What her heart desires

Chapter 7

Authors note:
So...I had more writer's block, for this story anyway. Plus I have a few other stories that I'm working on, but here it is. Hope you enjoy it (this is a big one *wink wink*).

Hope's in the library, where she's surrounded by stacks of books. The lighting isn't what it usually is. It's softer, warmer, the result of the sun setting outiside, giving it a softer, golden glow. She spots Josie, sitting at a desk, her eyes glued to the pages in front of her. The warm light dances in her eyes, making them glimmer so so beautifully as if they were two pools of molten chocolate. She looks perfect, peaceful, and entirely unaware of the girl gazing at her.

Hope walks closer.

Josie looks up, their eyes meeting suddenly. A smile graces Hope's lips, the eye contact remaining strong. She has no desire to divert her gaze, no need to look at anything other than Josie. Her heartbeat echoes through the room, pounding loudly like the strokes of a clock. She swears she can hear Josie's heart too, beating equally as loud, each beat bringing them closer together until they sync into one perfect rhythm. The air feels thick, as if it's weighing her down, the tension unmatched. It's suffocating, yet she can't get enough.

But she doesn't move. She doesn't speak. She simply looks at Josie, and Josie looks at her. Her skin prickles with the intensity of the moment.

In a split second, Josie is reaching out, her hand inches away from Hope. She holds it high, a smile stretching across her face as she says "Come with me." The words pass through Hope's mind, and without hesitation she reaches out, desperate to connect their hands, desperate to see what will happen.

Hope opens her eyes, no longer in the library, but in her own room, curled up under the blankets, with Landon by her side. His arm is draped over her stomach, yet he still seems deep in his sleep, unaware that Hope has woken up. She peeks at the clock. It's still early, three hours or so before her alarm is due to go off.

Hoping to coax herself back into the arms of sleep, she shuts her eyes tightly, willing her mind to calm. A few minutes pass and she realizes that is not going to happen. As gently and slowly as possible, she slides out of bed. When she's sure she hasn't disturbed Landon, she creeps out of the room, taking small and delicate steps.

The tribrid doesn't have a particular plan, she simply hopes that a short walk around the school will clear her head enough that maybe she can get some more rest.

Truth be told, her head is racing. It seems it always is these days. So fast that a thought is gone as quickly as it comes, shortly replaced by another. That makes it all the more confusing, and all the more challenging for Hope to make sense of it all. She's having all these dreams, and as comforting as they are, they don't make sense. She still suspects they will stop soon, but even then, there must be some kind of meaning to them - something she hasn't quite noticed or perhaps is too afraid to notice, too afraid to look deeper and see what the dreams are trying to tell her. All she knows is that in them, she feels free.

It almost seems like parts of those dreams bleed into her real life, like that time she said she had to go to the library, even though she didn't and she wound up talking to Josie. It was as if her mind knew Josie was there, like their subconscious' are still tied together in some ways.

She winds up standing in the hallway by her room and Josie's, having not even noticed she'd made it back here. And she feels it again, here, now - Hope feels what she's felt in those dreams, what she now knows she felt at the library. It's here, and it's palpable.

Hope listens closely. On her left, she hears Landon's steady breaths and his quiet hums in his sleep. On the other, she can hear incantations escaping the lips of her best friend.