I'm Still Sadie

My Nightmare

MY NIGHTMARE

I awoke to the sounds of the falling rain.

Gasping for air, I clenched the sheets and struggled to make myself sit up.

Relax. You were just having a nightmare.

A nightmare, huh? That was weird considering that I couldn't remember what I was dreaming about, but why should I bother overthinking?

Just accept the first solution you came up with.

Thunder boomed outside my window and showed no sign of stopping soon. Trying to go back to bed would just be hopeless, so I turned on my lamp and rubbed my eyes.

Uneasiness settled all over me. Something was off, but I couldn't put my finger on it. I was in my bedroom and everything looked just as I had left it; clothes were still strewn around the room and my basketball hoop was still on the door.

Wait a minute. This is my bedroom, I'm home again!

I felt choked up, was I really back?

And then, I laughed at the strange situation I was in. Body switching just sounded ludicrous, something I'd make up in a dream...

No. That shit was way too real to be a dream, and you know that.

At this point, I had to acknowledge that the body switching happened, even after I became Sadie again.

But saying that seemed wrong. Was I Sadie again, or was I someone else?

How many people had to ask themselves such a question fifteen days in a row?

I stumbled out of bed and hobbled out of my room with caution, almost as if the walls were going to suddenly peel back and reveal that this wasn't actually my bedroom, but a Hollywood movie set instead.

In the bathroom, the cool texture of the tiled floor sent chills up my spine. Part of me felt that I should've been overjoyed because of the familiarity, but I couldn't help feeling like a freak, like a monster.

The face glaring at from the mirror wasn't doing anything to help that either.

But it was me.

My light brown hair that normally fell to my shoulders consisted of only knots at this point, and several new breakouts were strewn across my nose.

That was not a monster's reflection, it was something much worse. Staring back at me in the mirror was Sadie Arlo, an ugly, cruel, mean and narcissistic person, but she was still me nonetheless.

Only when I stopped being Sadie did my true personality shine through the clouds. 

I flicked on the faucet and splashed water onto my face with a cloth, but as soon as I turned the water off, a murmur crawled inside my ears.

Not being able to decipher what was being said lead me to peeking my head around the bathroom door and into the living room. A silhouette paced around the room and I felt my heart race a little.

Tiptoeing into the living room, the murmuring transformed into a voice; a woman's voice, my mom's voice.

"Oh my god," she said into the phone, "Oh my god. Oh my god." She repeated that same line over and over again, enough times for me to wonder if she had a few bolts loose.