Dark Dreams

CHERRY LIPS

I woke up in the middle of the night. The room was flooded with fog; I couldn't even see the palms of my hands.

"Mom?" I asked, waving my arms to make my way through what now seemed to be dense gray smoke.

"What's going on?!" I screamed.

No answer.

I started coughing repeatedly. I thought momentarily about a fire, but I eliminated this option because of the extreme dampness.

The cell phone!

I headed triumphantly to the desk. I took a step, then another and then... banged into something low and hard. I put my hand on a huge, low table.

Suddenly the cloud became less thick, letting me glimpse what was where the desk should be.

It was... a coffin!

I couldn't believe my eyes.

"What kind of joke is this??" I yelled.

My head was starting to spin.

I would have fainted, had it not been for the coffin, which slowly began to open. I looked at the unreal scene, petrified.

"No, no!" I said, bending toward the inside of the coffin. "What are you doing here?"

I bent over the corpse of a mauvish-skinned man in a tuxedo and squeezed him in my arms.

"Dad... who did this to you?" I said in a whisper, resting my head on his chest.

Thump thump.

My left ear perceived a distant drum-like sound.

Thump thump thump.

That sound wasn't a drum, but a heart!

With a violent blow, Dad kicked me away from the coffin. He jumped out and headed for me with his hands outstretched like a zombie.

"Dad, what...?" I couldn't finish my sentence.

Both hands of the man who only looked like my father grabbed my neck.

A faint breath of air was the only thing that came out of my mouth.

"It's all your fault!" he yelled, lifting me off the ground. What was he talking about?

I tried to release his grip with the little strength I had left.

"It's your fault I'm dead!" The blue veins of his eyes throbbed as they stared with hatred into mine, which closed after a few seconds, lifeless.

I woke up screaming.

I was shocked, but I wasn't scared. For two years my dreams had been about two specific people: my father and Dickson. I fell asleep, wondering what was wrong with me.

It was the first time in my entire life that I'd got to school early. The new Sarah didn't have time to be late.

No.

The new me had a very specific goal: to join a club, at any cost. No one could throw a monkey wrench in the works. I decided to repeat this phrase several times in my mind, trying to convince myself. I skipped algebra time to go to the sports fields on the east of the campus.

The tennis club was my first attempt.

I put on a jogging suit, telling myself that anyone who does sport should have one. I wasn't sure; the only sport I did was climbing the school steps.

I marched resolutely up to Amir, Haya's boyfriend and number six in the pyramid. He was focused on putting tennis balls in the ball machine. The playing field, whose brown soil shone in the sun's rays, was empty.