"Angelica! Where is that girl!" A sharp voice broke through the haze which hung over Angie's tired brain.
She stretched out a hand towards her nightstand and tried to grab hold of her phone. "I really did cry myself to sleep," she mumbled and noticed the glare of light coming in through a window. She grappled with the air as her hand missed the nightstand. A sense of confusion forced her to lift herself up. Angie looked around her room and felt a numbness settle in her chest. She bolted from her bed and felt the soft feeling of the carpet beneath her feet. She stumbled over to her window and pulled back the white linen curtains and was met with the sight of vibrant green trees. The type of trees she wouldn't see out the window of her New York apartment.
She frantically took in her surroundings as the sharp voice repeated itself. There was a large room which housed a double bed in the center of it. The bed has a white quilted back with gold beading and the pillows and quilt ranged in a series of whites and pale golds. It was clear that it was well slept in as it was in as much disarray as her own. Angie glanced at the couch on the end of the bed which was a soft grey color with two furry white pillows accenting the ensemble. She blinked her eyes and tried to understand what was happening. This was the room that belonged to Angelica Yang. The room she had pictured when the girl was readying for different things.
She chewed on her lower lip and pinched her skin. This couldn't be real. She shouldn't be standing in this room. She should be in her cozy Brooklyn apartment planning for her adoptive mother's funeral. She should be getting ready to email her supposed brother back in regards to that troublesome scenario. Angie doesn't belong in the bedroom of her fictional character or her past self whichever it was. The sharp stab of pain from her arms caused tears to prick her eyes and reality to settle in a bit more.
Angie looked down at her arms and noticed the lack of scarring on the pearly sheen on her arms. There wasn't the random scarring that had covered both of her arms after she washed ashore. Or the other scarring from the few surgeries she had to have to regain full function of her left arm. It was like someone had put a reverse switch on her. Something sent her back to before. Before her life fell apart and wiped itself clean.
She rushed over to the bedroom door and locked it. She needed time to put herself back in order. Angie looked back on the bed and noticed two nightstands on either side. She rushed over and checked the surface for evidence of a phone. She began to let out a string of curses as she failed to find it under the copious amount of jewelry and random nick-nacks. How could someone be so disorganized? Rephrase, how could she have been so disorganized? What kind of person didn't charge their phone next to their bed. Especially, someone who used it as an alarm clock. She was tearing the room apart as she tossed the mountain of pillows to the floor and the bedding to the foot of the bed. Angie felt her frustration mount at herself...past self… when she felt something hit her barefeet.
She let out a string of curses as she glanced down to see an iPhone rest between her feet. "Perfect!" She exclaimed and picked it up. She was elated to see whenever it was that the phone only had to use her face to get in. Angie wasn't confident in herself to be able to guess the numerical number her past self had used. She felt her stress mount as she noted the sheer number of apps that crowded the home screen. She swiped down and pulled up the search function as she located her Instagram. She looked at her account and at the flood of selfies and provocative poses. This...this couldn't be her, right?
Angie had a sophisticated Instagram page filled with images of her around the older parts of New York, her trips to England, France, and parts of China. She wore refined and chic clothes. Ones which made her fit in amongst the professors at her mother's parties or in cozy book cafes where she enjoyed her macchiatos. She posted quotes she adored from different poems or books she'd read. She didn't wear a Channel like it was all she owned. She preferred a Louis Vuitton purse and occasionally a pair of their loafers for her walks. This wasn't her!
She cried a silent tear for her loss of a carefully cultivated Instagram account which was created over nearly a decade. Angie glanced at her last post and felt her blood run cold. It was of her posing outside of the Cadillac that had given to her as a sweet 16 present. The caption of it declared proudly, "Time for an unforgettable Homecoming!"
Homecoming! The coup d'etat of her novel! It must be the day afterward. She checked the date and noticed it was a Saturday and Homecoming had been on a Friday night. She clutched her phone and chewed on her lower lip. She needed to escape. It was that Saturday morning that Angelica's parents told her she was being shipped off to a European boarding school. She pulled up her contacts and found the name she was looking for.
Eylse Ryu! The first and best friend Angelica...she had. She felt like she managed to clutch onto a safety raft amid a storm as she Facetimed the number. "Please, please pick up," she begged and felt her brain short circuit for a moment. That voice. THIS VOICE! It was hers. Had been from the moment she woke up in the hospital in France.
Angie stumbled onto the couch at the foot of the bed and stared blankly at her phone screen. It hit her once more that Angelica Yang was the same as Angie Dannel. That her fictional character had merely been herself. A self that she had forgotten about due to brain trauma. She really wished this was a terrible dream.
"Angelica! What happened last night!" A loud voice broke her from her thoughts. She stared down at her phone screen blinking as the annoyed expression of her friend stared back.
Before she could stop herself, Angie broke into tears. "Elli, I missed you!" She cried and was suddenly bawling as Elyse took her turn to stare blankly at her.