The World Behind the Star

“Why can’t you see that we have to leave?” I said with my anxiety growing more and more each second. It was too late. We had failed; no I had failed. “It is not as bad as it seems Jo. We can fight them. They don’t have the advantages we do. We could win if we stay and fight” He argued not seeing reason. Perhaps he was past it now. “They will kill us all if we stay here. There is no way we can win. Why can’t you see that? We can come back and fight. There is a plane, but we have to go now before it’s too late.” My arguing seemed to build his resolve. The walls seemed to be closing in around us as we waited for the sound to come telling us someone else had died. As we argued our own lives slipped more and more away; and then as we stood there looking at one another the boom of death came out of the sky. I began to run away from him without another glance. In dreams begins responsibility William Butler Yeats Very few things registered to me at the moment. Dawn had broken two hours ago over the small New Hampshire town of Pikes Cove and I had seen it from the moment it began. I felt overwhelmed as I looked outside at the rising sun. I sometimes forgot why I had come to Crestfield College even though it was home of the best international studies program in the country. There was no real explanation as to why I had come to New Hampshire. I had chosen to come clearly, but the reasons why now seemed rather small except for one, money. Crestfield had offered me something Bray College had not and I could not ignore that fact. That is what I told myself; there was nothing I could do now that I was here. I caught a glimpse of my face in the window. In the past I had been told I was rather pretty. My skin was pale, and a little translucent. My brown hair that sometimes looked red in the sun was pulled up into a messy ponytail. My eyes a light blue made my face look even paler in the new light of day. My nose had small clusters of freckles, and a small line across it from a figure skating accident when I was a child. The line was hardly noticeable to people who didn’t know about it, but I always liked to think it showed only the smallest of my many flaws. My family had always strived for perfection, but I was hopelessly flawed like the literary character they had named me after. The sounds of my roommate waking up brought me back to the present. The moment it took her to become aware of her surroundings gave me the chance to remember her name. If I had been alert I would’ve just looked at the door of our double to see her name. Eventually her name came to me and I said “Good Morning Lily”. Lily responded by sitting up in her bed then she looked at me with a smile on her face and said “Why good morning Josephine March.” ending with a laugh, of course. Her red hair cascaded down her back in a way that made it look as if it had been styled by a Victoria Secret stylist, the perfect mix of sex head and actual deliberate construction. Lily’s long red hair rested atop her nicely built frame of alabaster skin. Her eyes made her well proportioned face come alive. They were brown mixed with green and the combination of color made it seem like the color was endless, and always changing. Somehow in the current light of the rising sun her eyes seemed to burn red, matching her hair almost perfectly. I’d had pretty roommates before. Amanda my freshman year at Meyer University, and Julia at Bray, but Lily from our two days together I could see far surpassed the others. It was rather disturbing that I would always be assigned to room with someone so extraordinarily beautiful but I had come to except it over my travels from college to college. I had been to three colleges in three years, and each year had brought a more beautiful roommate. Things had rubbed off of course. Amanda taught me how to wear make up, Julia how to walk in heels without killing myself the way I did in flats. I wondered what glorious things Lily could teach me; how to curl a boy around my finger perhaps. The thought of me being able to attract and hold a guy was almost laughable. In three years of college there had only been one boy that had shown an interest, but he quickly had come to his senses and ran in the other direction. Amanda always said I fit my name almost perfectly. I was named after a strong willed heroine that I had luckily become as my parents hoped I would. If Lily was going to try and teach me about men then she would clearly have her work cut out for her. “Why are you awake at this ungodly hour” Lily asked with a big yawn. I hadn’t thought about what I would say if she were to wake up and ask me this question so I offered an unconvincing lie “I’m a morning person” I responded. “Ha!” she scoffed. ”Yeah right, and I’m five eleven. You know you can not lie to save your life. Are you sure politics is right for you? It seems like you should lie better in such a crocked profession.” Lily always seemed to be able to create conversation at any time even at this “ungodly” hour. “Thanks.” I sighed giving in as I knew I would. Why lie, she’d know I wasn’t being truthful. “No. I had a dream that freaked me out, and I couldn’t sleep. Ok.” There was no way I was going to tell her what my dream was about it was too embarrassing. “What was it about? Have a dream you were late for the secret meeting everyone is talking about and they made you stand in the front of the auditorium in your underwear?” She asked with a smile on her face, but her eyes still seemed covered in sleep. There was a way to end this conversation quickly. “Nope, nothing like that. I was just running in a never ending hallway with a loud boom going off in the background…” I trailed off and changed the subject. “You look like you could use some more sleep. Go back to bed we still have a few more hours before class.” “Don’t mind if I do, Miss March. You scare easy if that’s what it takes to get you in a tizzy. You should try to sleep some more too. Then we can go and see what kind of fine specimens Crestfield has to offer for the fairer sex.” “Ok” I replied crawling back into the bed I had only slept in for two nights. There was no way I could sleep, the dream still fresh in my mind. The half truth I had told Lily did make it seem as if I scared easy. Normally it was true, I did scare easy, but this dream felt so real. Even though it had been two hours I still couldn’t figure out what was truly happening. The boom made me push harder in my attempt to flee… was I trying to flee or was I running to something. It seemed like I was running to someone, or something, or nothing all at the same time. I had woken up out of breath and sweating perhaps that is why it felt so real. With my mind heavy with exhaustion I turned my face to the wall and tried to sleep. <>> At nine thirty I woke up to the sound of Clair De Lune as our alarm went off. It was nice and soothing as the notes lulled me out of sleep. I was happy this was how Lily woke up every morning. She told me she changed it from time to time, going from Swan Lake, to Mozart, and then to anything else that caught her fancy. Lily also said she had a soft spot for Moon River and that was her fall back to Clair De Lune. Lily rolled over and turned off her cell phone alarm. She pulled back her hot pink comforter and hopped out of bed on to the cold floor. She looked like every guys fantasy in her yellow lace underwear and blue tank. She walked to the micro fridge grabbed a Diet Pepsi, sat down in the blue rocking chairs supplied by the college and opened her computer. The TV was turned on, and the sounds of E! News began to come out of the little box on top of my wardrobe. As Guliana Rancic talked about the dos and don’ts of fall fashion I looked around our room. Lily’s side was consumed by all things pink. A hot pink striped comforter with light blue and lime green horizontal lines covered her bed, with a pink fluffy pillow at the head of the bed. A pink lamp sat