by Chun Lee
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\nIt\u2019s not like I knew this was going to happen. I can\u2019t answer very many of your questions.<\/p>\n
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No, you won\u2019t be able to talk to my mom. She\u2019s trying to find an answer to this mess.<\/p>\n
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I can\u2019t tell you why it\u2019s not happening to me. Well, I can tell you why. I just can\u2019t tell you how. My mom didn\u2019t want to read me. It\u2019s a remarkable amount of forethought on her part. She normally has an idea and runs with it. Either that, or the fact that I\u2019ve been a guinea pig for her for so long somehow vaccinated me.<\/p>\n
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A needle. I get poked and prodded a lot. It\u2019s just what happens when you grow up with my mom.<\/p>\n
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I can\u2019t tell you why she thought it was a bright idea. She never said and we know we can\u2019t talk with her right now. I think it has to do with a break up. She was dating John, who I think was a pretty nice guy. She was complaining about how men can never say what they really mean. And then I told her it wasn\u2019t just men. I was reading a comic book at the time and she noticed something about it that really interested her. She asked to borrow my comic book and then went into her lab, which takes up half the house by the way.<\/p>\n
This isn\u2019t completely out of the norm for her. She often has these brilliant yet absurdly impractical ideas. She doesn\u2019t like spicy foods so she invented a pair of glasses to see just how spicy something is.<\/p>\n
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Three weeks. She would come out to shower and eat. But yeah, that\u2019s about all she did for those three weeks. I suppose I should\u2019ve tried to get her to make up with John and this whole thing wouldn\u2019t be happening and the world wouldn\u2019t be about to explode.<\/p>\n
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I\u2019m sorry. I didn\u2019t mean that. Stop freaking out. I don\u2019t know if the world is going to explode, but I don\u2019t know what\u2019s going to happen either and it\u2019s a bit scary.<\/p>\n
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Maybe she\u2019s working on a way to change it. I honestly don\u2019t know if it will work or not.<\/p>\n
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I think the worst thing about it is how quiet everything is. I\u2019m the only one making a sound. Even the animals are doing it. Hell even my answering machine is doing it.<\/p>\n
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What\u2019s he saying?<\/p>\n
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I don\u2019t understand what he\u2019s saying. It\u2019s just a bunch of random words.<\/p>\n
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Japanese? What does that have to do with it? I don\u2019t care which country he\u2019s from.<\/p>\n
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Right to left? Ohhh. Well that makes more sense. But you see how much of a pain in the ass this is turning into?<\/p>\n
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Stop yelling. I\u2019m answering you the best I can.<\/p>\n
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Stop Yelling!<\/p>\n
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Because your font is huge right now! That\u2019s how I know.<\/p>\n
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You\u2019re yelling too!<\/p>\n
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All of you stop yelling, I can\u2019t see anything anymore!<\/p>\n
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Great. Great. Are you happy? All I see is \u201crabble rabble rabble\u201d over your heads. Do you know how silly you guys look? Just chill out. Please?<\/p>\n
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Okay, good. Now let me try to explain. I think she was really happy with what she did at first. Some good things did come out of it. The deaf suddenly have no disability, though the blind are suddenly in a world of silence. Everything everyone said to each other is very clear. No one can screw up an order and let\u2019s face it; this is one way to make sure we have a 100% literacy rate. The weirdest thing? You want to know how to spell something? Just say it out loud. The bubbles know how to spell better than you.<\/p>\n
My mother really thought she let people communicate more clearly with one another, but I think she first regretted what she did when she tried to play some music. A bunch of floating notes and lyrics just don\u2019t do the job and she really loves listening to Jethro Tull. My mom used to play the flute when she was young, you know. I\u2019m not saying that\u2019s what made her decision to do something about it, but I think it helped. She probably also didn\u2019t like the sound effects. Those things can be downright dangerous at times. When I drive a car and just see a big \u201cSCREECH\u201d coming at me I can\u2019t see the car in front of me. That\u2019s not safe at all, is it?<\/p>\n
My mother isn\u2019t one to feel guilty over her experiments. She just doesn\u2019t have the time for it. She sees a problem and then decides it needs to be fixed. Remember John? Well she made up with him. Not because everyone was speaking in speech bubbles all of a sudden, but because John\u2019s just a nice guy and way more patient with my mom than I am.<\/p>\n
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Oh yeah, sorry. I guess I got off my point. It\u2019s just nice to see her happy again. Okay so she realizes she needs to fix things and she goes into her lab with a box of Red Bull, she drinks the stuff endlessly, left over Easter chocolate from two years ago, and I don\u2019t see her for weeks. When she comes out she tells me to stay away from the house for at least two weeks. She\u2019s going to try something and it\u2019s going to be dangerous.<\/p>\n
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Have you ever tried to figure out what these bubbles are made of? Have you ever grabbed one and tried to pop one? They disappear as soon as they come, but if you ever managed to grab one you will find that they very much exist in the physical world. They feel like rubber, but I find it\u2019s far stronger than any rubber I know of. You can stretch them out to who knows where.<\/p>\n
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It\u2019s important because that\u2019s how my mom plans to stop all this. I can\u2019t explain the science to you. I mean hell she invented a new science to make this happen, but she thinks if we can pop one of those bubbles then the entire system will break down. We\u2019ll go back to normal if one bubble pops. But like I said the bubbles don\u2019t last long and they seem to be made of a very stretchable and resilient material.<\/p>\n
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A bubble normally only holds a sentence or maybe two. We don\u2019t normally think in more than one or two sentences; our mind can\u2019t hold it all, but my mom found a weakness.<\/p>\n
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Think about it.<\/p>\n
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She wants to stretch one out. Stretch it beyond its limits.<\/p>\n
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Yup, she\u2019s going to say a sentence so long it\u2019ll pop the balloon. Or maybe end the Earth. That\u2019s what she was doing all those weeks in her lab, constructing a sentence so long it will take her weeks to say it all. I can\u2019t imagine how big her balloon must be.<\/p>\n
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From space, huh? That\u2019s impressive.<\/p>\n
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I don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n
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I honestly don\u2019t know.<\/p>\n
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Either she\u2019s right and we go back to how it was before the bubbles.<\/p>\n
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Or the last thing we all hear is a big, big boom.<\/p>\n
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You don\u2019t have to say that to me. by Chun Lee It\u2019s not like I knew this was going to happen. I can\u2019t answer very many of your questions. _ No, you won\u2019t be able to talk to my mom. She\u2019s trying to find an answer to this … Continue reading
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\nCHUN LEE<\/strong> is dodging gators and enjoying amazing Cajun cuisine in Lafayette, Louisiana. His work has appeared in The Late Late Show<\/em>, Dissections<\/em>, Sails and Sorcery<\/em>, and the upcoming anthology Paper Blossoms, Shattered Steel<\/em>. He is a graduate of the WPF program at Seton Hill University and is currently earning a Ph.D. in English at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"