Crystal

Chapter 3: Living life to my fullest

I was jogging in the darkness. There was a faint, dark mist around me. I don't know how long I've been jogging but I knew I was inside the forest. As I jogged on, every so often there would be someone walking towards my direction as I would pass them by. They would appear almost as if they had a blue glow. But then the glow would fade, and so would the person.

I was deeper in the forest. I stopped to catch my breath. I suddenly felt dizzy. I heard a crack behind me and I turned around. I couldn't see anything, just trees. I continued on and heard another crack. This time when I turned around, I saw a long thick branch sticking out from a tree that had a weird movement to it. It wasn’t moving in the wind sort of way, it was moving as it was an arm. Then I focused on it a bit more and I realized it wasn't a branch. At that moment I took off running again.

I felt lost in the forest. I ran for a few minutes before I tripped. I fell hard on a little dirt slope. I got back up and stood frozen. There was Leza standing before me. She looked like she was in pain. Blood came from her mouth, she was holding her stomach. She looked up at me, her eyes pale. I stepped backwards.

"Leza..." I whispered.

"Run." She said. She faded away like the others. I stepped back again and bumped into something. I turned slowly, the first thing I see is a red smile and screamed as loud as I could.

I woke up in a cold sweat. I looked over at my phone to check the time. It was 3:44 am. I got up to get a drink of water. It was a nightmare, just a nightmare. But it felt so real. I haven't had a nightmare since I was 12 and that was about me going to school naked. I drank the cold water and took a deep breath. "It's okay. I just have to relax." I told myself. I made my way to the couch and turned on the TV. I found a marathon of 90s reruns and settled on that. I fell asleep a half hour later.

Today was long. After work I went for a jog, couldn't let a nightmare get to me. Then I went to the grocery store to pick up a pack of beer. I got home to see Rob smoking outside my house. As I pulled up, he started walking over to me.

"Yes?" I asked getting out of my car.

He walked over to me and grabbed the bag of beer from my hand.

"I was just wondering if you wanted to watch a movie or something." He followed me up the stairs.

"It depends. What are you into?" I turned to look at him. He was wearing a Black Sabbath t-shirt. That earned him a few more points.

"Action. Comedy. A little horror."

"This place is a little horror." I opened the door to let us in. I allowed him to follow me to the kitchen where he placed the pack of beer on the counter.

"Wow, you two really look a lot alike." He said. I took out two beers and handed him one.

I saw he was looking at the picture behind me on the counter.  It was Leza and me six months ago. We did look alike. We both had curly dark brown hair, except I kept mine long whereas Leza had cut hers shoulder length. We both had light grey eyes and the same upper lip shape. My bottom lip was smaller than hers. We both had athletically built bodies. But it wasn't always that way. I was super thin and she was a little bigger. We just started a diet last year that got us both healthy shapes.

            "I remembered when she moved in. And I remembered when I found out." Rob said looking at the photo.

"You guys ever spoke?" I asked.

"She didn't say much. But she and my friend got close."

“Really?” I was very curious about that. I actually remember her mentioning her saying “I have a pretty hot neighbor but his friend is gorgeous and super sweet.”

“Yeah, he took her out a few times but I don’t think they got too far into anything.”

We opened our beers and tapped them against each other. I quickly changed the subject by telling him I only had a bunch of Tarantino films. That seemed fine and we sat on my couch enjoying "Kill Bill."

But I couldn’t quite find a way to concentrate. I couldn’t help but feel a little guilty for watching a movie with a guy on Leza’s couch. Was this wrong? I wasn’t sure what to really think, but I felt that I was allowed to have my own life. I wasn’t going to let myself feel sorry about the situation. I was going to enjoy this guy’s company and live a little. I feel Leza would have been okay with that. She definitely would have improved on the idea of watching a movie with Rob too. I know she would look at me and say “Well, he’s definitely you type.” Especially since I remember how she told me he was attractive. I remember brushing it off since I wasn’t really in the dating spirit at that time. I was usually really picky when it came to guys and no one met my standards at home. Not that they were high, just weird. Leza knew me well, and even had mentioned “Next time you come, I’ll introduce you to my neighbor.” I smiled at that thought of a potential conversation I could have had, and tried to get back into the movie.