I wake up in a cold sweat, my hair sticks to my face. My labored breathing fills the thick silence. I ca hear the blood punding in my ears. My fists grip the duvet around me, my knuckles white. It's just a dream, it's just a dream. I repeat the mantra over and over again in my head u til my compsure returns. As I get up to wash my face, the room starts to spin around me and my body goes numb. I sit on the side of my bed until everything goes back to normal. I walk to the bathroom and splash cold water in my face. My eyes shift to the mirror in front of me and I don't recognize the girl staring back. "Who are you?" I say, not recognizing my own voice, but the stranger mouths it back simultaneously. "Who am I?" I rephrase.
My phone vibrates on the night stand next to my bed, who can be texting me at, I look at my clock, 2:35 in the morning?. I switch my phone on and it reads:
Luke: Hey baby, you up? Can't sleep :(
I respond:
Me: Yeah, I'm wide awake. I don't think I'll be getting anymore sleep.
I hit the send button and wait for Luke to reply. Minutes go by and Luke still hasn't responded so I decided to go for a drive to clear my head.
Outside the rain hits the window in a steady beat.
"I let it fall my heart,
And as it fell you rose to claim it.
It was dark and I was over
Until you kissed my lips and you saved me."
Adele's raspy voice pours from the car stereo, each note sending a chill down my spine. Her voice will do that to you or maybe it's just that I hate driving in the rain. My hands grip the steering wheel tightly. Outside, the road becomes harder and harder to differentiate from the thick blur of woods that borders it on both sides. Rain hits the windshield like rapid gunfire.
"My hands, they're strong
But my knees are far too weak
To stand in your arms
Without falling to your feet."
I can almost imagine my mothers face as she scolds mefor driving in the rain. "Driving in a rainstorm is just asking for trouble." In the background, I imagine my father chuckling from his arm chair by the fireplace, pretending the whole time that he had been innocently reading his sports column. "Especially with that hunk of rust you call a car." Just the thought of my parents causes some of the tension to ease out of my shoulders.
"But theres a side to you
That I never knew, never knew
All the things you'd say
They were never true, never true
And the games you play
You would always win, always win."
I take a deep breath. Inhale. Exhale. I roll my shoulders and shift on the leather seat. Relax, I chide myself. I breath in again. In and out. My grip on the steering wheel seems to tighten, somethings the mind simply can't control. Outside the storm picks up speed. I hate driving in the rain, it brings up too many unhappy feelings and unwanted memories. Not only is it raining but I know from the gnawing feeling at the pit of my stomach that I am lost. That fact alone is enough to keep me on edge. At fifteen miles an hour, I feel almost as if I am going at a snails pace. I'm moving too slow in a direction I can't even identify. In the background, Adele belts out her heartbreaking notes:
"But I set fire to the rain
Watched it pour as i touched your face
Well it burned while I cried
Cause I heard it screaming
Out your name, your name!"
Her voice isn't filled with agony and despair for a love lostbut with triumph for a love won, a love won for one's self.
"When I lay with you
I could stay there
Close my eyes
Feel you here forever
You and me togethet
Nothings getz better."
The lyrics cause my eyes to sting and tears threaten to flow. In an instant, Zane's pale face clouds my vision. I don't have tome to decipher whether or not it's imaginary. My senses take over, the sound of screeching tires, the smell of burning rubber. Time seems to stop and stand still. Suddenly, I'm no longer in the driver's seat but out of my body all together.
