The alarm rang, a shrill metallic sound that briefly filled the entire house until Tara hit it so hard she hurt her hand.

She sat up with tears in her eyes and let her feet dangle off the bed, then let her face crack into a massive yawn.

She got up, feeling her bare feet sink into the carpet and she slowly started to drag herself towards the bathroom. When she opened the door to the hallway she vaguely heard the familiar sounds from her parents bathroom. Clearly her mother had beaten her to the punch.

She put her hand on the door handle, then suddenly a word sprang into her mind. She let go again and half ran back to her room, where her notebook was still waiting for her.

“However, Swile had also planned to thwart her plans, by taking away her…” was still unfinished on the paper and Tara had to admit to herself she felt mocked by the unfinished sentence, but she knew how to finish it now.

“...by taking away her barges, so she wouldn’t barge in on his evil plans.”

Tara put the pencil down and, cackling to herself at her own wordplay, she rushed to the bathroom to make up the minute she’d lost.

“Keep it down!” Sawyer yelled from behind his bedroom door.

“Like you ever do,” Tara bit back under her breath, making a point of slamming the bathroom door as hard as she could.

“Tara!” her father yelled, “Keep it down!”

“Sorry, dad!” she called back, trying to sound innocent, though the giggle lacing her words made it unconvincing.

Thirty minutes of teasing and hairspray later, Tara was as satisfied as she was going to be with her hair. She had tried to get as close as she could to the Susanna Hoffs look, but she honestly wasn’t sure she’d managed. She simply shrugged and returned to her room in a cloud of hairspray, where the next challenge awaited her. What was appropriate to wear to a bookstore opening?

Often she’d just wear a gray woolen sweater, even in summer heat, to simulate that she wore a shirt of chain mail, but felt that would be off for the occasion. Her eyes drifted to the medieval dress hanging from her dresser, but found that might be too much.

She considered the usual dolphin sorts, then remembered the time. It would be too cold to wear that and she didn’t want her legs to stick to the plastic hospital benches.

Letting out a small sigh of frustration, she simply tore open her dresser and grabbed several garments at random. A bouffant skirt that she’d only ever worn to church once and an old shirt of her brother’s that would habitually slide off her shoulder.

Not knowing what else to wear, she settled on these, put it on and inspected herself in her vanity. She ran her hands through her hair, glad the shirts neck hole was so large it had done little damage. She twirled, found she looked pretty cool, then collected the things she’d need most; her notebook, a novel to read, a fresh set of pens, a handful of lollipops she kept in a desk drawer, and finally, twenty dollars of her birthday money( which she kept hidden distributed among several choose your own adventure novels).

With her necessities set, she smiled to herself, then ran to her mom’s car so she wouldn’t be forgotten.

Tara started when the car’s heavy door fell shut, half waking her.

“Well, you made it,” Mrs Brooks, dressed in her nurse’s uniforms, smiled, then started the car, “You sure you can handle staying up that long?”

Tara mumbled something, which might been have a boast about A’rat the Barbarian’s legendary ability to stay awake, but all Mrs Brooks heard was a half muttered, half yawned ‘abahb…’

“Right you are, dear,” Mrs Brooks giggled, slowly letting the car roll out of the garage, then suddenly hitting the brakes, sending Tara’s head butting into the dashboard.

“Ow,” Tara mumbled, sitting up and closing the dashboard cabinet that her head had opened, “What’s that for.”

“Seat belt,” Mrs Brooks said pointedly, waited for Tara to strap herself in, then properly started the drive towards the hospital.

Tara had hoped to get a little extra sleep in the car, but it turned out that part of her mother’s morning drive was singing along to whichever pop tunes were on the radio, so she had resorted to taking notes for her story instead.

“What you writing?” Mrs Brook asked, turning the radio down when the music was replaced by the umpteenth commercial break.

“...Stuff.” Tara mumbled.

“About boys?” was the teasing follow up.

“Ew, no…”

“You’ll change your mind soon enough,” Mrs Brooks observed, “The next adventure of Rat the Barbarian then?”

“A’rat,” Tara corrected, “And… maybe.”

“What’s she up to now?”

“Heading to the librar…” Tara started and realized that library sounded too modern, finishing the word with, ‘ium’.

“Librarium, hm? I thought Barbarians can’t read?”

“Her sidekick can.”

“Zarko?” Mrs Brooks asked, thought for a moment, then added, “I thought he went with the enchantress from the east.”

“Mom! Don’t read my stories!”

“You let me read the first few! I wanted to know more!”

Tara put on a petulant pout, “These aren’t done…”

“Well, next time don’t leave them lying on your desk… Unless you’re going to start cleaning properly.”

“Hrm,” was all Tara had to say to that, returning to her notebook as the radio went up again and Mrs Brooks continued to sing.