Amanda stood frozen, staring in shock at the body she had just accidentally struck with her car. Panic and disbelief warred in her chest as she rushed to the motionless figure, desperately searching for any sign of life.

There were none. Suddenly, a circle of green, blue, and purple formed in front of Amanda. It expanded, revealing a mirror-like surface. But instead of the man lying dead, in this alternate dimension, he was sitting alive.

Amanda had a choice to make. "Is this real?" she whispered to herself, her voice barely audible over the sound of her pounding heart. She reached out tentatively, her hand shaking. As her fingers brushed the edge of the circle, a jolt of energy surged through her. It wasn't painful, but it was powerful — like a sudden rush of adrenaline.

Would she step into the portal to this alternate reality? Amanda took a deep breath and stepped forward, imagining herself being engulfed by the portal. She felt the energy envelop her as she walked straight ahead into the alternate reality, where the man had not died—only been injured—and braced herself for whatever lay ahead.

Amanda blinked.

Glass and car parts spun and twirled before Amanda's eyes. Behind her, a portal appeared—then vanished. Suddenly, she was in a new timeline, with no idea how she had arrived. This timeline felt bolder, more confident. She was no longer standing amid wreckage; instead, everything seemed whole, and she found herself in an unfamiliar place that somehow felt completely familiar.

Amanda walked what felt like forever, searching for a place she hadn't known existed. Her body seemed to guide her instinctively, even though her mind had no idea where she was going.

As her steps carried her forward, Amanda's thoughts raced. She almost felt like a child again, and wondered if this was a glimpse of a past life. Everything was strange, surreal, and unsettling.

She felt as though she were drifting inside a dream — and perhaps she was — yet she remained fully awake within it. Around her, there were no signs of the home she knew, only the strange, unfamiliar world that had taken its place.

She ran wherever her body led, and it carried her to an old abandoned house at the corner of the street. The place loomed in silence, its broken windows and sagging frame casting an eerie shadow across the pavement.

She ran toward the house, her vision distorting as reality flickered in and out. One moment, she saw the abandoned shell before her, and the next, she glimpsed the house as it had been in another time — alive, familiar, almost as if she had lived there once. The shifting images overlapped, leaving her dizzy and uncertain.

Everything was confusing, yet she pressed forward. Stepping inside, Amanda felt the weight of memory pressing against her mind. She tried to recall fragments of a past life, searching for answers in the shadows of the house that seemed to belong to both her present and her past.

Finally, she was able to hone in on the older timeline — one that felt like a fragment of her past life. The house before her stirred something deep within, and though she couldn't be certain, Amanda sensed it had once been her family home. She felt it not in her mind, but in her soul.

And in this timeline, she was not Amanda Blackburn.

She braced herself and ran toward the thriving house, its windows glowing with life, its walls intact. Her heart pounded with anticipation and unease. She didn't know what waited inside — only that something was calling her forward.

As Amanda approaches the furnished home, she holds her breath. She is so nervous she thinks she could burst; she runs up to the house and, out of the corner of her eye, sees a man working outside.

It is the man that she ran over in the other timeline that she was in. When she steps into the portal, she goes into this man's life to see how he lives. And much to her total surprise, he turns around and says:

"Hey sweetie, come and get some food, it's fresh! Mom made some toast and eggs!"

Amanda gasps and runs up to the man. In this timeline, it is her dad! This is why, when she hit him in her correct timeline, everything seemed to go haywire. She wonders if she landed in this timeline simply to say goodbye.

The man looked at her with a puzzled face.

"Hello? Mom made food, and you aren't running to stuff your face?"

Amanda straightens up and acts like she belongs in this timeline, so as not to disrupt or look crazy. She has done the psych ward before; she is not going back.

"Oh, yes, just tired," Amanda says lazily.

Her "dad" smiles, and then they both go inside.

At the table sits a woman dressed in every color; she is vibrant, almost dazzling. She wears a neon top with a lace neckline and stark, bright pink pants covered in patterns that stick out like a sore thumb. Amanda looks at her face and is floored by who her mother is in this life—it is even more shocking than her father. She takes a second to regroup. Her mother is her best friend, only much older, and the realization makes her start to feel dizzy. Everything in this timeline is so different, so jarring. The room begins to spin.

Amanda falls to the floor, striking her head against the cement part of the fireplace behind her, and she passes out.

Amanda woke up on a bed, drenched in sweat, muscles aching, and consumed by fear. She did not realize upon waking that she was in a different timeline; her body was rejecting the very fabric of this reality, and the thought of explaining her distress to her current family stressed her out even more. Amanda felt around for her glasses, locating them on the small nightstand next to her. She looked down at her hands, unable to process her unfamiliar surroundings. Then, the truth descended upon her, hitting her like a physical blow. She remembered everything all at once. Everything started to go black again. This time, she refused to lose consciousness; she fought to remain anchored in the moment by searching desperately for a glass of water. Wobbly but moving at a pace impressive for someone who had just nearly blacked out, Amanda continued her determined journey to find sustenance. This timeline stuff is getting weird, she thought to herself as she finally reached the bathroom. She turned the sink on and took a sip of water, and it made her feel better. An unbearable ringing erupted in her ears, so loud that she had to quickly sit on the toilet to stabilize herself. All of a sudden, the room began to violently spin before her eyes. Breathless, she gripped the sides of the toilet and braced herself against the intensifying disorientation.

After A great time of being dizzy and disorented......

Amanda was bracing herself as another portal formed out of thin air

She looks in the portal and sees her correct timeline right before she gets in the terrible accident in the beginning. Her other self is just sitting there crying, not knowing what to do. Amanda wondered if she could help, so she stepped through the portal. While she was in the portal, she felt weird, like her body was changing. When she came to the other side, she was her other self again—her true timeline self: Amanda Blackburn.

The scene was exactly how she had left it. The man was struggling to breathe in the car. Amanda snapped back to reality, realizing everything that had happened before switching timelines. Confused and tired, she ran toward the car and removed the man. Suddenly, he started choking and moving around—a good sign, Amanda thought to herself. Now if he could just completely heal, she thought again.

At the sound of her internal plea, Amanda's hands began to glow. She felt small jolts of energy surge from each palm, and then, she intuitively knew to walk up to the man, reach out, and heal the wounds that were keeping him from living. She focused her intention: she wanted to save his life. Following her internal intention and the energy in her palms, the man sat up straight and immediately coughed. Amanda was amazed that she possessed this power. Is this why I went back to that timeline? she wondered. So many questions swirled about in Amanda's mind.

Amanda walked up to the dumbfounded man; he had seen everything.

"Ma'am, are you an angel?" the man let out with a sigh of relief.

Amanda smiled and shook her head.

"I'm so sorry this happened, sir. Saving your life was the only thing I could do."

The man stands and walks over to Amanda.

" You got the gift, girl, be careful and use it wisely."

Amanda gasped and yelled after him as he left. She quickly turned around, and he was gone.

The man’s silhouette vanished into the late afternoon haze as if he had never been there at all, leaving Amanda alone with the fading hum of energy still vibrating in her fingertips. The air around her finally felt still—no more ringing, no more violent spinning, just the heavy, grounding reality of the pavement beneath her boots. She looked down at her hands, the skin still warm from a power she didn’t yet understand but could no longer deny. The questions about timelines and portals remained, but the weight in her chest had finally lifted. With one last look at the empty road where the wreck had been, Amanda turned and began to walk, finally stepping forward into a future that was entirely her own.