Beneath The Blackwood Sky | ✓

Chapter Seventeen: Babysitting And Blade Cuts

SHAY WOKE UP WITH A JOLT, WITH COLD SWEAT PLASTERING her hair to her forehead, her breathing erratic. She coughed when she drank water too quickly, what was supposed to save her ended up choking her.

After an intense coughing fit, she gripped the pillow tightly, her nails burying into the feather. As she stared at the pillow like it was an exotic species of animal, she registered the world she was in.

Shay shook her head as hair fell into her eyes, trying to forget the world of non-existent horrors she had been plunged into. Her nightmares have been getting progressively worse, with the utmost respect to both content and length. Just when she thinks she broke out of her nightmare, only to find out that she was living in another nightmare.

With her father, her grandparents and Marina dead, people disappearing and little kids getting kidnapped and people killing themselves but not really.

A perfect setting for the worst nightmare. Except, she couldn't really differentiate between the nightmares she had been having and the nightmares she is living in.

Shay ran a hand through her curls as she opened the door, bright sunlight assaulting her eyes. She squinted as she let her eyes adjust to the brightness, and looked at the golden creature she loved more than any creature in the whole world.

Leo was like a four-legged, living and the best antidepressant in her opinion. Shay laughed as Leo flung himself onto her, then crouched down to pet his overexcited self. Chuckling slightly and with a much better mood, she greeted her friends by her presence, not her words. "Why didn't you wake me up?" she accused her friends as she pouted.

"You seemed to be sleeping peacefully and there was no urgent need for you to be awake anyway. So, good dreams huh? You were snoring happily." Shay snorted. "Was I?"

"Uh-huh."

Shay shrugged, going into the bathroom to wash her face which brought her back to reality once again. She felt like dripping water, on the verge of falling down and losing reality but not really, then falling down when it was least expected.

She sat at the empty chair beside Will, smiling at him as she patted the wet nose poking from below the table. Theo sighed as he stared at the screen of his phone with his eyebrows furrowed, looking up and admitting, "I'm really worried about Kara. She isn't lifting any of our calls."

Shay had been worried about her too. She had been rolling on her bed thinking about Kara, and her drooping eyes finally gave in to the sleep. She smiled at him, voicing out something she wished will be true. Hopefully, it will. "You know how Kara is. She might've forgotten to charge her phone or something. Let's go to the café again today. After we eat."

Shay glanced down at Leo, who was closing his eyes as Will ruffled his hair. Leo leaned into Will's hand and Shay had to stop herself from leaning on his shoulder.

This time when they exited out of the café, they were in a relatively better mood. When they asked the café owner if Kara had changed her shift, Mr Stone had looked up at them with a sheepish expression after swallowing the shock when six teenagers asked him the same question at a time. When he had said the words: "She didn't come today" the expressions on their faces had changed immediately, one could read the stages of emotion in their faces: concern, worry, and finally horror.

But after seeing the expressions on their faces, Mr Stone had lifted his hands in a surrendering manner. "I forgot to tell you guys about it yesterday because I totally forgot about it. Kara took a leave from this job for a week, she said that she wanted to go to another Isle to visit her Aunt. Maybe she preponed her visit and went yesterday. You don't need to worry that much about her, you know, she is a very bright girl and knows to take care of herself and others very well, that girl Kara, I know she is."