If I Should Dream Before I Wake(Sample)

Chapter 3

-Rave-

I watched her slowly disappear as she was pulled from her dream, pain gripping my chest the same way it always did when I watched her leave. Only this time, something was different. This time I knew her name. Tessa. I felt certain if I were able to dream, every single one would be about her.

I shouldn't have approached her. For months I had stayed behind, keeping to the shadows, silently watching her. I didn't know why I was so drawn to her, or why I found myself back at this lake each night, hoping for a glimpse of her. I only knew that I continued to watch helplessly as she mourned for her parents night after excruciating night. But what nearly killed me was knowing I was to blame.

At first I assumed she would move on the same way so many others did after their grief began to heal. Not Tessa. Something kept her here, kept her close, kept her connected to this spot, connected to the loss, which in a strange way kept her connected to me. For months I'd hoped she would realize the futility of her dreams, prayed that she'd find a reason to stop punishing herself. Still, every night I watched her cry, heard her call out for them, stood uselessly nearby as her body stilled with shock. Every time I witnessed her ritual of anguish it was as if I could feel her pain in my own body. I willed strength, comfort, rest, any type of healing I could think of to her with the hope they might help make her whole again. They never did.

At first I thought it would be enough to protect her body, to spare her the grim fate I knew awaited her. I was wrong. Despite surviving the fire some part of her must have died that night, and she seemed unable to revive it on her own. In fact, she didn't even seem to want to try. For weeks I watched and waited, trying to spare her additional pain while doing my best to keep my distance from her. Still, I longed to touch her, to hold her in my arms, even though I knew it was certain to bring about her death.

But this night, something was different. Standing on top of that dune I felt drawn to her In a way I couldn't ignore. I simply had to talk to her, to hear her voice. Surely just a word or two would be okay, help me take the edge off the craving inside me. Just a few moments, I thought, then I'd be able to leave her be, to allow her to be alone in the grief she so desperately sought night after night.

So, I climbed the dune and I stood behind her. I'd meant to help her see how pain can birth beauty, to show her how she would someday begin to heal from all of this, but I'd merely said something impossibly ignorant instead. Then she turned and saw me for the first time. She was more beautiful than any dream had a right to be. Her hair curled, tangled and windswept, around her face. The fervent red of her curls was cooled only by the jade of her eyes that took me in with confusion and disgust. In their flash I could see the spark of the willful spirit inside her, embers of her life still red with its heat. Too soon they would fade. Too soon the fire would die out and she'd be stuck in this place forever. Unless I could find a way to stop it. And I would. I must! I promised to do anything to save her, to keep her safe, even if it meant finding dozens of ways to make her hate me.

As I cast my eyes over the rubble that had once been a cozy lake house, a sparkle caught my eye. Eagerly I plucked a small necklace from the smoldering debris. I had seen Tessa wearing the pendant in some of her other dreams. A pair of small black wings, angled together yet parted slightly by a blood red ruby nestled beneath them. I gently held the pendant to my lips, feeling energized by the nearness of something that had once belonged to her. Before I could stop myself, I secured the clasp behind my head, more determined than ever to find a way to make sure she stayed away from me forever.

From the moment I spied her on this beach I vowed in my heart to protect this beautiful creature that for some reason slipped into the crevices of my darkest nightmares. But to save her I needed her to be gone from here. I needed to find a way to get rid of her before the nightmares of this place came to life and stole her the way they had stolen me.