Look for the light | Dalton Lambert

THE REVELATION

"HEY 'SUP NERD" Fosters voice sounded through the phone. Stella was sat to the left of Dalton, perched on his bed and slightly hoping she would be able to hear most of the conversation as she thought it may be useful to them later.

"A red door." Dalton spoke, desperate to get his brother to take the conversation seriously.

"Come on, man. Doesn't that mean anything to you? A red door?" Dalton asked his brother on the phone, looking to Stella as she sympathetically shrugged her shoulders at him, not expecting much to come from the conversation at that point.

"You sound weirder than usual." Foster practically avoided the question entirely and just decided to insult his brother in a roundabout way.

"It's a thing from art class. It's a painting. We had to find a memory, i thought it was something from our childhood" he trailed off, looking down at his lap bashfully and Stella lent forward to place a hand on his shoulder, she knew he was loosing hope and he was desperate at this point.

Foster suggested asking their mom yet Dalton just told him he didn't want to worry her.

"Is this what happens when you go to college? You become all cryptic and shit? I'm definitely not going."
Foster proceeds to hang up without even saying goodbye and Dalton sighs, placing his phone into his pocket and holding his head in his hands, leaning forward to stare at the painting.

"Hey, we're going to figure this out, okay? We'll be alright"

Stella crouched in front of him, clasping his hands in hers as he gripped her hands in return.

He turned his face slightly to peer down at her and slowly the two began to lean closer together, time felt as if it had been slowed as the two got closer

Closer...

The door behind them swings open causing the two of them to jump apart as Lizzie and Chris file into the room.

"So, after the whole spooky 'dream-not-a-dream' thing the other night, i did some thinking and I was like 'yeah, okay, Dalton's a weirdo. But, he's not insane right?' No." She places the laptop in Daltons lap and moves his painting away from him and placing the laptop then on the table as Lizzie sat on the bed and wrapped her arms around Stella, who after the shock of being startled by the two, cuddled into her roommates side and throwing the blanket from the top of the bed over the two and Dalton turned his head to smile at the two.

"I'm really gonna need that key back..." Dalton realised that even though Chris had actually moved rooms, the key was still in her possession.

"Right. So I started poking around the old inter-webs...and guess what, you're not crazy at all! You are an astral projector" Lizzie smiled at Dalton, the two girl's evidently having done research before arriving. Dalton and Stella look at each other as though Chris and Lizzie's heads were on fire.

None of this made any sense.

Truly.

On the computer screen there were two guys who looked as though they worked for McDonalds in the day and ghost hunted by night.

"Hey guys, this is spectral sightings. I'm specs, this is tucker. Okay, we are PPI, professional paranormal investigators. Today we are going to talk about something that dozens of you have been asking about. Astral projection. It's a real phenomenon, our physical body falls asleep and our astral body leaves the physical body... and floats off into another realm."  The two guys in the video talk, with a few corny edits in between.

"Hey! That's exactly what it feels like." Dalton leans forward, evidently relieved that the group may be one step further toward the truth and the secrets his past held.

"Our former mentor Elise Rainier had a name for this realm, the Further."

Dalton clicked on a video in the suggested bar and an elderly woman popped up on screen.

"It's nice to see you all" she began with a simple smile and nod of her head.

"So I'm here to talk to you about astral projection and the Further. Give me a minute. The Further is a dark realm, filled with tortured souls of the dead and some are doomed to live the worst mistakes of their lives, over and over again for all eternity. When you astral project, you travel to this realm, there are souls that you awaken with your presence, they can smell you. The presence of life. Life is what they crave, more than anything. So the further you travel, the riskier the journey becomes. They want life, and they can come to our world to get it. Keep a steady stride." She warns.

The group turn to Dalton as he sighs and leans back.

"No, no, no, whatever you're thinking Dalton don't make it something stupid." Stella sat forward, looking at him.

He turned to her "remember the kid was saw at the frat house?" He asked her, grasping her hand once again. "Uh the pukey kid?" She asked. "Yeah, he said something to us right? He said 'close the door' do you remember?"

"Yeah I'm sure he did. It probably wasn't his proudest moment." Chris cut in from the other side of Dalton.

"What if he meant something else? What if he meant this door?"

"So what?" Lizzie leant forward also "you want to go back and ask him?" She chuckled as Dalton turned back to her and Stella. Stella tightened her grip on his hand as if to silently let him know she was there with him and she would back him up.

"Seriously? I mean, I feel bad for the dude. However dark realms are the sorts of places I usually try to avoid." Chris spoke up again.

"There's something important about this painting guys, I have to find out." He looked around at them with pleading eyes and a desperate tone to his voice.

"Okay. But it's not like Nick the dick is going to just let you waltz into his bedroom and chat with the ghost in his bathroom." Chris pointed out.

Stella attempted to sit back on the bed and release Dalton's hand yet he wouldn't let her, his grasp on her hand wouldn't allow her to remove it and so she just continued to console his anxiety by holding his hand.

"He'll never know I was there"

We'll be alright.