Chapter 2
Princess' room was decorated in various shades of beige, brown, and gray, shot through with silver and gold accents. Princess didn't have a headboard. Instead, the entire wall behind her bed had been covered over with champagne-colored velvet. Pale pink, blue, and purple rhinestones served as buttons to tuft the fabric onto the wall. A chandelier hung from the ceiling, its clear crystals sending subtle rainbows around the room.
"This is beautiful," Aura said, which was an understatement. She felt like she'd been transported to the inside of a crown.
"Thanks!" Princess said. She unbuckled her shoes and then slipped them off. Aura was relieved that she and her other self had something in common besides their earrings. The first thing Aura did when getting home was kick her shoes off. However, whereas Aura would have just kicked them under the bed, Princess re-buckled the shoes and then walked them over to the closet. "Do you want to take your shoes off?"
Aura nodded. She wore steel-toed hiking boots about a size too big for her. She unlaced the boots and then slipped them off. Princess swung open the closet door and turned on the light.
Aura's closet was a mishmash of colors, patterns, and textures. She didn't have any room in her closet for shoes, so they lay jumbled under her bed most of the time, and she generally wore her hiking boots with everything. They were usually the easiest to find, bleary-eyed in the morning, and they came in handy in a lot of the more dangerous or colder worlds she visited.
Princess' closet, on the other hand, was a serene oasis of pastels. Shoes in equally pastel colors lined a low shelf stretching across the bottom of the closet. A similar shelf that ran across the top of the closet displayed tiaras in different shapes and sizes.
As Aura moved closer, she saw that half of the closet was taken up by long dresses made of sequins and chiffon. They were glorious, even within the confines of their clear garment bags. Aura sighed. "Wow." she said. "Do you, like, do pageants or something?"
Princess laughed. "No, I just like to dress up. Sometimes, I wear them to school. I went casual today."
Aura almost choked at Princess' definition of casual. She looked at Princess' closet again. Not a pair of jeans or sweatpants to be found. "Do the other kids make fun of you for dressing up in a ballgown?"
"No," Princess said. "Sometimes, I text my friends in the mornings and they dress up, too. Sometimes they don't, but that's okay."
Aura couldn't breathe. She handed her boots to Princess and then turned away. She walked over to the window. Princess had friends to text in the morning? At school, Aura either had kids who actively bullied her or kids who didn't. Sometimes, she served as a temporary friend for new kids who hadn't made any friends yet, but they usually forgot about her pretty quickly. Aura's real friends all lived in different worlds. She'd always felt like that fact balanced out her inability to make friends in her own world.
But here was Princess living in the same house, going to the same school, dressing like a weirdo, and being accepted. What was the difference? The sense of inferiority that had sparked in Aura when she first saw Princess burst into full flame. Aura's entire body was covered in hot, shame-filled goosebumps. She felt a telltale tingling in her earlobes, signalling her preparation to return home.
"Do you want to try one on?" Princess asked. "I think we're probably the same size," she added with a laugh.
Aura turned. "Try one on?" It was hard to concentrate on Princess' words over the roar of envy pounding in her ears. "You mean a dress?" The tingling in her ears receded.
Princess shrugged. "Yeah. I do it all the time. I get bored if I wear the same thing for more than a couple of hours."
Aura walked back over to the closet. She looked at Princess. "Which one should I try on?"
Princess grinned. She ducked into the closet and returned with a bright purple silk dress, the same color as Aura's backpack. It had horizontal stripes made of matching sequins running across the drop-waist bodice. The stripes continued onto the box-pleated skirt that fell to mid-calf. "Grandma got me this, and I didn't have the heart to tell her it wasn't quite my style."
Aura was speechless. It was the most beautiful dress she'd ever seen. She took it with reverent hands and went into the bathroom attached to Princess' bedroom. The bathroom was painted entirely in gray, with silver accents. She shucked off her school clothes, dumping them clothes onto the counter next to the sink. The dress slid on, the hem tickling her shins.
She returned to the bedroom, the swish of the skirt demanding to be twirled. Aura complied. Princess emerged from the closet. She had changed while Aura was in the bathroom. Now she wore a floor-length ballgown with a form-fitting bodice of opalescent sequins. The skirt flared out from the waist in long strips of chiffon made up of a rainbow of pastel colors.
"Wow!" Princess said. "If I'd known how good I'd look in that, I would have worn it a long time ago!"
Aura blushed.
"Sit down and I'll do your hair," Princess said. She gestured to a vanity made of natural wood that gleamed like gold. It had a ring of lights around the mirror and about a thousand drawers. The chair was made of the same natural wood and upholstered in silver velvet. Aura settled herself onto the chair, feeling like a queen.
Princess took down Aura's ponytail and brushed her hair with a silver-handled brush. "So, you're me," she said.
Aura nodded before remembering that her hair was being brushed. She cleared her throat. "Yes. Back at the school, you didn't seem to know what travelling was...is that true?" She could see Princess' reflection in the mirror.
Princess huffed a half-laugh."I mean, I travel, but only within my own dimension using like bikes and cars and planes and stuff. How were you able to get here?"
Aura shrugged. "I don't know. Mom says I've always been able to travel to different places. Even when I was a baby, I'd take her to other worlds. It scared her at first, but she got used to it."
"Hmm..." Princess said. Absently, she gathered up Aura's hair into a low ponytail and then started rolling it up from the bottom. "So, can other people from your world travel to other worlds, too?"
"Not as far as I can tell," Aura said.
"Is your world, like, closer to the Milky Way or something?"
Aura laughed. "I mean, I don't know. I just got here, but I didn't sense anything like that. I just tried to sense the next closest world and then I could feel this one, and then I was here."
Princess frowned. She used several hairpins to secure the roll to the hair just above the nape of Aura's neck. Then she fluffed out the edges of the roll. It looked like Aura's hair had lost several inches and now curled up to just below her ears. She turned her head left and right, admiring the effect. Princess went into her closet and returned with a simple tiara. She settled the tiara onto Aura's head, but placed it over her bangs, about an inch above Aura's eyebrows. It matched the style of the dress. The sparkle of the tiara mesmerized her.
She glanced up at Princess and realized that Princess was still frowning. "What's the matter?"
Princess flushed and turned away. She sat down on the edge of her fuzzy gray duvet. "Why can't I travel to different worlds?"
Aura stood and crouched in front of Princess. "Maybe you can. Have you ever tried?"
Princess' expression brightened. "No," she said. She leaned toward Aura, her eyes flashing with excitement. "Do you really think I could?" She frowned again. "Wouldn't I have done it by now? Plus you said that your mom told you that you've been travelling since you were a baby. My mom never said anything like that."
"Hmm...I don't know why you haven't traveled but maybe I can teach you to."
"Really?" Princess shot up from her bed. "Okay! Let's try it!"
Her sudden movement made Aura lose her balance.
"Sorry!" Princess said, She bent over to help Aura up.
"It's okay," Aura said, laughing. "At least I know how you feel about the idea."
"What if I can't do it?" Princess asked. She looked uncertain, an expression that Aura assumed was alien to Princess' face.
"Let's just try it," Aura said.
Princess took a deep breath. "Okay," she said. "What do we do?"
Aura held out her hands. "Take my hands and close your eyes. Okay, good. I want to go to one of my favorite worlds. It's a world made of clouds and rainbows and the only sentient creatures I've ever seen there are pegususes."
"What's a pegususes?" Princess asked, her eyes still closed.
"They're like horses except that they're rainbow and they have big bird wings."
"Wow," Princess said. "i can't even imagine a world like that."
"Try," Aura said. "Picture yourself surrounded by clouds, like giant pieces of cotton candy -- and that's what they taste like, except that instead of sugar, they're made of tiny drops of sweet water. In some places, they're so thin that you can almost breathe them, and in others, they're so thick that you can jump on them like a trampoline."
Aura felt it, the tingling in her ears that indicated her connection to another world.
Princess let go of Aura's hands. "Hold on, my ears are itching."
Aura opened her eyes and grinned at Princess. "Perfect!" Aura said. "My ears always itch before I travel."
Princess' eyes opened wide and she pulled her hands away from her ears. "Really? That means it was working!" She grabbed Aura's hands again and closed her eyes. "Okay." She let out a deep breath. Clouds, clouds, clouds...oh -- it's not working!" she said, pulling away again. "I'm too excited and can't concentrate."
"Okay," Aura said. "What if I take us this time? I'll take you there, and then you can try to bring us back, and if you can't, I'll bring us back."
"Oh. Okay," Princess said. "And I'll try to pay attention to what you do, so that I can try to do the same thing later."
"Awesome!" Aura said. She took Princess' hands again and closed her eyes. She brought her mind back to clouds and rainbows, and felt the answering tingle in her ears.
"This is beautiful," Aura said, which was an understatement. She felt like she'd been transported to the inside of a crown.
"Thanks!" Princess said. She unbuckled her shoes and then slipped them off. Aura was relieved that she and her other self had something in common besides their earrings. The first thing Aura did when getting home was kick her shoes off. However, whereas Aura would have just kicked them under the bed, Princess re-buckled the shoes and then walked them over to the closet. "Do you want to take your shoes off?"
Aura nodded. She wore steel-toed hiking boots about a size too big for her. She unlaced the boots and then slipped them off. Princess swung open the closet door and turned on the light.
Aura's closet was a mishmash of colors, patterns, and textures. She didn't have any room in her closet for shoes, so they lay jumbled under her bed most of the time, and she generally wore her hiking boots with everything. They were usually the easiest to find, bleary-eyed in the morning, and they came in handy in a lot of the more dangerous or colder worlds she visited.
Princess' closet, on the other hand, was a serene oasis of pastels. Shoes in equally pastel colors lined a low shelf stretching across the bottom of the closet. A similar shelf that ran across the top of the closet displayed tiaras in different shapes and sizes.
As Aura moved closer, she saw that half of the closet was taken up by long dresses made of sequins and chiffon. They were glorious, even within the confines of their clear garment bags. Aura sighed. "Wow." she said. "Do you, like, do pageants or something?"
Princess laughed. "No, I just like to dress up. Sometimes, I wear them to school. I went casual today."
Aura almost choked at Princess' definition of casual. She looked at Princess' closet again. Not a pair of jeans or sweatpants to be found. "Do the other kids make fun of you for dressing up in a ballgown?"
"No," Princess said. "Sometimes, I text my friends in the mornings and they dress up, too. Sometimes they don't, but that's okay."
Aura couldn't breathe. She handed her boots to Princess and then turned away. She walked over to the window. Princess had friends to text in the morning? At school, Aura either had kids who actively bullied her or kids who didn't. Sometimes, she served as a temporary friend for new kids who hadn't made any friends yet, but they usually forgot about her pretty quickly. Aura's real friends all lived in different worlds. She'd always felt like that fact balanced out her inability to make friends in her own world.
But here was Princess living in the same house, going to the same school, dressing like a weirdo, and being accepted. What was the difference? The sense of inferiority that had sparked in Aura when she first saw Princess burst into full flame. Aura's entire body was covered in hot, shame-filled goosebumps. She felt a telltale tingling in her earlobes, signalling her preparation to return home.
"Do you want to try one on?" Princess asked. "I think we're probably the same size," she added with a laugh.
Aura turned. "Try one on?" It was hard to concentrate on Princess' words over the roar of envy pounding in her ears. "You mean a dress?" The tingling in her ears receded.
Princess shrugged. "Yeah. I do it all the time. I get bored if I wear the same thing for more than a couple of hours."
Aura walked back over to the closet. She looked at Princess. "Which one should I try on?"
Princess grinned. She ducked into the closet and returned with a bright purple silk dress, the same color as Aura's backpack. It had horizontal stripes made of matching sequins running across the drop-waist bodice. The stripes continued onto the box-pleated skirt that fell to mid-calf. "Grandma got me this, and I didn't have the heart to tell her it wasn't quite my style."
Aura was speechless. It was the most beautiful dress she'd ever seen. She took it with reverent hands and went into the bathroom attached to Princess' bedroom. The bathroom was painted entirely in gray, with silver accents. She shucked off her school clothes, dumping them clothes onto the counter next to the sink. The dress slid on, the hem tickling her shins.
She returned to the bedroom, the swish of the skirt demanding to be twirled. Aura complied. Princess emerged from the closet. She had changed while Aura was in the bathroom. Now she wore a floor-length ballgown with a form-fitting bodice of opalescent sequins. The skirt flared out from the waist in long strips of chiffon made up of a rainbow of pastel colors.
"Wow!" Princess said. "If I'd known how good I'd look in that, I would have worn it a long time ago!"
Aura blushed.
"Sit down and I'll do your hair," Princess said. She gestured to a vanity made of natural wood that gleamed like gold. It had a ring of lights around the mirror and about a thousand drawers. The chair was made of the same natural wood and upholstered in silver velvet. Aura settled herself onto the chair, feeling like a queen.
Princess took down Aura's ponytail and brushed her hair with a silver-handled brush. "So, you're me," she said.
Aura nodded before remembering that her hair was being brushed. She cleared her throat. "Yes. Back at the school, you didn't seem to know what travelling was...is that true?" She could see Princess' reflection in the mirror.
Princess huffed a half-laugh."I mean, I travel, but only within my own dimension using like bikes and cars and planes and stuff. How were you able to get here?"
Aura shrugged. "I don't know. Mom says I've always been able to travel to different places. Even when I was a baby, I'd take her to other worlds. It scared her at first, but she got used to it."
"Hmm..." Princess said. Absently, she gathered up Aura's hair into a low ponytail and then started rolling it up from the bottom. "So, can other people from your world travel to other worlds, too?"
"Not as far as I can tell," Aura said.
"Is your world, like, closer to the Milky Way or something?"
Aura laughed. "I mean, I don't know. I just got here, but I didn't sense anything like that. I just tried to sense the next closest world and then I could feel this one, and then I was here."
Princess frowned. She used several hairpins to secure the roll to the hair just above the nape of Aura's neck. Then she fluffed out the edges of the roll. It looked like Aura's hair had lost several inches and now curled up to just below her ears. She turned her head left and right, admiring the effect. Princess went into her closet and returned with a simple tiara. She settled the tiara onto Aura's head, but placed it over her bangs, about an inch above Aura's eyebrows. It matched the style of the dress. The sparkle of the tiara mesmerized her.
She glanced up at Princess and realized that Princess was still frowning. "What's the matter?"
Princess flushed and turned away. She sat down on the edge of her fuzzy gray duvet. "Why can't I travel to different worlds?"
Aura stood and crouched in front of Princess. "Maybe you can. Have you ever tried?"
Princess' expression brightened. "No," she said. She leaned toward Aura, her eyes flashing with excitement. "Do you really think I could?" She frowned again. "Wouldn't I have done it by now? Plus you said that your mom told you that you've been travelling since you were a baby. My mom never said anything like that."
"Hmm...I don't know why you haven't traveled but maybe I can teach you to."
"Really?" Princess shot up from her bed. "Okay! Let's try it!"
Her sudden movement made Aura lose her balance.
"Sorry!" Princess said, She bent over to help Aura up.
"It's okay," Aura said, laughing. "At least I know how you feel about the idea."
"What if I can't do it?" Princess asked. She looked uncertain, an expression that Aura assumed was alien to Princess' face.
"Let's just try it," Aura said.
Princess took a deep breath. "Okay," she said. "What do we do?"
Aura held out her hands. "Take my hands and close your eyes. Okay, good. I want to go to one of my favorite worlds. It's a world made of clouds and rainbows and the only sentient creatures I've ever seen there are pegususes."
"What's a pegususes?" Princess asked, her eyes still closed.
"They're like horses except that they're rainbow and they have big bird wings."
"Wow," Princess said. "i can't even imagine a world like that."
"Try," Aura said. "Picture yourself surrounded by clouds, like giant pieces of cotton candy -- and that's what they taste like, except that instead of sugar, they're made of tiny drops of sweet water. In some places, they're so thin that you can almost breathe them, and in others, they're so thick that you can jump on them like a trampoline."
Aura felt it, the tingling in her ears that indicated her connection to another world.
Princess let go of Aura's hands. "Hold on, my ears are itching."
Aura opened her eyes and grinned at Princess. "Perfect!" Aura said. "My ears always itch before I travel."
Princess' eyes opened wide and she pulled her hands away from her ears. "Really? That means it was working!" She grabbed Aura's hands again and closed her eyes. "Okay." She let out a deep breath. Clouds, clouds, clouds...oh -- it's not working!" she said, pulling away again. "I'm too excited and can't concentrate."
"Okay," Aura said. "What if I take us this time? I'll take you there, and then you can try to bring us back, and if you can't, I'll bring us back."
"Oh. Okay," Princess said. "And I'll try to pay attention to what you do, so that I can try to do the same thing later."
"Awesome!" Aura said. She took Princess' hands again and closed her eyes. She brought her mind back to clouds and rainbows, and felt the answering tingle in her ears.
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