CLOSER (SAM FENDER)

ONE

TEN MONTHS EARLIER

It started with a dream.

The kind of dream that lingers in the corners of your mind far longer than necessary. Sometimes years later, those types of dreams work themselves back into the forefront of your mind, shocking you into the realization that your subconscious thoughts can make you cringe. That was the type of dream I'd had last night. The type I'd carry around with myself all day and play on a repeat loop in moments when my mind wasn't busy. The type that seemed so real, that felt so real, that being awake seemed wrong.

I'd tossed and turned over that dream on my way to work, and again on my lunch break. I'd thought about it while I was in the middle of a staff meeting and again on my way to the bar to have a drink with Kelley at the end of the day. It was all over me, affecting my mood and even causing that little wrinkle between my eyes to deepen as I thought about it.

I'd dreamt I was in love with Sam.

And not just in love, but built my life around him it seemed, and fell into some steady lifestyle I didn't know appealed to me. The dream started simple and seemed familiar. We were walking across the same park we walked home from the pubs in. It felt familiar because it was something we'd done a thousand times since we were eighteen. The act seemed normal; we laughed about something casual one of us said, and Sam wrapped us arm around my waist as if we would share in a hug from the side, something our friends did often on the way home from pubs. But his fingers lingered on my waist and tapped it slowly for a second longer than normal. Then he pulled me in and slowly drew my face toward his, his normal wide-eyed humor gone, replaced by soft, boyish eyes that made my stomach feel light. Before I knew it, his lips moved against mine, and I reacted like I'd kissed him a thousand times before. My fingers traced his jawline before cupping the back of his neck. We shared the kiss for a few moments before he pulled away and rested his forehead against mine.

"I'll always love you, Vi." His words were soft and they permeated my senses, forcing me to surrender completely to his grasp as he pulled me into an embrace and held me there.

"I know." I replied barely above a whisper, but Sam heard it and buried his face in my neck.

"It's going to be worth it, right?" He sighed as he slowly pulled away. Something inside of me wanted to soothe him, assure him it would be fine, and it felt primal. It felt engrained in me in a way I couldn't explain. I wanted to convince him that yes, it was worth it. All of it. I wanted to but I couldn't. I could only nod before light leaked into the edges of the scene and caused the vision to blur. Sam's face became more and more transparent as the light ate up the entire moment, gnawing off any fragment of images that were still circling in my mind.

Before I knew it, everything was over. I woke up in my bed, in my house, alive and well, my boyfriend Jake, sleeping soundly beside me, and my clothes for a day of work hanging from my closet door across from the bed. I was right where I should be, and everything up until that moment, had been fake.

I laid back down on a long exhale and stared at the ceiling with wide eyes. Even though I couldn't see it anymore, I replayed the dream in my mind and shook my head.

I'd known Sam for ten years.

I met him on the first day of school, when my family moved us to England from the US. I knew no one and the slang and dialect some of the kids my age used and spoke, was far beyond anything I could comprehend. By now, everything made sense to me, but when I first moved, I was terrified.

Sam ran into me in the hallway, nearly knocking things from my arms but I managed to save them before they crashed down in front of me. I didn't expect him to stop and apologize; no one else would have. But Sam did, and he said he felt "quite dreadful" for what he'd nearly done. I told him he shouldn't be sorry for something that didn't happen, so he laughed and apologized for simply running into me instead. Once Sam figured out I was the new student who moved here, he offered to introduce me to his friends. I wasn't in the market for friends just in case my family decided to move again. It made it easier to leave a place if you didn't have anything tethering you there. But Sam insisted, and I obliged, still to this day for a reason I didn't understand. He was the one who introduced me to Jake actually, and he'd done so early on in our friendship. I never entertained a thought about Sam because Sam was always just a friend and Jake was everything. Sam was my best friend. He was the big brother who made sure I spent my Friday nights drinking behind the old stadium with his friends until they became my friends too. He was always there, in every corner, at every party, or riding in the backseat and laughing with Jake and I. There was never anything else between us, at least until my dream last night.

And since then, I couldn't shake any of it. I'd spent the whole day dwelling on it to the point that I actually started thinking "what if". I shook my head and closed my eyes while I sat curled up on the couch watching television and waiting for Jake and Sam to get home.

As much as I didn't want to face Sam, because I knew all I'd do was revert right back into the weird thoughts I'd been having all day, there was no way around not seeing him. Sam, Jake and I all lived together, and Jake played bass for Sam's band. We were a packaged deal the three of us, and had been for almost half our lives, but that was going to make things weird, especially with the thoughts in my head.

It was a dream.

I kept telling myself that over and over but it did little to soothe me. It was a dream, but it was one that gutted me to a point that I felt like a piece of me was missing when I first woke up. I was homesick for a life I didn't know about, homesick for feelings I'd never once felt.

I closed my eyes and rubbed my temples, trying to calm my mind down. But the calming didn't last because after a few moments, the doorknob clicked and the loud sound of laughter filled the room. Jake and Sam were home from the studio, and by the looks of things, also the pub. Their boyish laughter was met with excited greetings as they ran to either side of me and jumped onto the couch. Jake found me first, and pressed his lips against mine habitually, kissing me quickly twice before settling in beside me. Sam nudged my shoulder and winked at me, something he'd done a thousand times, but this time my mouth went dry and I felt my cheeks burn. I half smiled and looked away quickly, forcing my attention on Jake and asking how their night went.

They filled me on in a new song they were working on and how great the whole album would be. Sam had already formed a decent name for himself in England, and was busy filling theaters and halls, selling out shows along the way. They'd come a long way since the days in my parents' basement. Jake always talked about going to school for something else, citing the fact that they wouldn't be young forever, but Sam begged him to stay as long as he could and promised him it would all be worth it someday.

"It'll all be worth it, right?" His words from my dream pierced my senses and I rubbed my temples again.

"Ya'llright?" Jake asked while narrowing his eyes at me. "You not feeling well?"

I used his question as a reason to stand up and I shook my head slightly. "Just a headache. I didn't sleep very well last night I think I just need to head to bed."

"Aye, and here we are comin' in and raisin' hell like that." Sam shook his head and bit his lip. "Sorry, love."

I froze as I walked toward the bedroom, ice filling my veins and pooling in my stomach. Sam called me love a thousand times, he called every girl that, but tonight, with the dream still fresh on my mind, it hit different. I forced myself to take a step on a shrug.

"It's alright, Sam." I shuddered as I spoke his name and I felt like I wanted to throw up. How could something so false, something straight from my subconscious affect me like this? It hadn't even been real and it was outwardly turning me into a wreck. I shuffled down the hallway and into my room where I collapsed into the bed I shared with Jake and wrapped myself up in our blankets. I needed to get my mind as far off of last night's dream as I could. I forced my eyes to shut and begged to dream about Jake, about a moment we shared in our past or for something entirely fake to bleed itself into my subconscious this evening instead of Sam. I needed to shake the weirdness of last night from me. I needed to go back in time and forget the whole thing.

Sam and I were not in love. We never would be. That's not how my story would go.

I drifted to sleep eventually, but I didn't dream at all.