To Be A Prize

Chapter 1

Wind whips through the trees, sending leaves flying through the air. A draft breaks through a crack in the window and I am reminded of what I was doing. 

Food. I was getting myself some food. As if guided by my hunger, I push myself up from the sofa where I was sat watching TV and head to the kitchen to make some dinner. 

Can it even be called dinner if it's 4am?

As I walk down the hallway, I hear shouting coming from my boyfriends office. Karl has been working on his computer all night doing God knows what.

 He's always pushed himself to work hard but I've never seen him like this before. He hasn't slept in days, indicated by the dark rings that settle beneath his eyes, and hasn't payed me any attention in even longer.

Now in the kitchen, I stand, bare foot, fixing myself a sandwich.

 In just a thin pyjama top and shorts, I shiver each time the cold from outside breaks in and caresses my bare arms and legs. This is the first cold night we've had in a while in Massachusetts so I'm still in denial that summer is ending, and winter is approaching, hence the inappropriate attire.

As I butter the bread I wonder, had I done something wrong to make Karl act this way? He's usually such an attentive, kind man who adores the ground I walk on and treats me as such but as of late he can't even look at me. Is it just because he's so busy or is there something else on his mind?

Now with my sandwich made, I turn to leave the kitchen I try to think back to the last time I saw Karl eat anything. Not last night, or the night before that or even the night before that, so I swivel back round to make him a snack too.

The tiles of the kitchen floor are cold beneath my feet as if taunting me for my stubborn refusal to change into something warmer. I make a mental note to ask Karl to help me get our winter clothes out from the cupboard where we've been storing them over summer.

Still racking my brain to figure out what it could be that has caused him to behave this way I race through memories to find something, anything, that could be a miss.

 Then, suddenly, I remember.

Five nights ago I remember waking up to a sliver of light seeping into my dreams. Karl was sat upright in the bed we shared with his bedside light on. He looked upset and tears fell from his blue eyes as he furiously scribbled in what I knew to be a notebook where he recorded his dreams.

He had always suffered from nightmares, just like me, so I suggested writing them down to rid them from his head. 

As he wrote, he occasionally flicked his eyes over to where I lay, now pretending to be asleep but very much intrigued to know what he was writing. I would ask but I knew when he got like this the last thing he would want is for me to find out as it embarrassed him to no end.

 Out of the corner of my sleep filled eyes I examined his face. His untamed brown hair was sticking up at all angles due to restless sleep and his broad shoulders heaved up and down as he tried to slow down his breathing, another trick I taught him. His brows were bent, frowning, and his usually plump lips were drawn in to a straight, stern line.

 He looked scared.

 No, not scared. 

Was it worry that distorted his face? 

His right eye twitched and I shut my eyes just in time to feign sleep as he whipped his neck around to look at me one more time before he turned off the light and rolled back to sleep.

Darkness flooded the room but a light stayed on in my mind , trying to figure out what it was that I had just seen. Karl wasn't scared or worried, I realised, he was angry. In fact, he was furious. But why?