Invisible, part 1

Hello! This is my NaNoWriMo novel. I will be uploading all of them as I write them. Keep in mind this is only the first draft and there will be lots of grammatical, spelling, and other errors.

Invisible, part 1


You could say that she was a lonely girl. When she was younger she never had a lot of friends. She preferred to stay inside and read books while the other kids when outside and played. She always sat alone at lunch, and always seemed to sleep through most of her classes. After she got older and graduated from school, she knew things had to change. Sarah Pinkleton knew she couldn't always live in her own head.

Sarah was shy, painfully shy. It was hard for her to social with those around her. She never knew why she was so shy, it was just something she had always been. She felt that she didn't need the company of others while there was another world out there. The world that was her own dreams. It was true that everyone dreamed, but Sarah felt that her dreams were different. Her dreams always seemed to take place in the same locations, with the same people around her. In her dreams she felt fulfilled, something she never felt when she was awake.

Now that Sarah was an "adult" she had to make a place for herself in the world. She didn't want to go to college and have to deal with people everyday. So many people. Instead she chose to start working. At first she got a job at a factory where she didn't have to talk to anyone. She worked on the factory line, packing sheets into boxes. She did this for 8 hours everyday, with a 30 minute break for lunch. Sarah hated lunch most of all, but she mostly spent it alone. It felt like high school all over again, only this time she was making money for being there, and she wasn't forced to talk to anyone. She spent most of her time day dreaming about the other life she lead, the one from her dreams.

You could say this is when Sarah started to spiral downwards. When she wasn't at work she was sleeping. Dreaming of a land far from the one we are on now. She started showing up late for work because she didn't want to leave her dream land, she didn't want to be in this waking world. Then she started not going to work at all. Everything came crashing down around her on the fifth of January, when she was woken up by her mother.

"SARAH!" her mother called out to her, standing in her doorway. Sarah still lived with her mother. Just the two of them made up their little family after Sarah's father had passed away when she was younger. Now that Sarah was an adult she was helping pay some bills, but not much else had changed.

Sarah blearily opened her eyes. "Huh wha?" She was still halfway in her dreamworld, not quiet awake yet.

"It's your boss, on the phone." Sarah's mom was normally a kind woman, but now she sounded slightly agitated. Sarah groaned and got up to answer the phone.

"Hello?" Sarah was nervous. She hadn't gone into work today, and she hadn't called in to let them know she wasn't coming in either.

"Ms. Pinkleton, I need to see you as soon as possible, we need to discuss some things." The voice was of her boss, Enoch Gomez. Sarah told him that she would be there tomorrow and they could talk then.

As soon as Sarah got off the phone her mother was waiting for her. "Sarah what's going on? Why is your boss calling you? I thought you had today off? He sounded angry with you."

"I ummm," Sarah stumbled over her words and sighed. "I think I'm gonna be fired Ma. I was supposed to work today but I uh forgot." Sarah didn't like lying to her mother, but it was easier than telling the truth right now. "I'm sorry Ma. I know we need the money right now, I'll get another job I promise!"

Sarah's mother looked very concerned. "Sarah, I don't...I just...what's going on?"

Sarah looked at her feet, feeling shame in her heart. She felt like she was letting down her mother, the only person in the whole world who loved and cared about her unconditionally. The woman who was stronger than anyone else Sarah knew in the world. Sarah couldn't seem to find the words to say to her mother, she just kept trying to speak but found no words coming out.

"Sarah look, I have to go to work now, but we'll discuss this when I get home. Please try to understand I'm really worried about you. It's just...well...we'll talk about this later Princess." Sarah's mom gave her a quick hug and left for work.

Sarah felt so much guilt laying on her shoulders she could barely stand. Her mother had always been so kind to her. After Sarah's father had died in a car accident when was just a little girl, it was up to her mom to raise her by herself. She had worked two jobs for most of the time. Even with working two jobs she had always been there for Sarah. If there was a school play her mom was there. If Sarah was sick and needed to stay home from school her mom was there. Her mom had always been concerned about her. She remembered with a slight smile the times her mom had forced her to go outside. Sarah had spent a lot of time as a child sitting in her house's basement reading books. Her mom put a chair outside and made her sit outside and read. It probably looked really comical, but Sarah didn't mind going outside to read, except when the wind would turn over the pages she was reading.

Remembering her childhood brought back other, not so happy memories though. Sarah had gone to a lot of psychiatrists when she was little. Her mother had always been worried about her always being a loner. Sarah didn't seem to mind, but her mother was always so concerned about her behavior. Sarah felt as if she had turned out alright, she never really felt that her lack of friends was a bad thing. She just simply wanted to be left alone, and only interacted with others when needed. And oh how she dreaded those moments that she had to do a class project or anything else with the other children.

Now that she was older, Sarah felt that not having friends was even better. She had a lot of money from her job, and since she wasn't spending it going out with friends, she could help her mother out. With Sarah's help, her mom had been able to quit her second job and only work one. Sarah didn't want to lose this job and make her mother work two jobs again. The poor woman had always been working so hard for Sarah, Sarah felt that she had to do anything she could to help her mother out. Even if she did lose this job she had to find another one right away so her mother didn't have to work all those long hours again. So many long hours that her mother was unable to do anything but work and then come home sleep, and do it all over it again the next day. That was no kind of life to lead.

Sarah, now finally awake, felt that she should do something productive with her time. Sarah loved to be neat and everything had to be in perfect order. She made her bed and went downstairs to the kitchen. There she found the load of dishes from the night before still in the dish washer, so she put them away before she made herself a sandwich to eat. Sarah had a very peculiar taste in food. Her sandwich contained turkey, strawberry jam, and chex cereal. It was something her mother had made for her when she was smaller, and it was something she never stopped eating, it was so delicious.

After her sandwich, Sarah decided to take a shower. She washed her long brown hair while looking down at her slightly chubby body. She somehow always wondered if she had been skinnier, with beautiful blonde hair, with perfect shining white teeth, if she would have been as shy as she is now. Instead she was chubby with annoying curly brown hair, and teeth that weren't perfectly straight and shiny. She sighed and thought that even if her outside was different, she probably wouldn't be any different on the inside.

When she had dried off and changed into some clean clothes, Sarah sat on the couch and decided to watch some daytime television, something she rarely ever got a chance to do. She flipped on the tv, and saw some daytime talk show. There was a lady and a man looking over a device on a table, the woman talking avidly about it. "So then you can watch your dreams back, and even upload them to the new website, dreamtube!" Those words caught Sarah's attention, and she rewound the show slightly to the beginning of the segment to see what they were talking about.

"So today we have Scott Brenner, the creator of Dreamsight!" the woman clammered on about joyfully. "He is going to show us how to use this clever dream catching device, and how you can show the world your dreams!" Sarah was stunned at how the woman could say everything with so much excitement in her voice, but honestly this excited Sarah as well. She had heard about this Dreamsight before, but had never actually seen one before. She listened closely to the show, waiting to hear all about the Dreamsight.

"Oh well yes, this is the Dreamsight." the man on the television said. "You simply place the Dreamsight on your head before you sleep, and it will record your dreams." He demonstrated by putting the Dreamsight, which looked a lot like a set of portable headphones, on his head. "All of your dreams are recorded and stored in this portion of the device." He showed a black box that was connected to the headphones. "Then you can upload it to your computer or cellphone to watch it back." He pulled out a USB cable from inside the black box portion of the and showed how one could connect it to a computer. "It's easy!"

"But how does it work?!" The woman somehow made it sound like she was excited even when she was just asking a simple question.

"Well it's a lot like the devices that allow mute people to talk. It takes your brain waves and manifests them into data. Instead of just communicating those thoughts into speaking, it records the whole thought process including the things your brain sees while you are dreaming. This data is then transferred onto your computer or phone, where you can see what you had dreamed."

"So then you can watch your dreams back, and even upload them to the new website, dreamtube!" The woman said again, Sarah recognizing the place where she had started watching the show.

"Oh yes," the man said, "Dreamtube.com is becoming a very popular place. It's a lot like Youtube, but with dreams instead. In fact, here is a video I uploaded myself to the site just today."

The view switched over to a computer screen. Sarah's heart started pounding. She had always wondered how other people dreamed, if their dreams were anything like how her dreams were. She watched as the dream started to play.

The man was sitting in a car driving. Except it looked to Sarah as if he was not sitting in the front seat where he should be, but in the backseat instead. Panicked words came from the television "Oh no! How can I drive like this I AM GOING TO CRASH!" Except he never did crash. The video ended shortly after that. Sarah sighed and turned off the television.

That wasn't like her dreams at all. Her dreams seemed so much more, well alive than that. She decided that she would have to look up that site at some point and see how some of the other dreams were, but she knew she'd probably be disappointed. At the same time she really wanted to purchase a Dreamsight for herself. She didn't want to get one right then and there with her job possibly being on the line, but if she didn't lose her job the next day, she would go out and buy one right away. It would be fun to see what other people's reactions to her dreams would be.

Sarah spent the rest of the day cleaning. She knew her mom wouldn't be home until around ten at night so she decided to be nice and make her dinner. Sarah wasn't the best at cooking but she managed. She made her most favorite meal, porkchops with mashed potatoes. She also got the applesauce out of the fridge, since you can't have porkchops without applesauce! As the time got closer to when her mom would arrive home, she got more and more nervous remembering how her mom wanted to talk to her about her job. Sarah didn't like to worry too much about stuff like that, but once she got a worry in her head it was hard to let it go.

As she sat at the kitchen table worrying, she heard the front door open. "Ma!" Sarah yelled towards the front of the house. "Welcome home!"

"Oh hello Sarah." Sarah's mother said as she came into the kitchen. "You made dinner?"

"Sure did! Take a load off your feet and join me." Sarah's mom put her bag down on a table near the kitchen and joined Sarah for dinner. "How was your day Ma?" Sarah asked her quickly, trying to deflect her mom from asking her any questions about her job.

"Oh it was the usual. Well one thing did happen, you know that cashier, Becky?" Sarah's mom continued without really waiting for an answer. "Well she did the silliest thing today. She was checking out a customer, and she just started crying right there! Well it turns out she just broke up with her boyfriend, and the customer was buying her boyfriends favorite brand of cologne, and it reminded her of him and she just broke down. The customer was really nice about it once she explained it to her, but the whole situation was pretty crazy. I sent Becky on break after that so she could calm down, but we had a huge rush then and I had to end up working the register. It was such a long day!"

Sarah's mom was a manager at a department store, and even though it made her crazy sometimes she loved it. Sarah's mom was so unlike Sarah, she loved dealing with people. If shyness was genetic, she sure didn't get it from her mother. Sarah managed to keep the conversation away from herself for the majority of the dinner, and when asked about her job, Sarah kept avoiding really answering, saying that everything would be fine, this was the first time she did a no call no show, it was an honest mistake, she was sure they'd forgive her. Sarah didn't mention how much she hated working with other people, how much she rather just be dreaming. Her mother had enough to worry about with the added worry of her daughter.

Sarah headed to her room soon after eating, with the excuse that she had to be up early in the morning to work. She wasn't really sure she was going to work, but she knew she had to at least talk to her boss. Sarah picked up her book reader and sat on her bed to read. She remembered when she was younger and all books had been on paper. This seemed so much more logical, all the books being electronic. It really helped with the environment not wasting so many trees just to make books. But this somehow seemed colder, and Sarah missed those paper books. She remembered how all the book stores had shut down, and then the libraries followed shortly after that. Then it was impossible to find paper books anymore. Sarah didn't really mind all the much, but she laughed at how her past self would've reacted to not being able to read because the battery was low. She read until she feel asleep.

That night she found herself in the familiar land of her dreams.

Words This Part: 2764
Words Total: 2764