A Touch of Madness (A Recipe for Disaster Novel 1)

It writhes under my skin

There’d been a reason I had been afraid to sleep this past week, and it was more than the pervading sense that I had been betrayed by someone. Anytime I’ve gotten into a good, deep sleep, the nightmares happen. Sometimes I’m aware of them and can wake up, sometimes I wake up in a cold sweat, and sometimes I’m not even aware that I’m dreaming. Those are the worst ones, the ones where I think it’s real until I jerk awake, where I live through scenes of Edward stealing my memories from my head and being frozen in place and unable to do anything to stop it. So for the last little while I’ve set my watch to beep every 30 minutes; it wakes me up and helps prevent the nightmares. But no amount of annoying beeps was going to wake me out of this drugged stupor. It was so similar to when Lucien was rampaging through my mind that for a moment I thought it really was him. When the nightmares changed in complexity I eventually realized it was just my own fears and twisted imagination presenting these horrors; thankfully  even with a sedative in my system adrenaline worked to wake me up eventually. Somehow I knew it was dawn outside, I could almost feel the sun rising over the horizon and breaking the hold of darkness both on the land and inside my head. I lay there in bed, gasping around my terror, drenched in sweat and I could feel where I’d torn the sheets with my fingers. My jaw ached, I could taste blood from where I’d bitten my tongue, and my throat was hoarse feeling; as if I’d been screaming. I grimaced as I realized that may be the case.

Someone must have heard whatever noises I’d made because I heard hurried footsteps come towards the cell door. I scrubbed the tears off of my face and used the ruined sheet to wipe some of the sweat off of my body. I noticed that I was shaking more than a little as the cell door clicked unlocked and swung open. A rather sleepy looking Alex, Barry and Jessica walked in so I scrambled off the bed and was over to the trio quicker than any of us expected; then I broke Alex’s nose again. Barry grabbed my arms and heaved me away, trying to calm me down while Alex glared at me.

“I told you this was a bad idea.” Jessica’s offhand comment to Barry interrupted my struggles.

“You planned this?” I demanded and stopped struggling. Barry let my arms go and I turned to look at him. He had the good grace to look mildly ashamed of himself.

“Yes. Jessica told me that you weren’t sleeping so I went to Alex with my concerns. We were hoping you’d sleep the first night but when I checked on you, you were wide awake. And yesterday morning I found your tools to try and jimmy the door lock. You’ve been on edge for a while Cal, and you almost got into a fight with a Changer the day before the full moon. You’re not thinking clearly. I wish you’d trust us to help you.” Barry explained, looking pained.

He looked even more pained when I kneed him in the stomach and then decked him on the chin. He hit the floor roughly and I used the momentum to spin out of the reach of Alex’s grabs. I kicked his knee as he rushed me and he hit the floor. I locked eyes with Jessica for a moment but she backed out of easy reach. The only reason I’d even done the damage I had was due to the fact that they’d just spent the night running around in beast form while I’d been sleeping. Alex was already getting back up; I’d heard his knee pop as I kicked it but he causally popped it back in.

“I had a good reason to not sleep.” I said voice angry. Then I turned and took off out the door, closing it behind me. I heard someone snarl as it automatically locked. Tired or not, a Changer can outrun me easily. I turned away from the door and hurried down the hallway, heading for the entrance. I’m sure there’s a way to open the cell door from the inside, they’d just never told me it. And I desperately wanted out of there. Barry’s betrayal had hurt and my heart ached; I had no one left to turn to.