I'll See You When I Fall Asleep

Chapter 4

Cammie woke up with a splitting headache. Asleep at her side was Adam. The night slowly came trickling back to her. They had both decided to drink instead of dealing with the problem that blossomed between them. It would all go away with the Dream anyway.

Cammie slipped out of the bed to fix coffee for the house. Savannah trotted out shortly after and collapsed into a stool with a loud yawn. Cammie slipped her friend a mug full of steaming liquid energy.

"Everything okay?" Savannah asked.

"Yeah, it's fine." Cammie replied. She grabbed a mug for herself and watered down the bitter coffee with creamer.

"What was he jealous about right now?"

"I don't know. He was upset that that girl was talking to me."

Savannah laughed into her mug. "A girl this time? He's really going overboard."

Cammie rubbed the back of her neck. "I don't know where this came from."

"Hasn't he always been jealous?"

Cammie nodded. "I have no idea why. I've never dated anyone other than him. It's so strange."

"I guess some people are just jealous."

Cammie shook her head, repeating that she did not know.

"Did you talk about it anymore?"

"No. What's the point? It'll all be okay on Monday."

"Why?"

"Once I have my Dream, he won't have anymore doubts about me or him. It'll fix everything."

"Sounds like a plan." Savannah sipped from her coffee so she didn't have to say more.

The two lapsed into a silence as Cammie gazed at a spot on the wooden table, chewing her lip.

"That girl was really into last night," Savannah said.

Cammie blink a few times, Savannah and the small apartment materialized before her.

"What?"

"That girl, the one that you were talking to by the drink bar. She was really into you."

"She let me use her bottle opener. We weren't really talking."

"That didn't really stop her from ogling you all night."

"What are you even talking about?"

Savannah smirked at Cammie's obliviousness. Savannah was quite sure that had she not pointed out that Adam was very much into Cammie, the girl would have said he was a very nice person and moved on with her day.

"That girl was definitely trying to hit on you."

Cammie grimaced. "Savannah, stop. That's weird."

"How is it weird? I've hit on girls. Even kissed a few."

"Yeah, but that's different."

"How?"

"You're not really into girls, you're just. . ." Cammie let her words die.

Savannah cocked an eyebrow. "So what if she was into girls. She was definitely into you."

"Ew. Sav, stop."

"Why is it 'ew'?"

"Because." Cammie had no reply. She thought about two girls being together and thought made her cringe. "It's weird."

Savnnah shook her head and began to reply when a doorknob turned and Adam walked into the living room. Savannah offered him a quick smile and excused herself. "Gotta go to work." She downed the rest of her coffee and slipped from the room. He ignored her, and made his way to Cammie, embracing her. She set her mug down and returned his gesture.

"Good morning," Cammie said. "How did you sleep?"

"Like a rock." He bent down and kissed her. He sniffed the air. "Smells good in here."

Cammie dutifully went and poured Adam a cup of coffee, but upon her return, he snatched her mug instead. Adam, standing much taller than Cammie, easily held the precious drink from her reach.

"I think I'll have this one instead." He took a sip.

Cammie leaped up to grab the coffee, unable to hold back her grin and laughter. Adam easily fended her off. While not an expert in many things Cammie, he was undoubtedly the undefeated champion of Teasing Cammie.

"Why do you always take my coffee?" Cammie asked.

She made another swipe at the coffee. Adam threw his head back with laughter and taunted Cammie by bringing the mug closer and closer to his lips. At the last moment, he aquiested and allowed Cammie to best him. He grabbed his own mug and took a cautious swip, smiling all the while.

Cammie punched Adam's arm, still laughing. "You're a jerk."

Adam smiled a reply and leaned in. Cammie kissed him lightly. It seemed that all was forgiven for the night before.

*

Cammie finished packing up her bags and the two headed down to Cammie's car to make the short hour commute back home. Savannah would be driving back later that evening after work.

The car ride began with Cammie jamming a CD covered in black sharpie into the CD player. This was the most recent mix tape Adam had created for Cammie. He tried to bring one with him every time they saw each other during the school year. Shared music was their passion. Cammie loved all types of music, though should could not play a lick. Adam also loved all types of music and began to dabble with his guitar. Cammie loved when he played. It wasn't perfect and he often made mistakes, his voice was a bit off key, but it was Adam and so she loved it.

After the CD ended, which was about another 15 minutes away from home. The two lapsed into silence as Cammie replaced the CDs.

"So," Adam said. "Monday's the big day."

Cammie rolled her eyes and wove her fingers into Adam's.

"C'mon, you always do this. You're not excited at all?" He whined.

"I mean, I guess I am." She paused. "A little?" She wasn't sure who she was asking. "I don't know," She finally concluded. "I guess it's exciting because we can get married soon?"

Adam laughed. "Oh, so are you amending your previous date?" Cammie had been very firm that she would not even consider planning a wedding until she had finished law school. Adam often argued with her that it really didn't matter, because she was guarenteed a spot at her family's law firm. Cammie shot back that she did not want to embarass the Driver name by being an "okay" lawyer. She wanted to be the best. Plus, it wasn't just her father's law firm. It was shared. And the Driver and Mills law firm could always just become the Mills law firm if Cammie wasn't careful.

Cammie shook her head. "Nope. Still not until after Law School." She flashed a pearly white grin that could compete with the best of the toothpaste models. "But at least we'll know."

"And you're not at all excited for that?"

Adam's eyes sparkled in the way that Cammie had learned meant Adam wasn't going to speak, but let her continue talking. He always took on this persona when he wanted to hear what Cammie had to say.

She sighed, struggling to find words to describe her feelings. "Well, I love you, Adam. We've been together for four years, and I can't see any end in sight." She shrugged. "I know I'm going to Dream of you tonight. It's not like I need some dream to confirm that you're my soulmate. I already know that."

"You love me?" Adam asked, feigning shock. "Whoa, Cam, this is moving a little fast for me."

"Oh, shut up!" Cammie grabbed a crumbled napkin from the floor and threw it at Adam. He laughed, catching it with ease, despite driving in traffic. Those years of baseball paid off nicely when it came to defending oneself from a girlfriend that liked to throw things, especially in your general direction.

"Won't be just a little exciting to know with certainty that we're soulmates though?"

She paused a moment before answering, recalling the last four years of their relationship riddled with small fights over jealousy and insecurity. All of it would go away. They would not have any more reason to fight, to be irritated with each other, to argue or bicker. Everything would be okay after Monday.

"I guess," Cammie replied, choosing instead to stay silent on the matter of her doubts. "Like I said though, there's not any doubt in my mind you're my soulmate."

"Is it cause I'm charming, irresistible, and your parents love me?" Adam wiggled his eyebrows, flashing that signature smirk once more.

Cammie rolled her eyes, but couldn't hide the smile from her face. "Careful; if your head gets any bigger I'm gonna have a hard time getting you out of the car."

He laughed and placed a quick peck on Cammie's cheek.

Cammie stared at the man sitting across from her. His steady blue eyes met hers and he smiled. The dimple in his left cheek shown. She recalled the first date Adam had taken her on. They were sixteen, and Adam's hands were shaking when he met her parents. He had longer hair then: a mess of blonde curls that hid his eyebrows. She was happy he had cut it.

Cammie never had expected much from Adam. Of course, he was brilliant—they had met in an A.P. English course their junior year—but he was also an athlete, ASB president, and very popular. Cammie sometimes wondered why Adam had noticed her in the first place.

But then she got to know him, and saw his genuine heart and his intentions with her. She grew to learn that Adam was intensely devoted to her, and had eyes for no one else. He always put her first, even when it inconvenienced him. He always sent her flowers and wrote her letters. They did have the technology to communicate every day, so they never let that eight hour drive get the best of them, but Adam always wanted to make sure Cammie knew he loved her, that he was thinking of her.

She smiled at the memories and of Savannah always wrinkling her nose when another bouquet of flowers arrived at their door. "You guys are disgusting," she would mutter, but Savannah loved that Adam treated her so well.

Cammie's family also loved him. His father often took Adam to baseball games (which Cammie would attend, but was no where near as enthusiastic as her father would have liked) and watched any game that her father had on the television. Her sisters, both younger, adored Adam, because he always made time for them, especially Annabelle, the youngest. She recalled the day she knew she loved him: when she had lost him, searched the house, and found him playing Barbies with her sister.

And now, here they were, four years later, making another commute back home after another semester of college eight hours apart. Tonight, she would fall asleep, and in the morning, she would know with certainty that she would marry Adam.

"What?" He asked, smiling.

"I know I'm going to Dream of you," Cammie said, finally being able to articulate her thoughts. "Because I can't imagine my life without you."

A small blush played on Adam's cheeks. He was the happiest man alive.

The rest of the car ride was spent singing at the top of their lungs to their favorite high school songs. They had made a collaborative playlist of all of their favorites bands that had gotten them through high school, when music was one of the only solace's.

Adam had a much better voice than Cammie—in fact, anyone probably had a better voice than Cammie—but she liked to sing with her boyfriend nonetheless.

They both turned to look at each other to finish off the chorus of a Hall and Oats popular song: "You make my dreams come true!"

They both laughed as Cammie pulled up to the curb in front of Adam's house.

"Tell your family hi, okay?" Cammie said.

"I will."

Adam leaned down to kiss his girlfriend good night. "Sweet dreams, darling."

"I'll see you when I fall asleep."

*
Cammie walked into the door of her childhood home, seeing her family for the first time in three months. She only lived an hour away, but this semester had kept her away from her family and devoted to her studies. Cammie stepped through the door with a grin on her face.

"I'm home!"

Cammie's youngest sister, Annabelle, rushed down the stairs and jumped into her sister's arms, wrapping her arms—and legs—around Cammie. She was ten years Cammie's junior and was more excited to see her sister than she was when her parents took her to Disneyland.

"Hey, Squirt!" Cammie dropped her bags and wrapped her arms around her baby sister. In that koala-like position, they walked into the kitchen to find their mother cooking dinner.

"Hey, Hon." Cammie leaned in so that her mother could kiss her cheek. "How was the drive?"

"Can't complain, Adam was with me." She grinned. "Where's Dad?"

"On his way home from work. He'll be home soon. Jess will be home tomorrow."

Cammie nodded and put her sister down. "I've gotta unpack, but we can hang out after dinner." Annabelle nodded and quickly scampered away to play with her toys.

Cammie picked up her bags and lumbered up the stairs to unpack for the four week vacation. When she arrived in her room, she looked at the pictures pinned all over the walls of her childhood room: pictures of her soccer team, of her with Adam at their senior prom, pictures of Savannah and Cammie through the ages, and many others. It was as if her entire life was in this room, tracked and recorded through photographs and memorabilia moving like a timeline across her walls.

She ran her hands over her Letterman's jacket that still hung on the back of her desk chair, filled with patches that described victories and accomplishments. Her fingers rested on a large white patch stitched into the middle of the upper back on the jacket. It had a soccer ball in the middle with plan trees and an orange sunset behind the ball. In red letters it proclaimed "2012 Sunbelt League Champions." Cammie smiled at the memory.

The last game of her senior year; the last game with her team, with her high school. It was in late March and the weather had turned nasty. The school they played at did not possess a terf field, but rather a soccer field composed of real grass with real dirt that quickly turned to mud in the rain. The game had gone all the way into overtime, and still no one had scored. It had some down to Penalty Kicks, where it was only the goalie and a player kicking the ball from five yards away. Penalty kicks were considered automatic goals in the game, so when a goalie was able to block a ball from entering the net, they were a hero.

Cammie was able to stop three of the five shots on the goal, allowing her team to win the championship game by one goal. She was the hero that day. She recalled Adam waiting off on the sidelines after her team had pulled themselves off of Cammie from the dog pile. He cheered louder than anyone and ran to her, sweeping her off her feet in a giant hug.

Cammie spun around her room and looked at her bookshelf. Resting atop was a dilapidated metal sign painted yellow with a bold red letters declaring "NO TRESSPASSING" nailed onto three withered pieces of plywood. Adam and Cammie had picked this up one day when they were hiking around Cammie's house. The memory made her smile. They had also encountered a bee hive on their journey and had to sprint out of the woods to their car. Cammie was mad at Adam for three days after that. Adam was always much faster than Cammie, and he had not hesitated to leave her in the dust when he spotted the bees. He claimed that because he was allergic, he had a right to leave her behind. She wasn't having it.

The memories swam around her vision as she spun through the room; they made her smile. She looked at photos pinned to the walls: Prom, Homecoming, Halloween, birthdays, holidays, everything; everywhere she looked, Adam was there, faithfully by her side.

Cammie found herself surprised at the sudden lump of anxiety that settled in her stomach. It was a feeling she was quite familiar with, the weight of What If. The What If usually took the form of: "What if I don't get into law school?" "What if I don't get an A?" They had to do with her career, her test scores, never about her relationship. Of course, she had had reservations about dating Adam in the first place, way back in high school. She never had any intentions to date at all; what was the point if you could very likely break up after your Dream? Savannah had convinced Cammie that is was not a big deal, that maybe they would go on a few dates, or at the longest, they would break up when they went their separate ways for college.

Adam had pushed as well, charming Cammie with every step. He brought her flowers to school, wrote her notes, poems, walked her to her car, waited for her after soccer practice. He had done everything right, convinced that Cammie was his Soulmate from the start.

It was not until Cammie realized that she had actually started to like the boy that she entertained the idea of dating him. That's when the anxiety began. But with a push from both Adam and Savannah, she gave in, and had not given it a second thought since. Well, since a few months ago when the reality of turning twenty-one was upon her.

A future flashed across her vision, showing her a time without Adam, without his comfort. There seemed to be a possibility that they would not end up together. And then what? Shaking her head, she grabbed the framed photograph of her and Adam she kept on her bedside. They were at the beach and Adam held Cammie on his back. They both grinned at the camera. How could she dream of anybody but him? She heard Savannah's voice in her head, taunting her, asking her to think about a future without Adam.

Cammie didn't like the thought.

She chalked the nerves up to the anticipation of the Dream tonight; everyone was nervous on the eve of their twenty-first birthday, despite their circumstances, even the most ideal. Cammie considered her circumstances in the Ideal category.

She in took a huge breath and signed it out, trying to push her anxiety and fears about the future—only a few hours away now—out of her mind.

"Nothing is going to change," she mumbled to herself. "No need to worry over something that hasn't even happened." Cammie decided to leave her room and socialize with her family; it was best to not be alone with her thoughts now. Cammie had learned early in life that her thoughts, when left to their own devices, grew into an untamable beast. She heeded her high school therapist's advice and removed herself from isolation to fence off the beast of anxiety.

Annabelle was delighted to see her sister join her in the living room. Cammie was quickly filled in about the latest plot development in the story of Annabelle's dolls. Cammie grabbed a doll and happily played the part of the girl who would not share her hairbrush with the other girls. Cammie smiled at the simplicity of Annabelle's imagination, where her biggest worry was sharing and the solution was simply saying sorry and getting along. Her sister had nothing to worry about; no tests, no relationships, no future. Annabelle was simply living in the moment, playing with her dolls and allowing herself to be creative.

When was the last time Cammie had actually sat down and drawn? She did doodle on her notes during class, but only because it helped her focus. She had not grabbed her sketch pad from its dusty spot on her desk in many months. Perhaps she should have brought that home with her over the break? Surely she could spare a little time to be creative.

A small pit grew in her stomach: law school was more important right now. It made Cammie even think about how she was wasting time with her sister right now when she could have packed in a good twenty minutes of studying.

The door cracked open and Annabelle bolted out of the room screaming "Daddy!"

Grateful for the distraction, Cammie pushed herself up to greet her father. He was exhausted from the work week, but excited to see his daughter.

"Hi, Sweetie." Keith Driver greeted his daughter with a hug. He wore his stress on this shoulders and neck, always rubbing the muscles out, only to have them tense while he lay in bed, stressing about the day at work tomorrow.

"How was work?" Cammie asked. Cammie had only been away from home for about a month or so, but it seemed like the lines on her father's face had deepened and multiplied.

He managed a smile. "Oh, same as always. But I can't complain. I have a great life." He seemed to say that every time Cammie asked, she realized. Perhaps this reply was well rehearsed, not for everyone else, but for himself.

Before Cammie had a chance to press further, Elizabeth Driver signaled to the family that it was time for dinner. They all gathered at the table, save for Cammie's middle sister, who would be home late tonight.

The family went around the table. Before digging into their food, the family joined hands and listened to a very enthusiastic Annabelle say Grace. After blessing their food, the family began chatting about their days, their weeks, their semesters. Annabelle babbled about sedimentary rocks and the Gold Rush, claiming she could distinguish between real gold and Fool's gold. Elizabeth offered Annabelle her golden wedding ring and asked her daughter to judge it, to which Annabelle confidently and firmly declared that her mother's wedding ring was made out of Fool's Gold.