Dreamcatcher

19

Cold air bit into Venus's lungs. Her heart pumped past the speed of intangible sound, her legs coursing past the slippery ice and melted mush. Soon all she could do was listen to her brief, cut-off breaths that raced against her lungs' abilities. Her ears screamed inside her head, and soon she couldn't handle it anymore. She didn't want to handle it anymore.

Her pace slowed. The houses whirred back into tan and white, doors into their dark brown colors with their clusters of dreamcatchers. Her feet slid across the snow-covered surfaces until she caught her balance, and soon all that existed between her and her house were...many other houses.

Venus felt her fists open and close. She clenched them again as she stood alone on the street, lost and alone.

It would take her a long, long time to get home.

~~

"Actually – what the hell? How is your summer get-away place bigger than my actual house?" Ruben stared out the open window with his wide brown eyes. The towering structure on the hillside shadowed over the small red car they were in.

"Ruben – I think you can get out now. Chase, can you go help Venus and your friends with the suitcases?"

Chase's mom was....young. She had long brown hair and blue eyes brighter than the cliff's ocean view.

"No problem, Mom!"

"You even have a freakin' pool? Sick!" Ruben set down his backpack and went right up to the edge of the glistening blue water, then dipped his finger like he was stirring up a concoction. "You think it's ocean water, Chase?"

"Why the hell would it be ocean water? Chase's family is rich enough to get a summer house, so getting a pool of fresh water isn't that hard," Navella interrupted. She motioned over towards the other two kids dragging their luggage across the cement. "I think Mrs. Ovella wants us to unpack upstairs first."

"Right now?" Ruben whined.

Navella glared at him.

"Fine...."

"Your friends are downstairs playing some board game. Why aren't you joining them?" Venus asked, peeking inside Chase's empty bedroom. He sat on the floor with his history book and a 'I'm so done' look on his face. "You're....reading?"
"I'm being tortured by my history teacher. She gave me homework over the goddamn summer, V..." Chase closed the history book and let out an irritated sigh. "You think I wanna do work voluntarily?"

"Ah, forget the homework for a second. Go down and hang out with your friends." Venus's words sounded more like an order than a suggestion, but Chase didn't hesitate before crushing his friends in Monopoly with three hotels.

"The dreamcatchers, Mrs. Ovella...they're gone from the door—"

"All of them, gone!"

"Including mine...Aw man, I worked so hard on it just to bring it here..."

"You think there's a thief around here–"

"Hey, V....What's your dream? What's my mom's dream?"

"For us to all live happily, of course. What's up with the sudden

question?"

"No reason. No reason."

"There's a knock on the door, Mrs. Ovella–"

"Can you get the door, Chase?"

"Oh my fucking god, Mom, there's masked men outside with guns—"