97

Everyone has a bubble world, a light floating world they think they control but is actually propelled by the wind. Each of the bubble worlds has a name: Star. Struggler. Romantic. Businessman. Lost Soul.

The bubbles sometimes pass each other, sometimes bump, sometimes just drift away. They merge. They pop.

I’ve been drifting, but not exactly aimlessly. I’d say more like casually. I’m a writer with the unlikely name of Biff and I simply hadn’t settled on a world of my own just yet.

I’ve created many worlds, some more appealing than others. There was the detective world, with apparently random murders which only a brilliant mind could figure out and—with seeming ease—unmask the killer. And the romantic world with longing and eventually bodice-ripping sex. Then there’s the robots and aliens versus the scrappy remnants of the post-nuclear human race.

And I considered these worlds and others but they just didn’t fit.

I was floating and my bubble was still undefined. I bumped into another bubble. The occupant looked unhappy but I made a crazy snap decision: to switch places. “Biff,” I said to myself. “You can keep floating, keep inventing new worlds, but if you really want a change, you have to take a chance and make one.” I mean, what he heck. I was bored. It was time for a change.

I settled in my new bubble and looked around. It was disorienting but refreshing too. The bubble was clear, like my old one, but this new world had different filters. It was darker, gloomier, brooding. Sometimes I couldn’t see out at all. So, I started looking inward, past my invented worlds and into a previously unexplored inner mist. It was hazy, now, and relaxing. Sleepy.

I dozed for an undetermined length of time, seconds or centuries.

I awoke, showered, shaved and started a new day. No, a new life. I highly recommend it.

Now, I’m gripping the steering wheel and looking out the windshield. The wheel is just like the one from my previous world; feels great in my hands but it doesn’t do anything.