SHATTERED

CHAP:3:DREAMS

Author's Note: The pic on the right is of Reyna Ichihara

It was a beautiful yet modest home an olden time Victorian style house with its red-tiled roof and white walls. A meticulously kept garden filled with roses, wallflowers, dahlias and marigolds lead upto the steps. In spring, the wistaria was a solid mass of lilac plumes rioting all over the outerwalls and the varanda roof. A stand of magnificent ghost gums with pallid white branches and their curtain of thin leaves shaded the house. The pepper trees were alive with the sound of bees. But there was none of that on that stormy night five years ago, a memory that comes as a seemingly normal dream and haunts the sixteen yearold Reyna as we speak.

It starts out with a good picnic weather gone bad. Setting the stage for the bloodbath that was to take place no matter how many times she sees it , she always ends up waking by screaming, each time paralyzed with a fear that takes several days to recover from.

A corridor with a door at the end of it . I keep running towards it but I never seem to get any closer, its like I'm on a treadmill that has no intention to stop. From somewhere in my mind I get the feeling that I've been here before, like a dei-ja-voo yet...

Somedays when i get close enough to yank the door open, the same ear-spitting scream yanks me out and I find myself sitting upright in bed gasping for breath, clutching the covers to hold myself still , failing terribly as an uncontrollable shudder takes over my body.

The screamings have happened so often my family has ceased to bother checking up on me anymore. Whenever i try explaining it to just about anyone , my whole mind goes blank so i bottle away bottle away whatecer scares me shitless because i have yet to see the whole dream .

That's the scary part reliving something over and over again knowing it will come back as i have yet to see the other side of that door. Do I even want to see ? I don't know. I wake up , my body feels like goose flesh , I try to take a peaceful showerwith my housekeeper banging on the door that i'm gonna be late for school. I give up, get dressed and get down to see a breakfast of eggs, milk, toast and fruit and a note on the table waiting for me.

REYNA,

We will be late from work, Carol is taking an early leave today . Be a dear and go buy some groceries on the way home from school. Rememember No shopping means No food . Don't forget.

Love ,

Mom

GREAT . JUST GREAT. Extra work to do , I HATE extra work to do. Mom had scraped the house clean and made breakfast and now I had nothing do eat unless I do the shopping. To top it off, my eggs had gone cold. I shoved the disgusting stuff down my throat and bolted for the door.

On my way to school I pass by a cafe , where i see a couple, a beautiful girl with blonde hair hugging an equally if not more stunning brown-haired guy . He turned his head and for a brief second our eyes met and I had the feeling of someone prying into my mind, shocked my mind instantly went into defense gear and I tried to block it out.

At the same time I noticed a flicker of surprise then alarm . As quickly as it had appeared , it was gone, and he leaned in to kiss his girlfriend. She didn't seem to have noticed anything . Weird. Or am I having illusions ?I tried to put it out of my mind , still shaky , as I headed straight for school.