3 A Rainy Day

Amanda was miserable. Walking back to her crumby apartment was the worst part of every day. She hadn't known her feet could hurt so much until she started working at Pizza Palooza. Such a stupid name for a restaurant. She sighed.

"This really wasn't the way I saw my life going." 

Ever since Amanda could remember, she had this idea of how her life was going to turn out. She would graduate valedictorian of her high school (which she did), be given a full scholarship to Detroit university(which she was), graduate summa cum Laude and go on to become the most famous Lawyer of her generation. After that, she would enter politics, and eventually be elected president of the Council of Nations (which would now never happen.) 

Amanda kept trudging down the dark street and started to remember the day her life had completely gone down the drain.

                            __________________________

"Honestly, Sarah, I don't know why you're excited about graduating. After we leave school you're just going to be spending most of your waking life in some gross hospital with dying people."

"I'm excited because soon I'll be doing the work God intended me to do; helping people through medicine. You just wouldn't understand."

Amanda rolled her eyes and looked away. She was getting sick of Sarah always going about God this and Jesus that, and Holy Spirit whatever. It had been this way ever since Sarah had come back from visiting her grandparents in Seol. Somehow the old coots had brainwashed her into believing the same stuff they did. 

"You better not talk about that stuff to anyone else, you know. You could get in some serious trouble." Amanda warned her.

They came to a stop in front of Sarah's door. Amanda waited as Sarah let the door scan her retina, and then followed her into her apartment after it opened. 

_______________________

Amanda jolted out of her thoughts back into the present. That day would live on in her memory forever. She remembered how she and Sarah had spent that night eating junk food and watching holo-movies. Then, about a quarter past twelve, a group of armed men burst through the bedroom door and hauled Sarah away. Apparently, she had tried to convert another girl at school; who had afterward ratted her out to the authorities. After a brief trial, Sarah was sentenced to being Banished. 

Amanda fell into an intense state of grief after that. Without Sarah by her side, she started becoming depressed and angry. Eventually, she snapped and got into a fight with a classmate whom she heard saying he was glad Sarah got kicked out of Detroit. That was how she was expelled. 

Amanda looked up at the dome's ceiling. It was raining outside, but of course, she could only see it. She wondered briefly if it was possible Sarah could have survived outside, but she shook the thought away. No need to entertain false hope.