With late May came the most important tests of the school year.  A boy sat at his designated testing location trying to finish one of them.  He looked at the clock to see that he had not but fifteen minutes to finish his World History Final.  In his opinion, he didn’t have nearly enough time to finish answering sixty-five questions, but it wasn’t exactly his choice.
     Fourteen.
     The nature of Tracy was to look at the person to his right as a form of fighting his way out of a corner.  He had most definitely done it before, but never on an important test, feeling it was immoral to do so.
     Thirteen.
     Tracy’s idea of immoral had changed over the last couple of years, however.  Just recently, he had told his parents that he was going to spend the night at a friend’s house, when in reality, him and that friend went to egg their geometry teacher’s house, and then spent the rest of the night cruising the down town.
     Twelve.
     Tracy had, in all ways, become a fake person.  He had lied to his teachers, his friends, even his girlfriend.
     Eleven.
     He was running out of time.  Tracy hadn’t payed a speck of attention in history this year and only had about thirty or thirty-five questions answered.
     Ten.
     He casually looked out the window to his left.  To balance it out, he casually looked at the clock to his right.  And then he slowly let his eyes fall down to his desk mate’s paper.
     Nine.
     He was finished in eight minutes.

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     Tracy had no problem telling his parents about what an easy test it was at the dinner table that night, and he absolutely had no problem falling asleep, either.
     Problem wasn’t a factor in Tracy’s life at the moment.  That moment, however, lasted very shorty.
     A layer of pollen was always transferred from Tracy to Tracy’s bed in the springtime, leaving him either runny or congested in the morning.
At 8:00 in the morning, Tracy awoke with a long stretch, sucking in air as he did so.  On this particular morning, he had no problems with allergies, allowing him to breath happy.  He looked around his bedroom.  Everything felt newer.  Cleaner. 
     The trophies on his dresser all looked shiny and golden.  But the accomplishment that came with them, he just couldn’t feel.
     He got out of bed and walked over to them.  He picked up one he had earned from winning the championship in his basketball league in eighth grade.  It still had that factory fresh smell that he forgot was ever there.  He put it back down and opened his drawer, pulling out a neatly folded pair of sweats.
     He put them on and walked on a reflective hardwood floor to the stairs.  He went down, step by step, walking past family portraits that had been hung there years ago.  One caught his eye.
     It wasn’t any different from the one that had been hanging there before, although it looked like it had been dusted.  No, it looked exactly the same.  Tracy stared at him and his parents on the beach, however he couldn’t remember for the life of him when that picture was taken.  It seemed to him like it had never been taken, actually.  He remembered being at the beach.  He remembered pictures being taken.  But he couldn’t remember being in this one.
     It’s not like he hadn’t seen this picture before.  In fact he remembered walking past it every morning of his life.  But it had just crossed his mind now that he didn’t have the memory that the picture held.
     Tracy realized it was crazy to think that the picture hadn’t been taken, obviously it had.  It was right there in front of him, it was just odd…
     It didn’t stay in his mind for too long.  A couple of steps later he was down the stairs and he had his mind set on a hot cup of coffee. 
     His mom was an avid coffee drinker, and always had a pot made.  If she didn’t make it, his dad always made one for her.  Tracy took after this, although wasn’t as enthusiastic about it as his mom was.  A cup a day was all he needed.
     He pulled a well-washed mug out of a cabinet and picked up the shiny metal coffee pot.  Either he got stronger over night or there wasn’t any coffee in the pot, because he almost broke the coffee machine trying to lift the thing out of it.  He set down his mug and pulled off the coffee pot’s lid, to which he saw nothing.  He looked over at the clock, wondering if he woke up too late to get any.
     Still 8:00, which was strange.  Had it really taken him less than a minute to wake up, get out of bed, get dressed, come down the stairs, stare at a painting, and then check the coffee pot?
     The clock was working okay, he heard it ticking and saw the second hand moving…  Maybe his nightstand clock was just a little ahead…
     He put the coffee pot down.  It was a strange morning…  Even though everything was exactly the same.
     “Hey Mom!” he called out, wanting to ask about the coffee.
     “Hey—“ he started, but was interrupted by seeing his mother sitting on the couch.
     “Hey mom…”
     He was waiting for a response but didn’t get one, so he continued.
     “Did you drink all the coffee?”
     Again no response.
     “Mom?”
     She sat there silent, looking at a T.V. that was turned off.
     “Hey Mom…?”
     Maybe she was asleep.
     He looked back to the cabinet and pulled out a bag of coffee grinds.  He took 2 scoops and put them in to a filter, and then into the machine, which he filled up with water.  With a sharp CLICK of the ‘ON’ button, the machine went to work.  He turned back to his mom, she hadn’t moved an inch.
     “Hey Mom.”
     Again, he waited for a response that didn’t come.
     She didn’t look asleep.  She sat upright looking straight at the television. 
     He walked over to her and stepped around the couch.  Her eyes were wide open and glassy, fixed on a certain point, unmoving, unflinching.
     “Mom?”  The normal human expects some sort of reaction whenever they call out to someone, something is always wrong when they don’t get one.
     Tracy didn’t get a reaction.  She looked dead ahead at the same spot.  It was as if she was completely unaware that she was alive.  She was a plastic doll on a self.  Tracy shuddered and asked again, looking for any sort of response.
     “Mom?”  She didn’t move, she didn’t flinch, she didn’t look, she stayed still.
     Tracy moved toward her hand, which was resting in her lap.  He didn’t know what he was going to feel, or what he was expecting to feel.  On any other day he would’ve expected to feel skin, to feel warmth. 
     What he felt was cold.  What he felt wasn’t skin. It was as if he feeling a part of his arm that he had slept and had no more feeling in.
     All at once.
     All at once he realized what was going on.  He gasped and fell back, focused all too much on the state of his mother.
     Where was she?
     He realized that everything in his world had been replaced with an exact copy.  Nothing was his any more.  Nothing was what it was.  Nothing was the way it should be.  And it never would be again.
     Was he crazy?  Was he right? 
     No matter how much he didn’t want to be, he couldn’t shake the undoubted feeling that he was.
     He was asleep.
     That was it.  That was just it, he had to be asleep.  He ripped his eyes away from his mother and closed them tight.  He had to be asleep.  There was no other way that this could be real.
     He had to be asleep.  He was going to wake up real soon and that was going to be it.  He had to be asleep.
     He had to be asleep.
     He had to be asleep.

The End