Trust Issues

Chapter 11: Visitors

I hear a knock, early morning, on our apartment door. I reach over to my phone and look at the time. 7 am. I wasn't expecting any visitors. I look to my right and don't see Catherine. I hear the knock again and finally decide to check who it is. I look through the peep hole and see...my father and mother with strange demonic smiles. Catherine is with them, bleeding, tied up. I instantly open the door without a second thought and feel myself go numb when I see nothing. Everyone disappeared, I close the door and walk backwards inside. I turn around and see my old room in the exact layout that I had left it. My queen sized bed adorned with white puffy duvet, my assortment of cushions and teddy bear on top. My blush pink wallpaper from my childhood still untouched. Furniture in their respective positions, clothes on the floor and desk chair. Though I reminisce, there is an eerie atmosphere that has my heart rate extremely elevated. I turn to look around and there he is again, my father comes at me with a bag, putting it right over my head and I scream at the top of my lungs.

I wake up gasping for air sweating profusely. Catherine wakes up with a jolt at my desperate sounds, she tries to calm me down helping me breathe.

knock knock

I jump and squeeze Catherine's hand at the knocking on our door. I quickly scramble for my phone... 7am. I look at Cat, gulping loudly before getting up to go investigate.

I slowly creeped up to the peephole to see...Jacob and Alison?

An instant wave of relief and excitement came over me as I ripped the door open.

"What are you guys doing here?" I exclaimed excitedly embracing both of them at the same time.

"We wanted to surprise you! Surprise!" Replied Jacob just as excited.

"You guys scared the shit out of me! I had a dream about this exact situation but...it wasn't you guys at the door." I explained letting them in.

I explained the dream to them and Cat while making breakfast and coffee for everyone. With everyone being freaked out by my strange dream, we changed the subject. We caught up for a while before they revealed how all this was pulled off.

"Cat told us you had today off so we thought the first day we stay over should be when we can spend the whole day together." Said Alison.

I look at Cat giving me a big triumphant grin. I then asked, "wait, first day? How long are you guys staying?"

"We're here the whole week!" Ali said clapping her hands excitedly.

"Oh, we should find you somewhere to sleep then." I thought out loud looking around our apartment.

"Don't worry about that, we split a super cheap airbnb that's not too far from here. It's all taken care of." Answered Jacob.

As we finished breakfast and before Cat headed to school, we stayed sitting for a while longer.

Then Jacob asked, "so, back to the dream. Are you feeling okay, have you heard from them at all?"

"I've been okay. I haven't dreamt about them yet so that's new. No, they haven't tried at all." Then I remembered that time I was walking down the street and my phone was called by some strange silent person on the other line.

"There was one time an unknown caller called me and when I answered it was silent, all I heard was breathing and then hung up. You don't think..." Too afraid to hear the answer, I let my sentence trail off.

"CJ, no matter how crazy they are, there is no way for them to know where you are or figure out what your new phone number is. You are safe here." Answered Ali.