Me Too

15

The sound of running water filled my ears as I was drifting off in bed. How can I be so worked up, yet rest so easily? I've had practice, I suppose. My eyes begin to flutter shut, and I am asleep before Sofia returns from her sauna.

Unconsciously, against my control, my mind is rather dark. It has been since I was younger, I've just gotten better at controlling it when I am awake. Asleep, I'm screwed.

I've been having reoccurring nightmares since I was a teenager, after my dad died was when they started, but I've gotten so used to them that they have become no longer a problem. They're always the same thing, and I'm not scared of them anymore.

My real night terrors are flashbacks.

Dreams are just pretend, they never happened, and hopefully never will. When I fall asleep some nights, I know I'll have a nightmare. All the same, I know when a flashback will consume me, like I know tonight will result in one. They've been happening a lot recently. But I fall into them so willingly. Even though the pounding drum in my chest, the clawing feeling behind my eyes, and the nauseating tug at my stomach try to save me, I always fall into one of seven scenarios that have happened and are marked forever in my life.

One flashback goes to my horrible high school experience before I left Bainbridge, another is the sound of my mother crying at night after my dad died and the pit in my stomach that I am helpless, and that I couldn't change our loss. The one that jolts me out of bed every time is recent and I haven't gotten used to it yet.

It's alright. I'm okay. I'm not being hurt by any of them, they're all just memories. The pain has already been done, it can't be changed now. I just need to grow up and get over them- or at least, that is what Ryan told me to do.

As I rolled on the bed, onto my back with all of the white sheets over my small body, the biolayer of plastic under the sheets crinkled. So terrifying, right? A boxer took my heart as his punching bag and began pounding under my skin. "Dove?" again the voice called, "Chloe?"

It had already started when Sofia laid next to me. Her warmth didn't help, it wouldn't make it go away, it wouldn't wake me up. Nothing would. I can't even open my eyes to get out of the vivid replay. "Shhh," the memory whispered, "relax." I didn't want to listen, but I had no control. I saw blackness, and I heard nothing save the ghost's voice approaching me. "I won't hurt you," it hissed again, "I love you."

A searing hand print pressed into my thigh, the bedding cracking under my legs. Another heavy weight pushed down next to my shoulder, my hips pinned by a brick. I had been asleep until the cold air hit my leg under my dress. It was all my fault, I suppose. I was wearing a tight fitting and revealing dress that night, it was very short and it was meant to display me. I caught his attention. It did what I intended it to do, but I didn't want for my night to end like this.

"Trust me." Gritted air petted my ear, when a poisonous kiss wetted my temple. It felt like waterboarding as I slowly came to realise.

I didn't fight him. I was half asleep until he started.

"What are you doing?" I had asked so casually, my voice whispering on account of my sleepiness. I was too calm in the moment while he bit at my neck and pressed down on my hips. A very painful sensation came from between my legs and that was when I woke up. I screamed as if that would change anything, how stupid of me, I only encouraged him. It was useless, it felt like I was tearing. Burning dry, sinful hell. I still didn't open my eyes, or warn him. I didn't tell him he was hurting me, it would only satisfy him more. He took my whines as praise and my complaints as accomplishment. Neither of us knew any different.