"Don't worry, Tim," Sophia said and gently reached over to pat his shoulder. "If something is broken it can be replaced. Besides, most of my stuff is meant to be played with. It's all action figures and replicas. You can mess with anything you like." Still she turned on the tv and flipped through the channels until she found The Mask playing one station. "Cool," she said with a grin. "I like Jim Carrey. The Mask good with you, Tim?" She looked over to him to see how he was doing. He seemed extremely nervous, more so than he was at the mall. Sophia hoped that he might be able to relax and feel more at home. It would be nice, she thought, if he had a second place besides his own apartment where he felt comfortable and at ease. Suddenly Sophia remembered something. "I was looking into those runes," she informed Tim as she started to dig into her gyro. "A lot of the symbols are similar to various alphabets of different languages, but none of them match exactly. I've had no luck with translating anything. Not a word."

Tim turned to her when he heard her talking about the runes. He got a little less nervous, and his body visibly relaxed as they started talking on the subject. He sighed out a bit, rubbing his arm a little. "Oh, yeah, right...um, I tried remembering what those looked like, but I uh... I couldnt really remember that much after we left the cave. I um... yeah, everything is a bit of a blur? Like... everything from the car to my apartment, um, It's... it isn't all there, y'know? I wish I could remember what they looked like..." He was relaxing a little more, yet at the same time, he looked a little... sadder. A little disturbed that he couldn't recount his memories. "Were you able to find out anything at all, even a bit?" he asked, sliding just a little bit closer to her.

"You were pretty freaked out after that," Sophia told him, not unkindly. "I can't blame you. Couldn't then either. I was just trying to be the calmer of the two of us at the time. Still had to drive, ya know?" At his question of if she had been able to discover anything she shook her head sadly. "I couldn't find out anything at all," she said with a note of disappointment in her voice. "But I still have all the pictures I took! I uploaded them to my laptop so they're in higher resolution. I can grab my laptop and show you." Tim agreed and Sophia went into her room and grabbed her laptop. She came back into the living room and moved her food over some so she could set the laptop on the coffee table. She opened it and then booted it up. Once her laptop was up and running she opened a folder labeled simple as _Cave_ that was saved to her desktop. Double-clicking on the first picture she brought it up to view. "Here," she said handing the laptop to Tim. "I tried to take pictures of everything that was there, but I might have missed some things."

Tim clicked through the photos she had on her laptop, the memories of the tunnel rushing back almost instantly. His face lit up as he went through the photos, remembering how excited and interested he was in the runes. "Oh, wow, these are still really neat." He said, smiling and shaking his head in awe as though he were discovering them for the first time again. He clicked through all of them, looking at each individual rune closely, trying to find some sort of similarities between them, which he failed to do for each. After a moment, he put the laptop down on the coffee table in front of him, turning to Sophia. He was visibly excited. "Do you think they have something to do with the crystal hole thingy?" He asked, moving closer. "Oh, that's probably it." Sophia replied. "They all probably revolve around the hole thing. Actually, I think...yeah, I might have a picture of the hole on there in a different folder, here, lemme show you." The two both moved in at the same time, going for the track pad. Sophia got there a moment before Tim did. Tim, however, had his eyes fixated on one of the runes on the screen of the computer, and he absentmindedly put his hand on top of Sophia's. There was a moment of absolute stillness. They both knew what had happened, but neither made a move. Slowly, Tim looked down at his hand. HE noticed that his hand was a bit bigger than hers. It was concealing most of her hand, but her fingertips were still exposed. He felt his cheeks starting to turn red, but he didn't feel embarrassed at all. He didn't feel _horrified_ at all, and it surprised him. Slowly, he turned to look at Sophia. She did the same. The two of them made eye contact, and neither of them said a word. His hand was still on top of hers.

Tim placing his hand over hers had been an accident. Sophia was sure of that. She hadn't thought anything of it because, hey, accidents happen. Knowing Tim, however, she had expected him to suddenly get flustered and pull his hand away as if it was on fire. But he didn't. That's what caught her attention. She looked at their hands for a moment and couldn't help but notice that his hand was bigger than hers, enveloping it almost completely. Yet Sophia was sure that if she were to turn her hand around and interlock their fingers their hands would fit together perfectly. The seconds ticked by and seemed to stretch on, feeling more like minutes. Still Tim did not move his hand. Sophia began to wonder if maybe he was in a state of shock and simply couldn't. She looked over to see his expression and he looked at her at the same moment. Tim's face was a bit red, but other than that he looked... calm. Really calm. He didn't say anything, nor did she. His hand remained where it was. Sophia felt her face heat up as a million different scenarios played out in her mind. She could directly ask Tim to move his hand, or indirectly bring his attention to it. She could move _her_ hand and simply direct him to the folder she had intended to bring up. Or... Or she could hold onto his hand. Just that thought alone sent Sophia's cheeks aflame with red. But why hold onto his hand? Help him get more used to physical contact and her in general so that he wouldn't be so nervous around her? Because she liked signs of human affection? Or simply because she had already taken an extreme liking to Tim and simply wanted to hold his hand? It was a mixture of all three, but if asked about it Sophia was likely only to tell Tim about the first reason. She made her decision. Without saying anything Sophia shifted her fingers a little until they were in the spaces between Tim's fingers. She pushed them through and turned them so that their fingers were kind of interlocked with Tim's hand still resting atop hers, then moved their hands from the track pad to rest them on the couch between them. She and Tim were still looking at each other and so far he had not pulled away yet, not freaked out. Neither of them said a word either. Sophia took that as a good sign and she shifted her fingers so that she had a better grasp on Tim's hand. Finally she looked away toward the laptop. Sophia moved a bit closer to Tim, adjusting their hands accordingly so that they still sat between them but were now closer to their own legs with a smaller gap in between their bodies. Leaning forward Sophia used her left hand to use the track pad, minimizing the previous folder and bringing up a new one labeled _Tunnel_. It was a single picture of the hole taken on accident, but you could still kind of see the jewels embedded into the tunnel glowing dimly. "This picture was a complete accident," Sophia finally said. "I didn't even know I had managed to capture this until I was looking through the photos again. But take a look at this! See those runes above the tunnel?" She pointed out the hieroglyphs that stood out on the wall. "They're the exact same ones as these right here--" she paused to pull up a picture of the runes from the previous folder, "--because that was the exact same spot. But look. No tunnel." Where the tunnel should have been in that photo was a blank spot of wall. She looked over at Tim, wondering what he thought of her discovery.

Internally, Tim was freaking out a lot. Physical contact was never something he excelled at, exactly. For the most part, he tried to avoid touching people at all times, or at least, as much as possible. When he was touched, he usually recoiled. He should have tone it when he touched her, but he just... didn't. He didn't feel horrified by her touch. Her fingers interlaced in his as she held his hand. He swallowed hard, still trying to grasp exactly what was happening. It was good, whatever it was. He liked it, but he didn't know why he did. He didn't let go of her hand, either. He just sort of... held on. When he answered her, his voice was soft and quiet, his eyes fixed on the laptop screen. "Oh... that is really weird..." He said, leaning in, his voice almost a whisper. "That doesn't make any sense at all... wow, what the fuck..."

Tim had still not pulled his hand away from Sophia's. It gave her a sense of relief as it meant that Tim was getting more accustomed to her. But even more than that she was glad that he had not pulled away because that would have made things more awkward for them both. He might have thought her brazen, perhaps insane, and over stepping her boundaries. He surely would have pulled farther away from her emotionally and perhaps withdrawn from her all together. Closed off all chances of the friendship they had. The thought of a sudden and final rejection caused Sophia's heart to ache painfully, and a lump rose in her throat. Without really being aware of it Sophia gave Tim's hand a light squeeze as a look of worry crossed her face. Then in an instant she appeared to look calm again and she swallowed, forcing the lump back down her throat. "I think it has to be some sort of magic," Sophia said, her voice a little low. "As crazy as it seems it might be. But I can't think of any other explanation as to what it might be, considering everything was the same and yet... different. I think maybe we activated something when we touched the runes. Or maybe it was activated by the light from my camera flash. It could be anything, really." Sophia was still really conscious of her hand in Tim's. She wanted to say something about it, but she couldn't. She was too embarrassed. Clearing her throat she told Tim, "I'm going to get some more water. Let me know if you want something." She finally let her hand slide from his before standing up from the couch. She grabbed her empty glass and moved into the kitchen to get some water from the sink. Her back was to the living room so Tim could not see Sophia's face as it burned a bright red, nor see her hand shaking a bit as she raised the now full glass to her lips and downed it all in one go. _What the hell is wrong with me?_ She thought. _Why am I so nervous?_

Tim stayed put, balling his hand into a fist and releasing it a few times, just to make sure it was still his. He wasn't sure. He lifted his hands into eye sight, double checking. His hand was still, not shaking at all. He touched his face to conclude that yes, indeed, this was his hand and yes, indeed, he was in control of it. He just dint understand how. Any other time, touching someone else would have sent him into a downward spiral of apologies and anxieties. He would have recoiled at the slightest touch. Touching people is bad. But he touched Sophia, and he felt... good. That was weird to him. That was not something that happened to him. Tim never just felt _good_ about touching people. He looked at his hand one last time before shaking his head and sliding it into his pocket. He exhaled loudly, not realizing that he had been holding his breath. He chuckled to himself at the prospect of the whole situation. He looked at the computer again, the picture of the strange tunnel still up on its screen. It was so out of place in the cave they were in. That whole entire room was out of place, actually, but he couldn't quite place what it was that seemed so off. He wondered why.

Sophia refilled her glass one more time then head back into the living room looking calmer than she felt. She sat down on the couch, kind of close to Tim but not too close. Picking up her unfinished dinner and starting to eat again, Sophia said, "If you'd like I can email you copies of the pictures." She didn't know what else to say really and just ate in silence for a while. Eventually Sophia thought to ask, "Should we show these pictures to someone? Like someone at a museum? Or do you think we should keep this to ourselves?" She was trying not to talk about what had just happened, trying not to dwell on it too much. But she still felt her hand tingling where Tim's hand had been, still felt the warmth of his hand.

Tim made a noise that clearly meant "i have no clue." He was still trying to process all of the events that had just happened. He shook his head, throwing his hands up in an exaggerated shrug. HE sighed out before answering. "I dont think anyone would believe us if we did try to tell them." he said, looking at Sophia again. "They'd call us crazy, probably."

"Well _we_ know we're not crazy," Sophia stated confidently. "We'll just keep this to ourselves then and see if we can find out more about the runes. Then maybe, just maybe we can go take a look at the cave again. But just the cave!" Sophia paused and grimaced a little before adding, "_If_ it's still there." Her smile returned again. "Anyway, how about for now we forget about that stuff and just relax?" Tim agreed and Sophia shut down her laptop, closed it and put it to the side. They resumed eating their dinner and watching The Mask on tv. After the movie had finished Tim was getting tired and was ready to go home. On the way there both were relatively silent, neither discussing much or mentioning the short instance earlier in which they had held hands. Finally they were at Tim's apartment. "Today was fun," Sophia said, putting on a smile. "I'll talk to you later, Tim. Just text me whenever you want to hang out again. Or... Or if something happens and you just need someone around." "It was... fun," Tim agreed. "I'll text you later. Night." "Good night," she replied, watching him get out of the car and disappear into his building. Sophia drove back to her apartment and instantly went and flopped down on her bed, all the while in a dream-like state. As she lay in bed she looked at her right hand, wondering why she had done what she did. And why Tim had let her.

Tim, for the first time in what felt like years went into his bedroom. He lied down on his pillow, looking up at the pale blue ceiling of his room. Of course, he was thinking about Sophia. He was thinking about the way her hand felt, the softness of her skin, how small it was compared to his. He was calmed by the memory of it. He didn't know why he let it happen. He would never let it happen, ever, but he did, and it was... really nice for him. He ran a hand through his hair, and he was smiling a bit, he discovered. He rolled over in his bed, ready to just pass out completely, and for the first time in a long time, he was honestly a little happy. That night, he dream't of his mother, and the blood.

It was morning and Sophia's phone was ringing. She jerked awake, picked it up, and stared at it groggily. The time said it wasn't long after seven. Then she focused on the caller ID to see who was calling. _Tim._ Still completely out of it she slid the icon on the phone to pick it up. Lifting it to her ear she answered in a sleepy voice, "Hello?" "Sophia, it's Tim," Tim said, sounding a little frantic. "I... I need you to come over here. I'm freaking out. I don't know what to do." Instantly Sophia was awake and she threw off her covers, turned to sit with her legs dangling off her bed. "Stay calm," she instructed him with a gentle firmness. "Breathe, Tim. Just breathe. What's going on?" Sophia heard Tim trying to breath, trying to stay calm. But he was having trouble keeping it together. "What's going on?" She repeated. "The tunnel," Tim finally gasped. "The tunnel. Like from the park. It's here. In my apartment. My living room." Sophia swore. Then she calmed down and said, "Alright, Tim. Stay calm. Don't go in it. Don't even touch it. I'll be there soon." "Ok. Ok. Just... please get here quickly, Sophia. Please." Then the call ended. Sophia didn't even bother to put on day clothes. She just threw a jacket over her pajamas and slipped on her tennis shoes, grabbed her keys and wallet. She hurried to the cafe and rushed up to Tim's apartment. Sophia didn't even need to knock. Tim had heard her coming and had pulled the door open for her. She slipped inside and they shut the door and locked it. Her eyes went wide in surprise as she saw the tunnel with its glittering jewels.

There, right in the middle of Tim's kitchen wall, right next to the fridge, was a hole, just big enough for a person--and by a person, that means Tim or Sophia-- to climb through. It looked incredibly out of place in his wall, the yellow, floral print of his kitchen slowly tapering off into a strange, rocky area that lead to the entrance of the cave, surrounded by jewels and crystals. Tim walked up next to the hole, throwing his arms down at it in a "look at this!" sort of pose. _"What the **FUCK** is this doing in my goddamn kitchen?!"_ he shouted, a mixture of anger, fear, and confusion welling up in his voice. "I-I-I woke up to to to just take some _medication_ for my _problems_ and look at what I find! A fucking... a fu-- _**this**!_" He backed away from it, still talking as he peered into the hole. "There is an amount of things I can deal with, Sophia, and this is far _fucking_ from that! I-I dont know what it's doing here, Sophia! This is just too _fucked up_ for me to handle!" Tim felt like he was going to have a panic attack, but his emotions were going so haywire that he couldn't really tell if he really was having an attack or if he was just experiencing way more than he usually did. Either way, he was freaked out.