We were going to New York City for a school trip. Our bus pulled up to this humongous hotel, and we all lined up to check in.

As I came to hand in my ticket, I noticed it said "This ticket has been lost or stolen". I was suitably alarmed, until I noticed that wasn't the part of the ticket you turned in. (Maybe it's there for your safety in some bizarre way.) I ripped off the perforated "ticket" part of the ticket, handed it in, got my key, and carried all my stuff to the elevator.

The elevator was small, but the ride was short. Arriving on the relevant floor, I noticed that it too was rather small for what you'd expect in a big hotel like this. There were about four doors in a hallway shorter than any in my dorm. I set down all my stuff and looked for my key--and couldn't find it. Rrr.

It didn't help that I didn't know what number my room was. I was pretty sure it was printed on the key, but of course the key was missing. I went and I tried knocking on the left door at one end of the hall. Before I could touch it, a strange man opened it up and told me that no, this wasn't it. Looking inside the room, I saw that it was some odd cross between a room and a bathroom, all tiled with sinks. Hmm. He went across to the door across the hall, where another man received him.

Then someone from my school came out the elevator, and asked me if I was lost. I guess about now I was. He left, and I picked up all my stuff and got ready to get back on the elevator but ah!--there was my key, right under my bag. I put it on my keychain so I wouldn't lose it, and I looked at it... Apparently it did not have my room printed on it, at least not clearly: There was a different number on each side of it. Then the stranger from the other room called out the date--17 February--and I noticed the number on one side was 17 2. So I decided that no, this was the wrong floor, and went to the floor indicated by the number on the other side.

I got up there, and it was even weirder. It wasn't rooms on this floor. It wasn't even cubicles. It was just a set of tables or desks in a large pattern of rows. I walked to my place and used my key, I don't know where, to get in and sit down. There was a TV showing some stuff, but some joker went and replaced it with some gay sex video. The police came in and shut off the TV and carried him away.

I don't remember what happened next, until I'm at a big modern house. A precious little girl lives here. She is very smart for her age--maybe six or seven--and loves to invent things. For example, she invented her family's dog.

I forget the details of this part... but her inventions had started developing bad quirks... the second dog she built was a bit vicious... they wouldn't tell me about the third one... I was sure it wasn't her fault; dogs go bad all the time on their own, don't they? (I hate dogs.)

A friend of mine told me this wasn't natural, she shouldn't be able to do things like that at all, she must be evil. I was yelling at him--You think all genius is evil? What about people like Mozart, who was composing before he was five?. I don't think I convinced him--the movie "Amadeus" kept popping up--but there was an argument about how old Mozart actually was. Feh. I always get sidetracked arguing with him.

I had gone back to the little girl's house, and they had all gotten out of the pool and were heading to the showers. I waited in the living room, and she came out. Do you hate me? she said. No, I said, and hugged her.