stars || Joe Sugg

2.) nightmares

joe

I've been woken up a lot of strange ways in my lifetime, but I can say that I've never been woken up by a twenty-something-year old girl screaming at the top of her lungs. My door was closed and at first, I wasn't exactly sure what I was hearing. I checked my clock which read 2:51. I almost considered that I was just imagining it, but now that I'm standing outside of Caspar's - Ruby's - room, I know that it is Ruby.

"Hey, love?" I say, opening the door just enough for me to peek my head in. In the dark, I can barely make out the figure in the bed. The black-haired girl is curled up into a tiny ball in the bed. She holds her head in her hands as she continues to scream. "Ruby?" I call louder into the room.

Ruby whimpers quietly, but she stops screaming. She begins crying, which stresses me out even more. I've never had to calm someone down when they've started crying. Ever. It's just not something I've ever experienced, and I really don't want a test run at three in the morning. I step into the room and lightly touch her leg to see if I can at least wake her up. She lets out one more shaky breath before barely opening her eyes.

"Joe?" She asks. She rolls slightly over in the bed; only moving the top half of her body.

"Are you okay?" I ask. I run a hand through my hair lazily, accomplishing basically nothing. It just flops back in front of my eyes. She looks at me for a short second before looking at my hand. She pulls her leg away slowly and sits up in the bed.

"Uh, yeah." Her voice is quivering, and in her current state, she looks anything but alright. I turn and flip on the light. Her dark hair is falling out of the ponytail, and her nose piercing looks red, as if she'd been pulling on it. There are tear tracks across her face.

"Do you need anything?" I offer cautiously. She adverts my eyes and looks down at her phone on the floor.

"Water?" She asks, looking up at me for a short second. I nod and exit the room. I nearly run up the stairs and to Caspar, who is passed out of the couch. It's a wonder how he didn't wake up from Ruby's screaming. But, it's even weirder that she didn't wake herself up.

"Caspar." I say, poking and prodding him over and over again, until he finally wakes up. "We need to talk about our house guest." I say to him. I pull him off the couch and towards the kitchen.

"What's wrong with Ruby?" He asks sleepily. He rests his head on his arms crossed on top of the counter.

"Does she have, like... night terrors?" I ask, sitting a water bottle on top of the counter.

"Does she have what?" Caspar asks. Surely Caspar had to know at least something about this girl. He'd met her a few times, but honestly, I thought he would ask questions before letting her move in.

"Like, nightmares."

"Doesn't everyone?" He begins to walk back over to the couch. I run in front of him and stop him.

"She literally just woke me up, screaming from a nightmare. Not everyone does that." I explain. I watch as he thinks about it for a second.

"It's probably nothing. Quit overreacting." The blonde steps around me and falls back down on to the couch. I know that there is no way that he is going to answer as he covers his head with a blanket.

I guess, it could just be anxiety or stress. Zoe used to have nightmares frequently when she was younger due to her panic disorder, but it was never this bad. She also, as far as I know, hasn't had a nightmare since she was a teenager.

I begin down the stairs, holding the water bottle in my hands. I turn into the bedroom to see Ruby scrunched up in the top right corner of the bed. She has her head between her hands again, and she's resting it on her knees. Her hair is down and encircling her rolled-up body. I can hear her whispering swear words under her breath. I knock my knuckle against the door frame causing her eyes to blink up to meet mine.