Second Sight Summer

Chapter One: The Dream

It was a typical summer day. The birds were chirping, the heat swelling in the air, the sun shining brightly. Typical that is, with the exception of being on the run for your life.

Paul's grandma has been dropping him off at his favorite hangout every Friday and Saturday since he was eight. It sounds irresponsible, but the town they lived in was small enough to the point where everyone knew each other, so there was a large amount of trust that came with the territory. For a small town, ironically, it had one of the biggest hybrid shopping malls in the continental United States. Originally planned to be a theme park, the developers decided at the last minute to make it a shopping mall after the original buyer backed out of the deal. Said mall had its very own water park, mini golf course, concert venue, movie theater, arcade and even a laser tag arena–along with all of the boring stores all of the boring adults liked to shop at. It made Las Vegas look like a department store.

Paul didn't mind the fact that his grandmother, his only caretaker, worked three jobs just to keep the lights on and a roof over their head. It allowed him to play video games and stay up late as much as he wanted. He never once asked for an allowance because he knew how tirelessly she worked, but that didn't stop her from spoiling him. Not only would she buy whatever expensive toy or game he wanted, but she made sure to treat him like a king every birthday. She would also give him one hundred dollars at the start of every week, which allowed him to pay for lunches at school, pay for takeout at dinner time, etcetera. He usually saved about half of that money by the end of the week so that he had money to spend at the mall. Any change Paul had leftover after that, he would feed to his pink ceramic piggy bank. He hated the very idea of being spoiled–which, again, did not stop his grandmother much to his chagrin–as it made the other kids at school somewhat jealous of him. He hated attention. In a perfect world, he would watch action movies, eat junk food, play video games, and build Lego contraptions all day if he could.

As much as he enjoyed his independence, he secretly yearned for the lifestyle his peers had. You know, the life where Mom picks you up after school every day and embarrasses you in front of your friends; where dad would come home just before Dinner, interact with you and your siblings and kiss his wife on the cheek; and where everyone would sit up to the dinner table yapping about their day while shoveling food down their throat. The kind of life where he didn't go to bed alone every night, sometimes crying himself to sleep. Instead of his mother and father tucking him in at night, he had his iPad, which played his favorite cartoons on repeat–even well after he had fallen asleep. His grandmother would come home every night at one in the morning, suffering from sleep deprivation. The only down time she had to herself was a beer, a pack of cigarettes before bed, and whatever leftovers Paul kept in the fridge for her. She thought Paul didn't know her secret routine, as if she didn't check in on him every night to make sure he was there, safe and sound, snug as a bug on a rug.

Every night, she would pop her head in and whisper "Goodnight my little cherub." Then, she would close the creaky old door to his room and saunter to her own bed down the hall, leaving a cloud of smoke and alcohol behind her to fester and slowly dissipate in his bedroom.

You see, Paul's parents unfortunately died when he was a very young age. His mom lost an aggressive battle with cancer at the tender age of five, and his dad died of a heart attack a year later. That's when his grandma, his mother's mom, stepped in to take care of him and became his legal guardian. She was sixty-two years young at the time and happily retired. She had long since divorced, so because of this she had no supplemental income to rely on. She knew that raising her grandson would quickly deplete her life's savings, especially since she promised her daughter that he would go to college. So, without hesitation, she jumped feet first back into the workforce.

At first it started with a part time job at the convenience store down the street, but the money wasn't good enough. Plus, she had no insurance. She had a few old friends that asked around and managed to find a desk job for her. For eight hours a day she would sit in a lousy, gray old cubicle and answer one angry phone call after another. Now that she had the extra money and the health benefits for her and Paul, it still wasn't enough. Despite the fact that they lived in a small Californian desert town in the middle of nowhere, the mortgage was expensive. On top of all that, she was still paying for her daughter's funeral, eight years later. So, she ended up getting a third job, bouncing from a convenience store as a cashier late at night, to a waitress at their favorite diner on the weekends. Paul saw how much his grandmother had sacrificed in order to take care of him, so he swore that as soon as he turned sixteen he would start working and make her quit her at least both of her part time jobs. His plan was to apply to every fast food joint in town–to every place imaginable, to be honest. He would work anywhere, just so that he could see his tired old grandma relax and smile again. She always had a smile on her face, she was such a steadfast and kind woman. He saw where his late mother got a lot of her personality from, which he adored. Maybe that's why he bonded with her so much, because she reminded him of his mom. Yes, he was so young when his mother died, but the memories he had of her were all fond.

Paul had a bedtime routine of his own. After eating dinner, dessert, and finishing his homework, he would change into his pajamas and sit in front of the tv in his bedroom, playing his favorite video game until the tips of his fingers ached and he couldn't see straight. He would then go brush his teeth, turn on cartoons on his iPad, crawl into bed and fall asleep. Paul would always wake up to the sound of his grandmother's beat-up station wagon pulling into their driveway, with the bright yellow headlights piercing into his bedroom window, lighting up the entire room. Paul would jump out of bed and grab his iPhone off of his desk, checking the time as he frantically ran back to bed. Before he grabbed the charging cable to plug in his phone, he would stare at his screensaver and kiss it goodnight. After his smartphone would beep at him, acknowledging that it was charging, he would say goodnight to his mother and father aloud, pull the sheets up to his neck and close his eyes. A half hour later–after grandma would finish her nightly routine–he would roll over and go back to sleep, thinking about how lucky he was to still have someone in his life that loved and cared for him.

He never really had any bad dreams that he would occasionally remember the next day, but tonight was different. This dream seemed to be a glimpse into the future, a warning he wouldn't realize until it was too late.

In this dream, this clairvoyant nightmare, he was running. It wasn't a carefree frolic through the forest kind of run. He was running so fast it felt like his legs would fall off, running so hard his lungs might explode. He couldn't comprehend why he was running, but he felt that it was serious. It wasn't like any other nightmare he had, not like the one where you're running away from a monster but not going anywhere. This was different because he could feel the negative sensations of his body begging him to stop moving so fast and strong. He could also feel that there were eyes on him, piercing him like daggers to the back. He could tell that he was in imminent danger.

Just as he rounded the corner, studying the colorful patterns of shapes and lines on the dark purple carpet as he stopped to catch his breath, he took a peak.

Before he could let out a scream, the dream ended abruptly as he shot up straight in his bed, eyes wide with terror and confusion.