The clocked stopped.

Was it a sign?

Carly shook her wrist, frowning at the white leather contraption bound there. She was one of those old fashioned girls. She didn't dye her hair golden; it was natural. She had freckles, and crows feet around her eyes. She didn't want to remove them. There was a 19" boxy TV sitting on her dresser and an powder blue, rotating-dial phone on her nightstand. Her barely used cell phone was sitting in the pocket of her purse. She couldn't use half the features it came with but she knew how to use the clock.

She checked her alarm clock. Still blinking. The power had been out while she had gone to work. the clerk at the drugstore across the way had informed her so. She unhooked the watch band, hating as usual the white ring it left in its wake. It responded not to her jiggle or nail flicking. Dismayed, she gave the bathroom an apprehensive glance then trotted down the stiars, her ponytail jouncing along with her nerves.

By habit, she looked at the VCR. It blinked in digi-blue back at her. 'You forgot,' it said.

She had.

She lifted her sweater. Her purse was pink, and adorable. It matched her completely. Her phone was not in the little ruffled pouch that she placed it in, every day, before she left work.

Carly didn't panic. She was never a panicy girl. There was still the landline and the ever infallible Operator. Her phone was only misplaced, not disappeared. These thoughts swam through her head as she shook loose her sweater, checked the seats at the table, tha table itself.

Among these thoughts was a picture. A white plastic tube with a plastic bound window. One line. Two lines. Life continued or game/career over.