Ethereal

2038

All the lights in the house were off, the bedrooms and hallways silent except for the occasional creak of a rusted pipe and the freezer’s ice maker sputtering out freshly made ice cubes. Like every other house in the neighborhood, this one stood tall and hushed, blanketed by the warm shadows of summer.

A little girl sat on the carpeted floor at the foot of her bed, sifting through a small wooden box. It was filled with items she deemed irreplaceable – her grandmother’s crab broach made of a strange blue marble, a ticket stub to the first theatre movie she had seen as a child, a rare two dollar bill that had been shredded in four different places but had been gingerly taped back together again, and a glass marble she had stolen from her older brother when they were younger.

He believed it was still missing, having rolled under the couch or into an air vent, never to be seen again. If he knew she had kept it this entire time, she knew he would be furious with her. But she couldn’t help it – inside the glass marble was whirlwind of blues and purples, slowly fading into bright pinks at the edges of the sphere. It reminded her of the picture books in school that showed pictures of different galaxies and universes, and she thought they were beautiful.

She tucked the marble into her pocket and spared one last look at her priceless possessions. Her mother had just come into her room not even five minutes ago and told her to pack only what she could carry. She knew she would carry that little box to the ends of the earth, but she was worried it would get lost, or stolen. It was better to leave it at home, where it could stay safe rather than risk it out in the world. But the marble had to come with her, she couldn’t leave it behind.

“Sweetie,” her mother whispered, opening her bedroom door. She could barely make out her face in the darkness. “It’s time to go. Are you ready?”