All They Didn't Know

Chapter 7

I'm dreaming.

There's a girl, in the distance, and she's walking towards me. We're standing in a grassy plain. The girl squints, against the non-existent sun, like she's looking for someone but can't quite find them.

She's looking for me.

My mind far off in the clouds, watching the scene from above, I am in no control of myself as my feet pull themselves towards her like a magnet. And every time I grow closer, just in range of her sad, hopeful face, something pushes me back. An invisible force, scolding me, trying to tell me,

'You don't belong here.'

Somehow I know that it's right. I belong in another world, one stupid, and oblivious to this past age. But that's me. Caught between the two.

The girl, with big eyes and caramel hair, is trying to tell me something. It's clear she can't see me, for she's calling into thin air and looking desperately around, but I can see her lips moving, blood red against the pale white skin that stretches across the high cheekbones. If only I could read them -

But I can't. I peer at her. I shout. But even I can't hear my calls... and then six letters flash across my mind. It is those six letters plucked precisely from a range of twenty six, placed in that exact order, at that perfect moment.

JAYDEN -

I wake up.

My forehead's soaked.

But suddenly Joseph's invitation is not a question anymore. It's a statement. There is only one answer.

And I know what I have to do.