Going Home

         "Maryanne's dead, Katie." Lisa was trembling as she spoke. I said nothing, I couldn't think of anything. "For God's sake."
         "Lisa, how did you get my number?" My thoughts were fuzzy, like I was looking at them through a greasy window.
         I hadn't spoken to Lisa in over fifteen years. Our group, the one you cling to in high school and then never see again, had drifted apart as all of them do.
         "Katie are you listening to me?" She was shrieking now and that did nothing for my grip on the situation. I felt as if I was floating farther and farther away from the phone, from my cozy little studio. The air around me was dimming, the temperature rapidly dropping. "I can't find it. Katie, I can't stay here. I want to go home, Katie."
         I nodded, not at all aware that she couldn't see me. Maryanne was dead.
         "How?"
         "Well, we have to find the key, obviously."
         "No, Lisa, how did she die?"
         "What? It was a car accident. Katie, it could happen to any of us. Any of us, any second. We have to leave. Katie, please, help me."
         "Where are you?" She gave me the address and I hung up the phone.
         Numb, I barely managed to find my keys on the table right in front of me. Maryanne had kept her word and stayed close to the old school. None of us were supposed to move more than a few hours away and I got to her place in two. I stood by my car for what seemed like years, looking up at the two-story farmhouse look-alike. The place was right out of a magazine. Like Maryanne herself, really. She'd fallen in love with this world, with it's tight grasp on little details like dinners and neighbors, dresses and shoes, gardening and interior decorating. This place suited her well.
         I went through the little gate and up the walk, rang the doorbell. It seemed Lisa had been waiting right on the other side, because the door flew open before the chime silenced. Lisa flung herself at me, arms clenching tight around my shoulders. She sobbed.
         "I can't find it. I want to go home."
         "I know." I could barely manage a whisper. "We'll find it." I pushed my way inside and looked around. The place was just as I had pictured when I saw the outside. Everything sweet, fashionable, tidy.
         We searched the house for hours and the doorbell rang again. Kent and Geri greeted us blank-faced. The whole gang was together now. Except for Maryanne.
         It was Geri who eventually found the key. I smiled a little when she came out of the guest bedroom with it, the little faceted crystal sphere dangling on its delicate silver chain. She had always had such a knack for finding things. Kent called upstairs for Lisa and we gathered in the living room, forming our little circle, now one member short.
         "Will it work without Maryanne?" I asked.
         Geri  nodded. I hadn't been ready for something like this, hadn't even entertained the possibility of death. Clearly I wasn't the only one.
         "I don't want to die," Lisa sobbed again. "This wasn't that fun anyway. I want to go home. Please, let's just go home."
         Geri pulled a piece of chalk from her pocket and got down on her knees. Carefully she outlined our circle, scribbling words in a language that now looked so strange and alien to me. She drew lines from each of us into the center, finishing with another circle little bigger than the crystal she held. She placed the crystal gingerly in the center and the whole diagram began to glow. Geri took her place again and we all bowed our heads.
         "He won't be happy," Kent said.
         "The Master is ever merciful, ever forgiving," Geri intoned.
         "I want to go home," Lisa sobbed.
         And in a brief flash of light, we did.