Gifts

                I looked in the box, and there sitting in wrapped perfection was a tiny parcel, right on schedule. I had no idea where it had come from because much like its predecessors it had no return address, but I knew with certainty that it would be something wonderful, and intriguing. I carried the tiny box, no more than ten centimeters cubed, up to my room. Since I had started school I had received three packages, all of which came from my parents. That is until my nineteenth birthday upon which I withdrew from my postal box in the lobby a package containing the first of many oddities I was to receive. The packages had come at a rate of one a month always on the anniversary of my birthday for a semester and a half. My collection of strange things had escalated at an alarming rate.

 Now I sat on my bed with the tiny box nestled carefully in my hands. What wonders would this little package hold? Surely it was nothing as strange as the jar with the preserved salamander. I looked over at the bazaar gift where it sat on the desk. Though the sad little creature disturbed me, I hadn’t the heart to discard it. Nor could I have thrown out any of the other novelties that I had received. I balanced the small parcel before me between the tips of my fingers. It was a rather weighty little box for its size, and though I was wary of its contents curiosity won out over caution in the end and I tore into it quite heartily.

There settled on a soft bed of cotton was a perfect glass orb. I carefully raised the precious sphere from its nest, and held it fast between my fingers. It was of amazing quality. I looked through it and was unhindered in the morphed view of the other side. It was as though the form had been cut and shaped rather than poured. I held the glass up to my eye and surveyed the room. The surroundings looked minuscule through the looking glass.

 I let the glass sit upon my fingers as though they were a pedestal and I gazed into the depths of the glass. That was when the light began to shift. It startled me at first, but than once more the curiosity grew, and I looked yet deeper into the mysterious glass. What at first was a shimmer of color quickly became a moving figure and I feared that I might come all the way through the glass and out the other side in some strange new place. I could hear noises so loud that I thought I might go deaf, and I saw colors so bright that I was sure I would go blind. I wasn’t in my room, I was rather uncertain of whether I was even in Kansas anymore. The raging motion and shift and noise were enough to scare the little glass out of my hand. As the sphere tumble out of my grasp so too did I tumbled out of the nightmare of oppressive sensation. I panicked that the glass might shatter, but as I came to my senses I found the orb sitting innocently upon the bed spread completely unharmed.

I could do little but stare at the incredible object for a long time. What had just happened? What had I seen? Would it happen again if I took hold of the sphere once more? Did I really want to know? I settled on the fact that I didn’t for the time being and so covered the glass with a towel. I carefully lifted the weighty object to my desk and placed it into the first drawer. I decided I had to tell someone, lest the happening be lost to the doubts of imagination. So calmly I walked across the hall and knocked on my neighbor’s door. Sluggishly the door opened a crack. A series of grunts told a tale of woe about having to get out of bed at the ungodly hour of four thirty in the afternoon.