The Sub-Zero Summer | CURRENTLY UPDATING

Chapter 4

A hazy outline of a dream formed from absent-minded pictures to scenery. Flashes of pictures, colors, and people she didn't seem to question formed into something smooth; something that made Aubrey feel more awake than asleep.

She was standing in the center of a field. There was green a carpet covering the flat ground. Well... maybe it wasn't flat, Aubrey thought as she watched it. The earth was... bending? No, not bending, she changed her mind once again. The earth was breathing. It was rising and falling slowly in hills that turned to valleys. The rolling hills of green moved like waves. They raised her bare feet higher and then brought her down again.

Looking past the breathing earth, Aubrey could see a clump of trees. It was the only thing to be seen in all directions other than the blue sky and flawless blades of grass that each stood uniformly ancle height.

Aubrey took a step on the earth and it breathed beneath her toes. She had never seen a place like it before. It was clean. It was orderly. It was alive.

She took another step toward the clump of trees. One foot in front of the other; ever so slowly. Her feet bent the blades of grass beneath her. And as she continued forward, she became aware that she was not alone. Someone was beside her. It felt her bending each blade of grass. She knew the person.

As her body grew closer to the clump of trees, she became captivated by their color. There were deep purples, dingy oranges, and dusty reds amidst leaves the size of stop signs. Vines intertwined the branches of the trees so tightly that Aubrey was stopped in her tracks just outside the trees.

In that moment was when she noticed it. There was no sound. No birds sung. No crickets chirped. Not even the wind blew. Instead, the only vibration was beneath her feet. It provided no sound, but she could feel it. It beat softly. It was slow. It was steady. The feel of it reminded her of a heartbeat. Ba dump, ba dump, ba dump, it seemed to vibrate slowly, all in the rhythm of the waves of earth.

Pushing a vine out of the way, Aubrey's toes sunk into the moist dirt in the clump of trees. It was like she was stepping out of one terrain into another. The vine fell into place behind her. And as it did so, it closed out the light and plunged her into a dim clump of color.

Aubrey turned back to the vines to climb out of the clump of trees and back onto the breathing earth. But as she pulled the vine aside, her eyes met with only more forest. The waves of green were gone now; they had been replaced by the forest.

If she were awake, she would have panicked but dreams don't work that way. Instead, her face remained black and her feet pressed into the dirt as she moved forward.

The branches were close. She had to push them away from her face. She had to duck under climb over them but that did not make it impossible to maneuver through their branches.

That heartbeat-like vibration remained beneath her bare feet and it seemed to grow stronger the deeper she went into the trees.

Mindlessly moving, it didn't take Aubrey long to reach a clearing. The heartbeat vibrated so strongly now that it tickled the bottoms of her feet. She ignored it. Instead, her eyes glanced about the space.

Her attention was caught by something that fluttered above her head in the sunlight. It was no bigger than her hand. It carried a black color to it with hints of royal blue that glowed and glittered. It was a butterfly. The first living creature she had seen. It fluttered about the opening in the rays of light and Aubrey stared at it as if it was some alien.

Its wings were delicate and gentle and fragile. But somehow still, they carried its whole body above the earth.

Aubrey hadn't seen a butterfly in what felt like years. There were always the moths that flew inside her open bedroom window at night to make holes in her clothing, but butterflies didn't survive well in the city. Nothing beautiful really did. Every bright color eventually faded. Every bubbly tourist eventually went home. And ever moment eventually began a dusty memory.

Approaching the creature, Aubrey began to hear indistinct whispers that rung in her ears. They echoed like a melody with no tune or a string of notes with no beat. She couldn't make out what the whispers were saying. The closer she got to the creature, though, the louder they became.

She reached out her hand. Her fingers trembled a little. The butterfly drifted around her finger tips and then around her hair. It encircled her head like a crown, never once touching her. Its whisper of a song made Aubrey smile, yet she wasn't quite sure why.

The butterfly landed on Aubrey's fingertip. She held her breath. Looking at it carefully, she admired its delicate beauty. The song was louder now, yet it still did not form words.

"What is this place?" whispered Aubrey. The peace left with her words. The whisper-song ended. The heartbeat beneath her feet fled. Even the sun began to darken.

"Shhh," someone spoke as the sky fell to night, "do not speak, Reyrey. You are not meant to be here. You must go, now."

Wait! Aubrey mouthed.

"Trust me, Reyrey, and when the time comes, trust yourself. It is coming and they are going to need you."

***

Aubrey sat up in bed. There was a feeling in her chest that made her sick. It was as if... oh frick, she though. Jumping out of bed, Aubrey ran into the kitchen. The television still chattered as the bright lights flashed on Aunt Vicky's sleeping face.

Fumbling through the medicine cabinet, Aubrey pulled out her bisoprolol and downed the pill with a glass of water. She had forgotten to take it because she had fallen asleep too early.

Rubbing her eyes, she stumbled back to her room. She did her best to ignore the tightness in her chest as she opened her window and crawled back under her sheets.

But even when she was comfortably in bed, her eyes were blankly glued to the ceiling. Sleep seemed impossible. The image of the butterfly burned in her memory. It was so small... so fragile... so weak.

It didn't make sense. Nothing important ever seemed to. There was something about the voice as well... it seemed all too familiar. But, as the greenlights on her alarm clock screamed "one a.m." at her, she could not place the voice to a face.

Instead, she simply rolled over and forced her eyes shut. It probably was nothing, anyway; probably just a dream. Her brain probably made up the voice; probably made the whole world up. Yet for some reason, the voice would not let her sleep. The whisper song echoed in her ears. Something about it all stuck to her. Something was coming.