The new world surprised me as I passed through the wooden door. I don’t know what I was expecting, but it wasn’t this.
Snow swirled around me and my feet didn’t appear to like the frozen ice coming in contact with them. My feet dragged me faster.
All the trees seemed to be normal sized. I was glad the snow wasn’t super sized. “There has to be something weird about this world,” a voice in my head thought. I’m a boy now? Well, I’m not British this time.
My feet continued to pulled me through the snow covered forest. Occasionally, I would see a squirrel or rabbit scurry away from my pounding footsteps.
I was staring after a bright red squirrel when my feet stopped. I heard water flowing. Behind me, a river with occasional chunks of ice floating in it stood a few feet away. A beaver dam stood against the rushing of the river and “my” voice said, “I bet it’s warm in there.”
And suddenly I was inside. I didn’t walk in here? The dam was warm and had a surprisingly nice living space.
“Mr. and Mrs. Beaver?” I called out. My voice sounded confused. Suddenly I knew Mrs. Beaver would usually be in the small living area.
“Oh! Hello, Timothy! What brings you here?” a brown beaver with a feminine voice was walking on its hind legs is moving around fluffing pillows. That was weirder than the dragonfly.
My - Timothy’s voice - rang with a deeper sound, “I was in the woods looking for some game and got too cold in the storm,” I explained. Apparently I had been “hunting”.
“Oh, you poor thing!” the beaver rushed over in a waddle like movement and took my numb hand, pulling me into a chair next to a table that - just like the door - hadn’t been there before. A cup of tea was in front of me and a plate of biscuits sat steaming with melting butter on top. They looked amazing. Just as I was reaching for a biscuit, it was in my head and my feet were at attention and pulled me out of the chair, abandoning the delicious pastries I so longed for.
“I’m so sorry, Mrs. Beaver! I have to be home before dinner! Thank you for the treat!” ‘Which I had gotten none of,’ I thought bitterly. My feet seemed to scream in protest once they touched the icy cold snow. The dam was out of sight after mere seconds of being pulled away.
More creatures I passed called after me, “Timothy? Are you alright?” Squirrels and skunks can talk, too?
Another door stood on a tree my feet were speeding towards. As it swung open at the last minute, I hurtled through into the next world I would encounter.

This world wasn’t snowing or over-grown and didn’t appear to have any talking animals around. When I entered this world, I stopped thinking of it or any of the odd encounters I had in this….. running?
A house sat, small but beautiful, in the middle of a meadow of green grass and red flowers. I recognized it though; it seemed so familiar. I knew this place but couldn’t place a name for it. I looked around and saw a woman and man sitting on the porch of the cabin. The woman had her face buried in the man’s shoulder and looked to be crying.
A wave of emotions flew over me along with a typhoon of images. A little girl on a bike with the man on the porch holding onto the seat guiding her in wobbly lines across a street with excitement. The same girl blowing out a #9 shaped candle with a group of other girls and the woman kneeling by her side with happiness. Wait, I knew that girl! That was me! My name is Jasmine, and I’m 13 years old. My parents are Timothy and Sophia Swell. My neighbors are Mr. and Mrs. Beaver - yes, their last name is Beaver-, and my grandfather is Greg Derting. All the names in the worlds belonged to people I know!
A grumbling noise like a running engine came from the woods behind me. I slowly turned and saw glowing yellow eyes without pupils. It!
Suddenly a beeping noise interrupted my thoughts, and I smelled sterilized gloves and disinfectant wipes. The image of the house and it fell away and everything went black.

                                  ************************

Light filtered through my eyelids, causing an image of red to shine in my eyes. I willed my eyes to open, little by little, until I was blinking in the brightness of a lamp over me. The beeping noise continued along with the overwhelming smell of a hospital. Hospital?
I turned my head to the side with a groan of soreness and saw a bag of saline attached to my arm.
“Woah! Someone finally woke up!” a voice said from the door on the other side of the room. A nurse stood with a tray of medicine in hand. Her skin was cream and roses with blonde curls and blue eyes. She could have been a model rather than a nurse. Her red heels clacked as she walked smoothly over to my bedside. “How are you, Jasmine?” she asked as she sat the tray down and inclined the bed with a remote.
When I tried to answer her, I realized my mouth was enclosed in a breathing machine. “Where am I?” my voice was muffled by the plastic.
“Oh boy. That car really got you, huh?” she shook her golden topped head and started filling a syringe with some sort of medicine. “You’ve been in a coma for three days, honey. You’re in the Middleton Hospital,” she said studying my face.
I imagined the people in the image. “Are my parents here?” I asked, feeling sick while I thought of what could have happened to them. 
“Not right now, they just went for lunch. They’ve been here the whole time otherwise,” she moved over to my arm and injected the needle into my arm. It stung as it left my skin, empty of the fluid. “Good girl. Would you like something to eat, or the TV on?” she asked, moving over to the TV in the corner.
“Sure,” I said, thinking of the biscuits and tea at the beaver dam. “You said ‘the car got me’, what does that mean?” I asked recalling her words.
“Maybe we should let your parents talk to you about that,” her face seemed pained, then lightened up a bit, “I’ll go grab some food from the cart and be right back,” she bustled out of the room.
Looking around, I saw the room was furnished with only a small dresser with a lamp and mirror, the TV, which was playing some sort of cartoon, and my bed. The door across from me must have been a bathroom.
The nurse appeared again and walked over to my bed, placing a tray with a small chicken breast, green beans, and mashed potatoes steaming in front of me. A cold glass of water with condensation beading at the rim waited to be drunk. I didn’t realize how hungry I was until just now. I picked up the fork, but put it down when I remembered the mask on my face.
“Can I have some help with this?” I asked motioning to the breathing machine.
“Oh, of course!” the nurse jumped to attention and turned off a machine beside me then carefully removed the mask from my face. As soon as she did so, I grabbed up the fork and shoveled large amounts of chicken, potatoes, and beans into my mouth, barely giving myself time to chew.
The plate soon was empty, and my stomach was full. I took a drink of water to wash it down and was satisfied. The nurse chuckled and reached for an intercom sitting on the dresser.
“Celia? Hi! It’s Samantha at Jasmine Swell’s room. Can we check the waiting room for her parents?”
There was a pause and Samantha looked over at me and smiled, “Great! Can you send them over here? She’s awake and has eaten.”
Samantha then hung up the phone. My parents. I get to see my parents! Only two minutes later the door opened, and a lady and man jogged in.
My mom! My dad!
“Oh, Jasmine!” my mom cried as she threw herself on me in a hug, “Oh baby!” I smelled her sweater and remembered it as a familiar smell to me. She pulled herself away and I saw her mascara was smearing over her beautiful blue eyes. She had a worried expression on her face. “Do you know who I am?” her voice was shaking.
“Yes. You’re my mom,” and I knew she was. My eyes filled with tears, too. “You’re my dad,” I said looking at my father standing right behind my mom waiting to see me.
Both were very attractive. My mom had dirty blond hair with topaz eyes. Her face was the perfect oval shape with a small nose in the middle.
My dad looked like a handsome movie star with his brown hair and mostly shaved beard. His eyes were hazel. His face was a little more square with an average nose. I wondered what I looked like.
“Well, she woke up and seemed to be fine. I gave her some more medicine and food. I’ll ask the doctor to come and meet with you about her release,” I had forgotten about Samantha in the corner.
“Thank you,” my dad’s voice was deep and had bass to it, “for taking good care of her.”
“Of course,” she smiled and walked out of the room, golden curls bouncing.
I looked over at my parents and saw my dad whispering in my mom’s ear, holding each other close.
“Mom, Dad?” I asked, “how did I get here?” Their eyes filled with dread.
Finally, my dad sat on the edge of my bed and took my hand.
“Jas, you went walking with some friends. You were on the crosswalk downtown, and the light turned green. You walked out and someone didn’t see you,” his voice started to sound angry as he mentioned the ‘someone’, “He hit you,” his voice broke on the word ‘hit’. “Luckily, one of your friends called an ambulance just in time and another called us. You’ve been out for three days,” Both of them looked at me with uncertainty.
‘He hit you,’ the line ran through my head. A flash of a memory of it flashed. The yellow eyes without pupils, those were headlights. Headlights.
The sheer reality of it all came rushing towards me as the doors in the dreams did. Speeding, until I broke through and I was in another place.
I need to stop thinking of the other worlds. This is the world I belonged in. I felt a sudden wave of exhaustion come over me and yawned.
“You should rest. We’ll be here when you wake up,” my mother crooned.
My eyes began to close and I saw the image of their faces looking at me until my dad said, “We love you!”
And I knew they did.