I strolled into my room and pushed the door almost closed, assured that for once I was actually at home alone. Only my two kittens still remained inside the house with me, and the crack in the door would allow them easy access to my room even while I took a late nap. The world could wait for an hour or so… the bed looked far too inviting with its large fluffy pillows and warm burgundy and forest green quilt.
I shut off the overhead light, leaving the faint winter morning light barely illuminating the room through the curtains and dark blinds, and made my way around the bed to my favorite side. I had been away from the covers too long; any warmth I had left in the bed when I got up an hour ago to feed the kitties and take my vitamins had long since dissipated. I shivered after I crawled in between the cotton sheets in my warm flannel pajamas. I curled up tight under the covers, willing my body heat to warm the blankets enough to create an insulating cocoon. I snuggled in and closed my eyes.
“Do you like sleeping alone?” a soft, deep voice asked me.
I jolted upright and scanned the room in the dim light. I was alone. Even the cats were in the kitchen eating their breakfast. I could hear the faint clinks as their metal collar tags tinkled against the ceramic dishes. I frowned, wondering if I was hearing things. I finally decided that I was just tired and that some dream must have made its way into my consciousness before I was actually asleep. I dismissed the eerie ‘being watched’ feeling with a quick shake of my head, plopped back down on the pillow and pulled the covers back up around me as I closed my eyes.
“You will find I am not so easy to dismiss, my dear,” the voice spoke again, crisp inflection on every word. My eyes popped open and I looked toward the voice. Still I saw nothing. I frowned.
“Who’s there?” I asked suspiciously.
I was answered by a soft, deep chuckle. “Don’t you know?” he challenged me in a whisper. I felt the other side of the bed move like someone sat down on it. I backed toward the edge of the bed and propped myself up on my elbow. My eyes had adjusted enough for me to see clearly, but there was no one there.
I must be dreaming, I thought, shaking my head again. My friends didn’t call me “the dreamer” for nothing.
“Do you often dream about me?” the voice chuckled. “I suppose I should be flattered.” The sound was so close I could almost feel breath on my face.
“Show yourself,” I demanded.
“Only because this game is not as entertaining as I had hoped,” he conceded, slowly becoming visible. “You do not scare easily.”
Less than two feet away from me lay a handsome, slender man wearing an emerald green tunic with a knotted border pattern and black pants. His eyes perfectly matched his tunic and his layered black hair was combed away from his face and curled slightly in the back. He was leaning on one elbow, mirroring my position, his long pale fingers tracing the seam lines of the quilt. I recognized him. But he was an actor, a character in a movie I had seen. He wasn’t real.
“I think you will find I am very real,” he told me, a smirk on his face. He absently traced around a few of the green patches in my quilt, ignoring the burgundy ones altogether.
“You can’t be,” I argued, sure of my facts. “All of that is fantasy. You’re fantasy.”
“No, you are quite mistaken.” He cocked his head sideways, scrutinizing me and daring me to argue with him further.
“Then you’re…” I trailed off, less than eager to give a name to the face I saw.
“What, you are afraid to say it? After all your bold utterances yesterday, you cannot bear to say my name now? How disappointing.”
Yesterday? What happened yesterday? I combed my brain, trying to remember what had happened. Oh, no. But that was just a game we were playing, a silly fortune-telling game with poker playing cards and made-up rules. It wasn’t serious, wasn’t real.
But each one of us had chosen characters from the movie to stand in as would-be romantic partners. Elizabeth had a fangirl crush on Iron Man, Celeste had picked Hawkeye, and I had chosen… Loki. My face paled.
