Beautiful Dreamer

Chapter 7

Chapter Seven

That night, I had a most terrible dream.

I went to bed a fitful, exhausted mess, annoyed because, though I had searched everywhere, I'd been unable to find my necklace. I was asleep before my head hit the pillow. But no sooner had my eyes drifted shut than they flew open again, propelled by an invisible force hidden inside my mind. I'd told myself, during all those hours I'd spent in my room since arriving home, that when the nightmares came, I'd be ready. That I knew what they were, and they couldn't hurt me, and I wouldn't panic when they inevitably appeared.

The reality is, I can lie to myself all I want; but fear will do as fear does, and it has no discretion as to what decisions you have made or what bravery you have tried to muster. And it certainly did not hold back in volume when the shadow creature appeared before me, staring me down with those intrusive, soul-searching eyes.

Frozen in place, unable to breathe, I watched in horror as the dark being that stood at the foot of my bed, the monster with a human shape, moved closer, circling around my bed to move right beside me—just outside of my peripheral vision. I couldn't see it, but I felt it, felt it moving closer, closer, closer, its cold, evil breath brushing against my cheek.

The demonic weight on my chest shifted, digging deeper into my ribs , as the shadow brushed its ghostly hand against my throat. I thought I had braced myself, but nothing could have prepared me for the finger of cold that seeped slowly into my bloodstream and turned my heart to ice.

My mind was screaming, brimming with hot panic, and I swear the monster could hear it because suddenly, it began to laugh. The sound was harsh and metallic, like knives being struck against each other, and it took air right beside my ear. I felt the stagnant heat of rancid breath against my cheek.

An invisible shudder rode a wave down my petrified body. It seemed that the shadow could sense my fear; as I became more terrified, its laughs escalated to hysterical cackles. Yet I still could not see it, at my side and just out of sight.

And somehow, that was even more terrifying.

It's just a dream, I told myself. Just a dream just a dream just a dream.

And I found that, after repeating those words a few dozen times, my eyelids began to drift shut. Somehow, they alone had been freed from the paralysis. The rest of my body was still trapped, that weight seeming to grow heavier by the heartbeat, but I saw only the innocent calignosity of my mind.

I thought I would fall back to sleep, after that. Already, the presence beside me was fading, my body seeming to relax. But just as I was turning over my mind to rest, feeling my breath return, a massive, crushing force came down on my torso. It should have crushed me. Instead, it peeled my eyelids back from my pupils and forced me to watch the scene unfolding before me.

There were phantoms lurking at the edge of my bed.

If it had been possible for me to scream, I would have. I would have emptied my lungs, woken all the neighbors, then sucked in a new breath and begun again. My terror was so tremendous at that moment that I am surprised it didn't simply break me in two.

Just like the monster who had laughed at me, these specters were nothing but shades, dark splotches against the already lightless room. I can't tell you for certain how many there were—four, perhaps five—but they stood in a cluster, surrounding the iron steeples of my footboard with their hulking presence.

As one entity, each the figures raised their right arm (if you could call it an arm), and pointed the wispy limbs at me. And gradually, deliberately, my comforter began to slip off my body.