Prismatic

May awoke to her accursed alarm clock beeping her awake. She swiped at where she thought it to be, missing a few times before finally clobbering the snooze button with a closed fist.

The lights in her room were still on. Though it took great effort, she finally dragged herself up to being upright.

After getting ready for the morning and grabbing her textbook and notes, she shuffled down the stairs in her clothes from the day before.

She could hear Alice’s show playing in the living room downstairs as she went, and when she entered the kitchen, she saw her father hunched over the folder. He was clumsily shoveling cereal into his mouth with one hand and propping up the folder with the other, reading it like a retiree would the morning paper.

“Hey, Dad.”

“Mm,” he mumbled through a mouthful of cereal.

“What’re you reading?”

“Folder.” He resumed chewing after the word without so much as glancing at her.

“I know, Dad.” She huffed a short sigh. “I’m asking what in the folder.”

He turned his eyes up to her for a second. “What’d you say, May? Sorry. This part is… dense.”

Her expression fell to annoyance. “Well, are you actually listening now?”

“Yes, sorry.”

He still looked at her in that same sidelong way. She didn’t have faith that that indicated his undivided attention.

“I asked if you wanted some water in your cereal,” she said deadpan, walking to the fridge.

“Ah, mm. Yeah. That sounds good.” He turned his eyes back to the folder, resuming their scrolling back and forth through its dense content.

“Really?” May stared daggers into him. She’d gotten a glass of water for herself. Maybe following through would wake him up, she thought.

But instead, she just shook her head, placed the cup in the sink, and started walking toward the door, putting on her shoes. “I’m headed to play in traffic!” she called to the kitchen. “Wish me luck!”

“Okay, honey, be—”

He cut himself off.

“...Wait, what?” he finally called back.

She laughed drily. “Seriously, Dad? It takes me threatening to do something suicidal for you to actually talk to me?”

“Honey, where are you going?” She heard him walk to the kitchen doorway. “Are you going out?”

“Yeah, Dad, to play in traffic.” She glowered at him.

“May, come on. Be serious.”

“Dad, I’m just gonna go to the café. Or the park. I don’t actually want to get hit by a car.”

Ken paused before replying, “...Don’t you think you should stay here?”

“What?” she stared at him, brow furrowed and eyes narrow. “Why would I have to stay here?”

“I mean… you felt like you were getting targeted. I just want you to be safe.”

She barked a laugh. “Now you’re concerned about that? When nothing’s happened for 3 weeks?” Shaking her head, she didn’t give him the chance to reply. “I’m going out. I’ll be back.”

And she stomped out the door, slamming it behind her.

“May! Come on!” her father called after her.

But she ignored him, skulking around the corner toward the café down the street.

———

May’s eyes remained trained on the ground as she walked.

The air was colder now than it had been when she left, she was fairly sure. She shivered as a breeze blew over her, rubbing her hands to create some warmth.

But finally, after a couple minutes more of walking and shivering, she glanced up, and the sign of the café was just down the sidewalk about fifty meters away.

She looked down at the two books in her hand, swaying back and forth as she walked. I'll have to work even harder, she thought. 

Arriving below the sign, she reached out to head in.

“Hello.”

May jumped, caught completely off guard by the words. “Uh, hi.”

She glanced over at the person speaking to her to see a familiar face: the girl from the café before, Bianca. Her cheeks were red from the cold, but she still wore no coat in spite of the freezing temperatures.

“Oh. Hey, Bianca.” She pulled open the door and held it to allow Bianca inside past her.

“How have you been?” Bianca asked, stepping past her.

May followed her inside, following Bianca to the seating area. The same two girls worked today as the previous time, one of them rolling her eyes as she saw May and Bianca enter.

May plopped down at a table and dropped her notebook and textbook onto it. “I’ve been good,” she finally replied. “You?”

Bianca looked out the window for a moment. “Oh, you know… just preparing.” She floated down into a chair at May’s table.

“Oh, you’re… sitting there.”

“Is it a problem?”

“...I guess not.”

After both grabbing their respective coffee orders, they walked back to the table. May grabbed her notes and textbook, opening them both and taking out one of the pencils jammed into the notebook’s spiral binding.

“Don’t you have school?” Bianca looked at May, gesturing to the textbook she read from.

“My Dad is letting us stay home. An extirpation hit the high school.”

May glanced up at Bianca, tapping the pencil on the paper, looking irritated at having been interrupted just before starting to work.

Bianca looked sad—the sort of sadness one gets when looking at a beggar when they have nothing to give. It was not the expression May expected.

“Did people die?” she asked.

May’s eyes narrowed, and she shook her head. “No. It was on the news that no one did, right?”

Bianca sighed, nodding. “I just worry that they lie.”

“Why would they?”

“I suppose you’re right.” She looked out the window at the quiet morning street—quite the contrast from the state of things during their first encounter. “Especially with everyone already knowing about the end,” she added.

May simply nodded in response, and turned her head back down to her work. She had the diagram she’d tried to show her father open. Her heart clenched as she looked at it, so she flipped to a new page.

“What was that?” Bianca asked, leaning over the table toward May.

“What?”

“That page you were on.” Bianca made a motion to turn the page back.

May complied, flipping back. “It was nothing. Just this diagram.”

Bianca studied it, and for a moment, her eyes widened slightly before settling back to her unbothered default. She blinked a couple times, leaning back and staring at May’s face.

She stared for a long time. Uncomfortably long.

Though May held her gaze for a time, she found herself flushed at being so intently studied. “What?” she asked, hoping to relieve herself from the pressure.

“No… nothing.” Bianca turned to look out the window again. “You don’t mention the prismatic effect there.”

May sat silent, staring blankly at her now.

Bianca sipped her coffee and continued, still staring outside. “The extirpations. This diagram is of the distortion that precedes them, right?”

May nodded slowly, not thinking about the fact that Bianca probably couldn’t see it.

“Well, you’re on the right track with that, but… you’re missing the prismatic effect it has on the light. The rest looks good.”

“How would you know what I’m missing?” May asked. She was completely baffled. This stranger was correcting her diagram. That she’d toiled over the whole prior day. Though, it was at least validating knowing that someone acknowledged it, even more so with her saying part of it “looks good.” Whatever that means, May thought.

Bianca glanced down at her smartwatch and stood up abruptly. “I should be going.”

“Wait, what?” May looked up at her.

“I… have somewhere to be.”

She snatched the pencil from May’s hand, scribbling something on a napkin. Then, walking briskly to the door, she pushed it open and stepped through.

“It was great to see you again, May!” she called back on her way out. May watched through the window as she ran down the street, her gait running as graceful as walking.

May looked at the diagram on the page. “Prism?” she asked herself. But, shaking her head, she picked up the napkin to see what Bianca had written. Just 10 digits. Could be something physics related. Could be a phone number. May wasn’t entirely sure.

Regardless, she’d at least given May’s work a chance, even if the way she did was decidedly quite strange. And nonsensical.

She took a deep breath, smiling a little and tucking the napkin into her pocket. “Prism,” she muttered, flipping back a few sections in the textbook. “Let’s see what you’re talking about, here, Bianca.”