The night before I had trouble falling sleep, I had all the troubles of a test stuck in my head that I hadn’t studied for at all. The trouble of my best friends fighting and then the dentition I got for punching a guy that was saying nasty things to my friend. Lets just say my parents couldn’t believe that their perfect little girl had gotten a dentition for hitting a boy that was two grades above of her, a good 50 to 60 pounds heaver than her, AND number one on the wrestling team. Not to mention she had knocked him out cold. Yep, I’m grounded from drama club, Japanese club, and Karate club. Also I can’t leave the house to go and hang with my friends or go to my best friends birthday party, did I mention it is her sweet sixteen? All around my day has sucked and the next three weeks was going to be even worse.
To add to this my mother had announced that she was pregnant. AGAIN. This means I might have ANOTHER little brother or little sister. I was tired of being the oldest, but I did count myself lucky that I wasn’t one of the younger ones who got the hammy downs. My mom was giving birth to number six. I was hoping for a girl, I only have one sister. Four little brothers are NOT fun.
This is all running through my head as I toss and turn in my bed, which is in the room that I share with my only, and youngest sister. I’m sixteen and my younger sister is actually the next in the family. She is about 14 and looks just like our dad. I on the other hand got the good looks from our mother.
Our mother is the most beautiful lady that I know. She had flowing black hair that is wavy all the time but it looks perfect no matter how she wore it. Her eyes are like green jewels that never loose their sparkle. I had been lucky enough to inherit all of that from her and then her good figure as well.
That night I never did manage to get to sleep no matter how hard I tried, I thought about my test and got up to at least try to study. I knew there was no chance of me getting to sleep anytime soon or that night at all. That’s how I spent the rest of my night, studying my history under my blanket with a flashlight so that I wouldn’t wake up my little sister.
At 7AM my alarm went off like any other day, and I got out of bed and I turned the alarm off. A sleepless night was not going to make my day any better, nor was it going to help me with my troubles.
I got ready for the day, I had decided to wear my hair up in a simple ponytail, not wanting to deal with makeup, I skipped it. I walked downstairs fresh for the day with my book bag. I looked around the kitchen and was surprised to find that my mother not in the kitchen. She usually got up to see me off and make sure that I had money for lunch. I wasn’t too worried about my little brothers and sisters because school for them didn’t start for another hour so they didn’t get up just yet. My father worked nights so I rarely ever saw him.
Walking down the street at 7:13 I realized that the street looked a bit… Dead.

No one was up getting their mail, no one waling their dogs or taking early morning jogs. No one mowing their lawn or even leaving their houses. All I could do was shrug my shoulders and head on to school, which was just down the block and around the corner.
I arrived at school just a few minutes early, as I walked into the hallway I stopped dead in my tracks. The school was empty. Not a soul in the halls.
I, believing that I was at school on a Saturday or had missed school being closed for the day, flipped out my phone to check my messages. None. I used the school’s Internet and searched our school website. School wasn’t canceled.
Confused as ever I walked down the hall to my locker. I unloaded my bag except my cell phone and then went to my homeroom. I even sat in my seat and watched the clock.
Was this a inside joke? A skip day perhaps?
Well I think I would know if there was a skip day, I was pretty popular even though I was just one of the smart pretty ones. The first bell rang and nothing. Just as I was standing up a boy from my class ran into my room.

“Oh thank god!” He said relieved.

“Derek?” I said confused. “What’s going on here? Where is everyone?” I asked.

Now Derek is my homeroom’s class ‘bad boy’, but not one that everyone wanted. They didn’t want to touch him because he was just a delinquent and did nothing but bad. But Niki had to admit he had good looks. Dark brown hair and hazel eyes, and also a good height, he was pretty cute. She had always had a secret crush on him but she didn’t tell ANYONE.

“I have no idea, but I am glad that if found you Niki. No one is here and no one in my family would wake up this morning when I tried to get them up.” He said with face of confusion.

“Wait. They didn’t wake up? I didn’t try to do that with my family. My mom is usually the only one up.” I said.

“Well I guess that’s why you aren’t totally freaking out right now.”

“On no. I’m freaking out.” I said, with a mirrored look at him.
“But isn’t weird how we are the only ones awake though? When I tried to wake my older brother Nick he just seamed to be sleeping. My guess is that is what everyone else is doing…” He said almost quiet.
“Sleeping? The whole town?” I said skeptical.
“No I don’t think it’s just the town.” Derek said going to the classroom TV and turning it on to the nation news channel. Nothing was playing, same with the local and state channels.
“The whole world? You think that the entire world is sleeping? How is that possible?” I said shaking my head.
“I think it is, because it’s happening right now.” Derek said pointing to the TV and the fuzzy screen.
“What do we do?” I said, totally lost with words.
“Well I don’t know about you but I’m going to go have F. U. N.” He said. “If you know how to do that you can come with.” He said with a smirk as he left the room. I turned off the TV and chased after him.
“What? Just like that you are going to go out and have fun? Supposedly the entire would is asleep!” She said jogging to catch up with him.
“Yep.” He said with his hands in his pocket as we left the school. I couldn’t help but follow after him; he was the only person at the moment that was ‘awake’. He yawned, now that she thought about it he didn’t look like he slept at all.
“Did you sleep last night?” She asked curious.
“Nope. Not a wink.” He said with a small frown. “Studying for that stupid history test that we were supposed to have today.” He said with a chuckle. “Hey. Wasn’t it you that knocked Trevor out yesterday?” He said with a laugh and pointed to her.
“Yes but that’s not the point. I didn’t sleep at all last night either!” She said, as if she had just solved a riddle.
“So?” He said lazily.
“So? So! I think because we didn’t fall asleep last night is the reason why we are still awake.” I exclaimed. Derek stopped for a second and though about this.
“You know. I think you got a point. But that still doesn’t change a thing. I’m still going to go have my fun.” He said with an almost knowing smile. I, not wanting to be left alone went with him and spent the day having ‘fun’.
We went to places that would be open no matter what time of the day, we stopped at a convince store and took two bottled sodas. I insisted that we pay so we left money on the counter, and then we went on our way. Derek dragged me to the movie theater, where we watched the newest movie. The cinema was programmed to play at 9, 12, 2, and 4. We caught a movie and then went to the park, where we did nothing but just sit on the marry go round and just look at the sky. We went to the river and skipped rocks and dangled our feet in the water. More than once I asked him: “This is fun?” He only answered me with a laugh and just dragged me along. I don’t know why I didn’t leave and just go home, but I guess I didn’t mind. We went back to the convince store and bought lunch and left money on the counter again.

By the time that the sun was starting to go down we went back to the school and we both got our bags. I turned to him.

“What if tomorrow is like this?” I said almost afraid, I had been thinking this over all day.

“It wont be.” He said with a shrug.

“How can you be so sure?” I said almost angry with him. He was about to talk but I turned and ran out of the school and then to my house. I heard him call after me but I ignored him.

I don’t know how I had gotten asleep that night but I did. Well a day running on no sleep did have that effect. I had tried to wake up my family but they didn’t wake up.

The next day my alarm woke me up like usual, I slept right through it. In return I got pulled out of bed by my feet. “Niki Rae Johnson! Get up this minute; you’re going to be late! And turn off that alarm!” I opened my eyes in shock and there was my mom, beautiful as ever and looked very refreshed. I jumped up and hugged my mother as tight as it can. She laughed.
“Mom! I love you so much!” I said, almost in tears.
“Hun. I love you too but you’re late!” She said with laughter. With that she left the room, I turned off the alarm, my sister was frowning at me from her bed. Her hair all ruffled from sleeping. She rolled over and then went back to bed. I changed and got ready for the day; I was running out the door. Just as it was closing my mom yelled, ‘Love you!’. But the door cut it off. I arrived to my locker thirty seconds before the bell rang. I was relieved to see the halls somewhat full; kids were heading to their classes.
I made it to homeroom just as the bell ran.
“Niki you’re lucky this time!” My best friend said with laughter. I walked over to my seat and sat down. Still in shock at what has happened in the past day and then in the morning alone.
As homeroom ended ever one left she stayed behind, she looked at Derek as he walked up behind her.
“Told you.” He said with a smirk. “You didn’t have freak out there at the end.” He added with a laugh.
“How did you know?” I asked totally amazed, this had been bugging me all day. He leaned over and whispered something in my ear and then walked out of the room with that arrogant swagger of his.
What he had whispered into my ear that day were four simple words.
“It happens every year.”
I ran after him and whispered something in his ear. He laughed and nodded his head as if it was a simple answer and then went down the hallway. My friends came up to me and asked what was up. I just said it was nothing and we went to our lockers to hang out.
What I had asked him was simple as well.
“Lets hang out again.”

After that we always shared knowing looks when that time came around again and every year we made it a tradition to go and have ‘fun’.

It has always baffled the world on how once a year, their electric calendars seamed to ‘skip a day’. Those knowing what happened, but never told of the magic on that one day, decided to keep the tradition and just call it; ‘a glitch in our electronics’. People went with it though over the years and many never really seamed to notice. People were to caught up with all the things in their lives and those ‘little problems’ that really should never get in the way of the big picture.