When the girl opened her eyes, she saw stars. They were pieces of her childhood that refused to unstick from the ceiling. She turned her head to look at the clock.

10:36.  

"Shit," the girl mumbled. She was positive that she was at school twenty minutes ago. It usually didn't take her this long to slip back into consciousness. She attempted to sit up. The unnatural shift of skin on the nape of her neck stopped her. Instinctively, her hand investigated. It wasn't the injury that made her panic, but the ability to touch it. There was no wall of brown locks standing in her hand's way. She patted her neck, bearing the pain, to ensure that she wasn't going insane.  The girl whirled around to observe her pillow. Its white cover was stained by a tangled mass of brown mixed with a bit of red. She looked at her hand, which was dressed in inverted attire. The glint of scissors on her nightstand was the next to catch her attention.  It still had traces of the hair she used to call her own. They accompanied a sliver of peach skin on the blades.  The girl blinked. If she didn't know better, she'd think her other persona was trying to kill her.

The full-sized mirror nailed to the door helped the girl snap back into reality. Her school uniform wasn't safe either. The uneven collar, the drops of blood sprinkled on her beige skirt, the lopsided sweater that left a shoulder exposed…She looked like an accident victim. After fixing what she could she tried a second time to make it to class. On her way to the living room something that she prayed would disappear from existence stood in her path. It was transparent orange bottle of pills, little white reminders of her ailment. She pretended she never saw them. Next to the bottle was a bookshelf full of black magic. Aged relics stacked like dominoes frozen by time, the books contained the girl's family history buried in pages of spells. She never understood why her parents refused to return them to the library. They were nothing more than a laughable way to pass the time. Shaking her head, the girl went into the cramped bathroom by the front door. She washed the blood from her hand before searching for a first-aid kit under the sink. Once her wound was dressed and concealed by a scarf, her hair was the next to be dealt with. Luckily, it wasn't completely disastrous. If she brushed the longer bits over the uneven patches, maybe put on a toboggan, it could look somewhat like a pixie cut.  She went to work. Every now and then she glanced at the clock on a wall a short distance away.

10:47.

10:59.

11:06.

The girl missed second period. She exited the bathroom, ignoring the pills and books. Her messenger bag was sprawled on the wooden floor. She was grateful that the other persona didn't place it somewhere inconspicuous again. She scooped it up and lifted the strap over her head and onto her opposite shoulder. She sighed. The window by the door reflected her modified appearance. It wasn't cold enough to have so many layers but it would have to do.

"Oh my God, what happened to your hair?" was a variation of what many familiar faces said as soon as she arrived. Somewhat disheartened that her disappearances have become so common that they weren't her friends' primary concern, she simply said "I didn't like it so I cut it."