After watching the trailer, I felt a little better. That crazy Jack, I thought. He was my favorite character, and never failed to cheer me up. Then again, he was my father's favorite character for the same reason...

I shook the thought out of my mind, my eyes wandering around my room, where I had been watching the trailer on my computer. My gaze fell on my black mutt, Rex, who was sleeping peacefully on my purple beanbag.

That reminds me of the time Dad...oh, crap. I groaned, frustrated, as thoughts of my father crept back into my mind. I hated these moments: I would feel the need to push the memories away, but feel guilty at the same time for wanting to forget my own father.

I decided to watch The Curse of the Black Pearl again. This seemed like a good compromise to me, as it would remind me of pleasant memories with my father and keep me distracted from sad thoughts. Except when Elizabeth was with her father.

When the music on the DVD main menu started blaring from my speakers, Rex woke up and groaned.

"Oh, shut up," I grumbled, selecting Play. "You can leave if you want!"

Rex started to stand up, but then thought better of it and curled back up in the beanbag.

"Yeah, I knew you were too lazy." Grinning, I lay down and snuggled into my quilt, centering my attention on the small TV on the shelf next to my bed.

I got to the part where the wall in the jail was blown out, freeing all of the prisoners except Jack.

"Hey, that's the kind of luck I have!" I muttered. "Having to do extra chores all the ti--holy crap, chores!"

Remembering my task of doing the laundry, I paused the movie and scrambled to get free of my quilt, managing to fall off my bed in the process. If I had any traits to rival my clumsiness, it was my forgetfulness. Rex stared at me with his deep black eyes, a pitying expression on his face.

"Shut up!" I groaned, not managing to hold back a giggle and a snort. Sometimes the stupid things I did cracked me up!

Once I was free of my virtual quilted prison (which took me forever considering the messy state of my room and my klutziness), I sprinted downstairs, with Rex barking at my heels, and skidded to a halt in front of the laundry room. Well, it wasn't so much as a skid as it was an I-almost-fell-over-and-broke-my-neck.

"Blegh!" I wrinkled my nose as I lifted the sopping heap of clothes from the washer, the stench of bleach stinging my nostrils. Rex scrunched his eyes closed and began scratching his snout.

"You'd think I'd be used to it by now, but noooo," I huffed, dumping the heavy pile into a basket.

I took a breather before heaving the clothes into the dryer. Although I wasn't out of shape, struggling to escape a quilt and racing downstairs was taxing for me, especially as I had been laying in bed for a while.

Finally, I grabbed the basket and started dumping clothes into the dryer. I groaned as I noticed how wet my cutoff bluejean capris and purple T-shirt got.

When all of the white load was in the old green dryer, I shut the door and picked the right drying cycle. Finished, I sighed happily. Any chore done was a chore well done, in my opinion, especially with my track record. Barely a few weeks went by without my dropping a plate or bowl when loading or emptying the dishwasher. And don't even get me started on the number of socks I had managed to lose in that damn dryer!

Speaking of socks... I thought. I had noticed a stray one that hadn't made it into the basket with the rest of the whites. I opened the door and tossed the wet sock in...and noticed a strange light coming from the inside of the dryer.

"What the...?" I muttered, frowning. In all of my loads of laundry, I had never noticed anything like this.

"Ah, well...the old thing's probably malfunctioning," I said to Rex. "You know how many days it's seen..."

As if in answer to my scrounging for a logical explanation, Rex started barking at the old green appliance.

I peered into the back of the dryer, sticking my head into the opening. Then I realized how stupid I must look with my butt sticking in the air, my clothes wet and my dog barking at me like a mother yelling at her bratty kids...and I started laughing. I tried to pull my head out of the dryer, but it felt like I was being pulled in...

Alarmed, I tried to brace my arms against the opening of the dryer, but found that the hole was getting bigger and bigger!

"Okay, okay, I'm not laughing at you anymore!"

The light was growing brighter as I was thrust into the dryer. Soon I was nearly blind from the light and my ears were filled with a whooshing noise and the high-pitched barks of Rex...and then I knew nothing.