NO PARKING ZONE

Jessica made her way down the porch of her newly bought house in Manhattan. It was the perfect house, with the perfect view. Whenever she saw the place, she knew she had made it, she had bought her dream house. She had succeeded in life. The only problem with her little paradise was that there was no real place to park her car.

The gardener had cleaned the backyard and planted new saplings of tomato plants. She walked over to the plants and saw the little leaves swaying to the music of the wind. 

“Love to dance huh?” said Jessica, to the smallest sapling. She loved talking to the plants in her garden. 

She noticed that one sapling was a slightly different colour than the rest. She could not understand this anomaly. 

Why would one plant be different from the rest? Had the gardener done a mistake in planting that particular sapling?

She reached out to the plant and slowly caressed the leaves. She found that they were just as soft and fresh as the rest. She plucked one little leaf from the sapling, and she was thrown backward with a crazy force that knocked her right off her feet. She fell down a few feet away from the sapling, from which she had plucked the leaf. 

She looked around her and saw that the sky had turned dark. She could see the Nebula bursting into the different planets. She could see the dinosaurs being destroyed by that mighty meteor. She could even see that mankind was being destroyed and the world was ending. She was instantly soaked in sweat. She felt the tips of her fingernails being chewed off but could do nothing to stop herself. She felt her pulse go up and down irregularly. 

One minute her heart was beating hard in her chest and the next she was sure she was dead.

What was going on? Was she in fact dead?

She felt another push of the wind and she landed flat on her keister. She knew nothing anymore. She saw people with green hair walk up to her and that was the last thing she saw before she passed out. 

She woke up after what she was sure was a crazy dream. Or she had been hit by the lightening, either way she was fine now. 

That was until she saw a bunch of other people with hair coloured green, blue, mauve, orange and a collection of other crazy colours that Jessica knew she would never colour her hair. 

She tried to sit up but the green haired woman put a restraining hand on her shoulder. 

She told her to lie back down by waving her hand downward. 

She felt like a baby being cradled. An orange haired man brought her a glass of juice that was a more shocking colour than his hair. Jessica was forced to gulp it down by the green haired woman.

After what seemed like an eternity of being scrutinised by these people, the green haired woman said, “She seems to have landed here from a foreign land.” She then turned to her and said, “English? You?”

Jessica felt herself instantly relax a notch when she heard English being spoken by the woman. At least she wasn’t stranded in some deserted island where she wouldn’t even understand their language. 

“Yes, may I know which part of the World I am in now, because the last I remember I was in Manhattan, trying to get my tomato plant to grow,” said Jessica, this time forcing herself to sit up.

“What to grow, may I ask?” said the woman.

“My tomato plants. I had a few beautiful saplings in my backyard and was hoping to be able to grow a vegetable garden soon,” said Jessica.

“A plant you say?” said another man from behind the crowd. “My great-grandfather spoke a lot about plants he used to grow in his backyard. Well, until that became illegal of course?”

“What?” Jessica screamed. “When did growing plants become illegal?” 

“Easy darling. I think you may have a concussion. Mind if I check your head?” said the green haired woman.

“I don’t have a concussion. But I am sure I have the wrong world,” yelled Jessica.

The green haired woman tried to push her hair back to check the back of her head, but she stood up and walked over to a wall on the opposite side of the room.

“3018?” she yelled again. “The last time I checked the calendar, it was a thousand years ago.”

She felt tears fill up her eyes. 

Where was she? 

The orange haired man spoke up, “Hey, are you Jessica Marin?”

“You know me?” asked Jessica, completely perplexed.

All the different-colour-haired people ran towards her with complete despise on their features. One of them knocked her off her feet. Another person pinned her to the ground while yet another tried to sit on her. The only person trying to help her was the green haired woman. 

“Get off her, now,” she screamed. 

Everybody obediently moved away from her. 

“Does anything hurt,” asked the green haired woman, helping Jessica to her feet. She stood clutching a table while the shocking orange juice was forced into her again.

“I am sorry, but why did my identity bring that reaction, may I ask? I am extremely sorry if I have made any of you feel bad in any way. That was clearly not my intention,” said Jessica, looking around at all the people in the room.

The room was silent for some time, then the orange haired man spoke again. 

“You are the one that the president keeps talking about. He says that it is thanks to you that he gets to rule us.”

“Me? Why?” 

“Aren’t you the one that lived in that mansion back there?” he asked pointing in the general direction of where he knew the building was.

Jessica tried to look where the man was pointing but all she saw was a large thick wall with no windows.

She looked around the room and found that all the walls were similar and none of them actually had a window or any form of ventilation.

She was suddenly light-headed. She sat down in a small bean bag that lay on the floor. 

Noticing her sudden state of breathlessness, the green haired woman pressed a large green button and the room was filled with fresh oxygen.

“What did you just do?” asked Jessica.

“Well, when our room is filled with more carbon-dioxide than is good for us, we fill the room with more oxygen from the tank and flush out the carbon-dioxide,” said the green haired woman. It was now obvious to her that Jessica wasn’t from the place or time. She had travelled to their world mistakenly.

“Why am I famous here, may I ask? And why does the President have a special interest in me?” 

“You are the one that built the garage in the building the President lives in now. I don’t know how you have travelled to our place or time, but let me tell you, you will not be welcomed if you leave this room?”

“Why? Is it also illegal to build garages in 3018?” asked Jessica with a chuckle. She immediately realised that the joke was in poor taste as everyone else had a sombre expression on their face.

“I am sorry,” said Jessica.

“Well, it is obviously clear that you don’t know what you are doing. But that is the garage where our President started his operation- ruin our lives,” said the orange haired man.

“I am sorry, I did not know that.”

“He also calls it the Jessica Marin room. He says that is where his life changed for the better. He has been ruling us ever since. He built a small team of experts both mentally and physically and overthrew the government that was ruling us until then. My great-grandfather told me that they used to vote their leaders. But now, we just listen to the President and do as he says else feel his wrath.”

“I am sorry I had no idea,” said Jessica. 

“Well, so are we. I just wish that either you had never built that garage or our President had never been born. But what is the point, right.”

Jessica felt her gut clench. She was supposed to meet with a carpenter the next day. She had no idea if she would ever go back to her house, ever. She could not believe that she might actually end up living here all her life. And she knew that life was hell here. She could not believe that it was her garage that led to the doom of the world. 

She sat down deep in the bean bag and put her hand in her pockets. She felt the little green leaf still sitting there. She played with it in her pocket, thinking of a way out, for all of them. The little leaf tore in two. 

She felt herself being thrown again, this time along with the bean bag. Her neck started to pain. She couldn’t take it anymore. One more time, and she was sure that her bones would snap. She saw the Nebula, the dinosaurs, the final war, all over again. 

She closed her eyes, her sweaty palms shutting her ears tight. 

She opened her eyes and saw the little tomato sapling sitting in its place, moving with the slight breeze. She saw that she was sitting in the bean bag, in which she had felt the sudden turbulence, and had been pushed in. 

She got up and walked over to the plants and found that the different coloured tomato sapling was missing, the leaf no longer in her hand. 

She heard the front gate creak open, the carpenter walked in.

“Hello, is anybody home?” he called out.

“Back here,” called out Jessica. 

The man walked to the back and saw her sitting in her little bean bag. 

“Nice bean bag,” he said. “You had called me earlier today, about the construction of a garage.”