The Convict

Nightmare

My throat burned as the thick red liquid rushed into my lungs. The sounds of my screams muffled as bubbles of air float up to the surface. The hand on my chest feels like a ten-ton weight, iron, impossible to remove.

I pick and pry at the fingers but to no avail.

Then my body fights gravity as I am yanked out of the tub, sagging from the weight of my sins.

I gasp for air, blood spewing past my lips as I spit it out. I have to blink the burning sensation from my eyes. The haze in front of me focused on Vegas and his deranged expression. He is shouting so forcefully that the veins pop out on his head.

It's strange.

Even though I can see how animated he is from his screaming and yelling, I don't hear a thing. All is silent as my body struggles to breathe. I grab onto his hand, the hairs on his arms providing some grip to my blood-coated fingers. I cling to him like a child clinging to its mother.

I don't get a chance to beg for my life before I am shoved under the tub of blood again.

I wiggle and squirm, trying to get free.

When I am brought up a second time, it's not the cold eyes of Vegas I see but his Daughter's eyes, Dakota. She looks like how she did when I first met her. Long blond hair, cold blue eyes, not a scratch on her perfect face.

She lifts a knife high into the air and jabs it into my arm, dropping me back into the tub.

I scream and shoot out of the tub, pulling the knife from my arm.

Blood drips from the tub to the floor as I cling to the side for dear life. I watch the blood droplets follow the grout on the ground, trickling to the door, but they stop at someone's heels.

I look up and see her standing over me, eyes filled with shock and terror.

"Help! Somebody Help me!" I reach out to her.

Antonia takes a step back and looks up at something behind me.

When I turn I am met with myself, standing with a gun to my face.

She pulls the trigger.

I shoot up in bed at the sound of a loud bang.

I am drenched in sweat.

My back aches in protest and my chest heaves up and down, fighting off the last images of my nightmare.

I turn in bed but Dakota isn't there.

I feel sick to my stomach.

I open my mouth but no sounds come out, just a gurgling whimper.

I slide off the bed, clutching my back as I look for something to make me feel safe and secure. I only make it to the bedroom door before I double over and dry heave. I fall to my knees, my body trembling, stuck in this cycle of fear and terror.

"Mel!" Someone runs over to me and when I look into her eyes I see those cold and calculating blues and I am transported back to the tub, back to that night on the sidewalk.

I scream and try to crawl away and she flinches back, confused by my reaction.

I sob and crawl under the bed, curling into a ball in the far back corner.

I close my eyes and try to find a safe feeling, a memory, a face, anything that will bring me peace once more. But all I see is Vegas and Charlotte. When I open my eyes, Antonia is lying next to me, dead, her throat sliced open.