Escape From Reality

The Chase

We are downstairs now, and both of us are scrunching our eyes shut, trying to force ourselves to wake up, but considering none of us had ever done it before, we weren't too sure how to do it. With every thud my heart leaps a beat, and I clench my eyes tighter, trying to will myself to wake up and at the same time trying desperately to fight against the allure of the dream.

"It's not working." I hear Jacob breathe out and we both nearly jump out from our skins as another horrifying thud echoes from outside. In fear, I open my eyes to see Jacob's increasingly worried face, his bright green eyes open, and I try desperately to clamp down the panic in my heart.

"What do we do?" I ask and the floor shakes and we nearly fall again.

"Maybe we don't want to escape enough?" Jacob suggests with a shrug.

"Well-I want to escape pretty badly!" I try to will myself awake, desperately thinking how much I need to wake up, but now I feel something is pulling me back, not allowing me to push through that threshold to reality. Jacob narrows his eyes, deep in thought about our predicament before a sudden look comes across his face. He grits his teeth.

"I think we have to go out."

"What? What do you mean we have to go out?" I screech, my heart beating fast at the thought of facing those monsters headfirst. I did not want to see those monsters in such close proximity.

"The house must have some kind of barrier to prevent us from waking up. I think we have to go outside in order to wake up."

"I woke up while I was in here before though." I thought back to the last time I dreamed, when I had entered the house for the first time. Little did I know things would go as bad as they did.

"How?" Jacob asks and I try to think back to that fateful day where I entered the house for the first time.

"I think I just did?"

"That's not really helpful." Jacob shouts and we hear another loud thud against the wall.

"So you want to just go out to the thing trying to kill us?"

"It's not like I want to get killed!"

"Well!" I shout because I don't know how to reply to that.

The sound of thunder crackled outside, the sound of rainfall outside is tremendously loud now, the storm waging a warpath outside, promising to destroy all that dared to set foot in the rain. The thudding continues outside, loud and unforgiving, threatening to kill.

"We have to make a choice, Chloe. I think we have to go out there and confront those things. It's the only way we can get out of here." Jacob's voice shakes as he says this, although there is a layer of grit inside it. Like he knows that we have to do it.

The idea of going out there admittedly scares me. Because with every thunder clap and thud I hear, the more and more certain I was going to die out there in the storm. I'm paralysed by the mere suggestion of it, and suddenly staying here forever sounds even more inviting by the second, not having to deal with those monsters outside.

Stay. The dream frantically whispers in my ear, and I nearly forget everything and give into it, the sickening feeling of suffocating safety dragging me in, and suddenly the house shakes again, and to both of our horror a crack starts to appear in the walls of the house, slowly growing larger as the monster comes closer to attacking us.

"It's coming inside." I gasp out, shaking my head, trying to clear my thoughts from the misty haze, focusing instead on how much I had to wake up for the sake of my dad. I pry myself away from its invisible fingers, struggling to break hold from its grip. No, I can't give in. I have to wake up for my dad. I push harder against the thoughts.