach Jareth.
When the light started to fade again, Sarah began to really worry. She paced the room some more, fumbling with her necklace. She absently ran the chain between her fingers, and stopped when she reached the little crystal.
The little crystal. Oh, what a fool she'd been. Why hadn't she thought of using it before? Quickly she unstrung it from the necklace and held it in her hand. What to wish for first?
"I wish to see Jareth," she said. The mists in the little marble cleared and showed the Goblin King pacing and ranting in front of a white unicorn. Sarah couldn't tell whether it was mother or daughter, though. His movements were quick and abrupt, his arms flailing about as he shouted at them. They were in a roomful of people, and Sarah could see Jareth and the unicorns in the background. With a sudden rush of panic, she realized that the evening's festivities were about to begin—and no one knew where she was.