Board Thread:Writer's Workshop/@comment-25743804-20141122100537

The first thing I noticed was my iPhone's alarm bleating for me to wake up. I hastily grabbed it from under my pillow and silenced the ringing. It was morning and the sun poured through my window into my room.

I slid my finger across my phone to unlock it and checked my notifications. It was a force of habit to do so as soon as I awoke; my eyelids were heavy with sleep and I could barely read my screen.

At first I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me, but I saw that I had 129 notifications on my Facebook app. I felt a cold dread wash over me as I wondered what could have caused such a stir overnight that I had that many notifications! I usually only had one or two, if any. I had just been on Facebook before I fell asleep.

I tapped open the app and waited for it to load. Before I could tap the notifications tab, I couldn't help but notice a special banner at the top of the app. It said,"Tell them you love them before it's too late." Tapping it sent me to my Messages app where I had nearly a hundred unread messages from friends, family, and a couple acquaintances, all telling me either that they loved me or frantically asking me where I was. Their messages were tense and hurried, and my close family and girlfriend had sent me message after message, seemingly desperate for a response.

Startled, I quickly sat up in bed and looked around. I was in my room in my parent's house. I had lived here my whole life, and everything looked like it always did. So why was everyone looking for me?

Turning around in bed (my window is right above my headboard) I was able to pinch the shutters open and look outside. Everything looked normal. Completely fine. It was a gorgeous summer morning.

I looked at my phone again where there were messages from my parents and aunts and uncles telling me that they love me so much and that they just wished they could see me again before "the end".

The end of what?

I tapped back to the newsfeed and as I scrolled I saw hundreds of status updates from everyone I knew. The emotions were at a fever pitch. Some people were ranting and spewing hatred at others, denouncing friends and family alike. Some were pleading with the universe or God or each other to be saved. Others were offering words of consolation and preparing themselves for the "next life". But amid this strange mix of brutal honesty and raw emotion, there were more and more news stories, and they all shared one common word:

“Meteorite”

My heart leaped in my chest. There was a meteorite that was going to hit earth!

I scrolled through the stories faster. "Only 12 Hours Left On Earth," "Only 1 Hour Until The End Of Humanity," "Goodbye," were some of the headlines of stories being posted by virtually every news page I followed.

Frightened and breathing shallow, I clumsily tapped back to my messages. My mom had been desperately trying to contact me. Most of my family were. However, none of them were online now.

My mom’s message said the family was gathering for one last meal at grandma's house on the north side of town, and, with a grim snark, she told me I shouldn't be late. I saw there were hundreds of missed messages from my girlfriend. I closed the app and went to my phone app, my palms sweating. I had 174 missed calls.

"What am I doing?" I yelled at myself aloud, and I hopped out of bed and flung my door open. I looked out down the hall and into the kitchen and saw nobody there. I ran down the hall and almost fell as my socks slipped on the hardwood floor. I ran through the kitchen and into the living room to find my mom and dad sitting in their chairs, drinking coffee, and watching TV.

They looked at me strangely. I was breathing heavily and had wild eyes. I snapped my gaze to the television, but there was no news of a meteorite. It was just a recap of President Obama's State of the Union speech from the night before.

"Honey, are you ok?" My mom slowly asked.

I turned around and ran to the front door and flung it open. Through the door I saw a normal morning: kids at the playground, a person walking their dog, and cars driving down the street in no particular hurry.

I was lost. Where had these messages come from? Was this a big joke? How was it possible?

I was standing in my front yard in my boxers, phone in-hand, dumbfounded. I opened up Safari and searched for the first news site I could think of and clicked on it.

The page didn't have news on it. It just had a white screen with a headline that said "GOD HAVE MERCY ON US ALL". A cold shiver ran up my spine.

I went to another news site. The last story posted had the headline "Sunday, July 16 is Officially The End of The World."

I visited website after website. They were all full of stories lamenting the end of humanity, and from the headlines I could gather that the meteor was due to collide with our atmosphere at any moment. I looked up from my tiny screen and saw a blue sky. What the hell was going on?

I ran back inside and my dad was standing up. "Are you okay?"

"No I'm not fucking okay! Where is the meteor!"

My parents' jaws dropped as they looked at me, and then at each other. My mom approached me and tried to hug me saying, "Honey, what's the matter with you? What meteor?"

I evaded her embrace and continued, shaking. I couldn't control my voice and I was beginning to cry. "You called me! You messaged me about a meteor, the end of the world! These news sites say the world is ending!"

I yelled and tried to explain until I broke down in tears as my mom and dad hugged me and tried to console me.

"Babe, I don't know what you're talking about but there is no meteor. Everything is fine! We were just watching the news right now. You must have had a bad dream."

My father, squeezing my shoulder reassuringly with his warm, strong hands, said, "Come sit with us and relax. Take a breath, okay?"

I wanted to, but I felt betrayed. "But you called me. You messaged me. You acted like the world was ending." But even as I said these things, I started to feel like maybe it was all just a dream, or some sort of ridiculous prank. My adrenaline was dying down, and the emotional turmoil had drained me. My face hurt from crying and my voice hurt from screaming. I dried my tears and hugged my parents and sat on the couch as they took their respective chairs and settled in for the news.

I was still clutching my phone in my hand so hard that it left white marks where the blood had been pushed away from my skin. My head hurt. It didn't make sense. I opened my Facebook app again and looked at the 90 yet-unread messages I had from close friends and family. The messages were real — right here in front of me. Even the ones from mom.

"You guys didn't send me messages or hear about a meteor?" I asked, skeptically.

"Babe, no. We have no idea where you got that," Mom said tenderly.

I frowned. "But it's all right here," I said, holding up my phone.

"Let me see."

She grabbed the phone and looked at the messages. As she read, her calm expression started to change, and the color drained from her face. My dad noticed and asked "Hey, what's wrong? Are you okay?"

“I did send it-” she choked.

She shakily stood up and brought the phone over to dad, where she pointed at the screen. He grabbed it and looked, and my heart froze as his calm expression cracked and his fear boiled over.

"Dad?"

He wouldn't speak.

"Dad? Dad! What's wrong?" I yelled, and I jumped up and grabbed the phone and looked at it myself.

The message on the screen was from my mom and it said:

Darling, I don't know where you are, but please just know that I love you with my whole heart. I love you so much. Don't be afraid

Sent on Sunday, July 16 2034  