An Interdimensional Portal to Venus Sounds Safer Than My Mom (But Not Really)

Before we start this whole "It was her fault" sort of thing, let's get this straight.

I've got a 4.8 GPA, skipped sixth grade, have joined every club possible, and still managed to screw things up with my mom. Why?

Because I was dumb.

But Sophia, you must be like a genius with that GPA!

Yeah, well, apparently I'm smart academically, but not when it comes to life decisions. I tend to screw a lot of things up.

At least I definitely didn't do anything as bad as my mom did when she was high school. That's pretty hard to beat. You're probably wondering what she did that I can't, but that would take a pretty long time to tell you. She gets enough spotlight already...it's my turn.

But long story short, my mom, Callie, accidentally created a portal that opened up a gateway for a bunch of mindless goons that walked around for a bit and disappeared when the sun came out the next day.

How am I supposed to live up to zombies?

Maybe I could do something with demons...

Stay on track, Sophia. Your mom may have gotten a lot of attention and popularity for what she did, but that doesn't mean she wasn't grounded for three months.

Besides, demons would be a lot more work to clean up. They'd probably start a rampage through my town then move all through the country. After the whole country has been destroyed, ripped to shreds, and terrorized by demons, I'd then take the pleasure of telling them to head on over to somewhere tropical...maybe Jamaica. I think they'd like it there and might decide not to drive the world into total chaos and destruction. Who knows, maybe they could take me with them.

I could lay on the beach, drink in my hand, stretched out on the sand and chilling with my new demon friends. I also heard that there's a lot of cute (not to mention shirtless!) guys that are on vacation on the beach. Curly brown hair, perfect body...

How did we get to this subject? Like, where did we start? Because I'm getting way off topic. And embarrassed.

Right.

Anyway, my mom's getting all this attention for nearly destroying the freaking world. I'm the smartest in my grade (maybe even the state) and guess how much recognition I got?

Zero.

Nothing.

Nada.

Zip.

Diddly-squat.

I needed to be seen. I needed to recognized. Enough about the wonderful Callie. It's time for Sophia.

So I got to making the portal.

You're probably thinking: Wow! You must have a cool lair to hang out at, and tons of super techy stuff. They're probably really expensive!

Hahahahahahahahahahaha.

No.

My "lair" is the dingy old basement that nobody ever uses. And the super expensive tech that I've got? The remains of my mom's old portal.

At least that part wasn't bad. I was planning on making a portal anyway, so parts from an old portal were just what I needed.

It only took me about three weeks. And the thing was, it should have taken me longer than that. My mom had like five gazillion different portals before one of them actually worked...so one point Sophia!

Oh, and I don't know if I already mentioned this, but my mom has a weird obsession with naming things. My dad, Ben, was just happy that one of them wasn't named after him. Especially because they all blew up.

So, I've decided to name my portal. Its name is Callie.

You know, because it's gonna blow up. Kinda what I want my mom to do.

I'm kidding. I don't really want her to blow up. She's the only person smart enough to help me with something, she's the only person I can go to talk to when I need to. She's always been there when Dad was off playing football for the stupid NFL.

Now you're probably wondering: But Sophia, if your Dad plays for the NFL, then why aren't you living in a mansion, and why don't you have a lair and super expensive tech?

My dad is a funny guy.

He's using that money to pay whatever bills need to be paid and all that stuff, but the extra?

It's all in the bank before I even know how much is left.

I have to wait until I'm eighteen for it. Then I'm supposed to use it to go to a super nice, well known college and get a house and stuff like that. BORING.

Only two more years, I guess.

ANYWAY (this is what, the gazillionth time I've gotten off topic?).

I made a list of what I needed to do. My mom is strong believer in lists, and so it just kind of comes naturally to me...it helps me stop and think through everything.

SOPHIA'S AMAZING PLAN THAT WILL GET MORE ATTENTION THAN HER MOM'S AND SOLVE ALL OF HER LIFE PROBLEMS:

1. Build Callie

2. Open the portal to the 2nd dimension (why the 2nd, I have no clue. My mom opened the portal to the 4th one, so why not give 2 a try???)

3. Close the portal if things get out of hand

4. Be totally unorganized and try and deal with whatever comes out of the portal.

5. Blow Callie and my mom up

Yep. That's a pretty bad list, but hey, at least I got one.

Over the time that I spent making Callie, I may or may not have ignored my mom. And she may or may not have been too happy about it.

We kind of grew apart, and even after the whole fiasco with my portal, we still aren't nearly as close as we used to be. That sucks. It really does.

I've been rambling on and on, and you're probably getting really bored. Long story short, the portal was a bust. I opened it, but it was an opening to Venus or something. Of course, I would have gone through, but I only would have been there for fifteen seconds before I lost consciousness from the lack of oxygen.

And Callie decided to blow up in my face. Literally.

So now she's gone, I've got a major sunburn, and my mom and I aren't on the same page as we used to be. I didn't get famous. I didn't get rich. But I did get grounded. For three months.

Now we're back to the beginning.

It was her fault.

If my mother hadn't made that stupid portal to the fourth freaking dimension and wouldn't have gotten famous for almost destroying the town, I wouldn't have felt like I had to live up to that. And now my mom, who used to be my best friend, doesn't talk to me that much anymore. Life kinda sucks.

I'm starting to think that maybe I should have stepped through the portal and onto Venus.