Only the Beginning

Chapter 7

||Carmen Anders||

I was running.

Where to? I didn't know.

I was just running.

I didn't know what I was running from either but I knew whatever it was scared the shit out of me.

I heard him calling me, telling me to come back, telling me that there was nothing to be afraid off.

But I didn't turn around.

He didn't know.

He didn't know.

He had no idea.

"Carmen!" I heard him again.

"Carmen! Come back!"

He sounded different now. It wasn't his voice anymore. He sounded more like my mother.

I stopped running and turned around.

"Carmen, are you okay? Why were you running?" My mother asked me, concerned.

I ran to her and she wrapped her arms around me.

I sobbed into her chest. "I'm scared, Mom, I'm scared."

"Where's your brother? Carmen, where's Jason?"

Jason.

Where's Jason?

I knew where he was but I didn't tell her. I didn't tell her where he was because I didn't want her to know. She would hate me.

It was my fault.

"Carmen?" She kept on calling me, trying to get me to tell her.

Slowly, her voice changed too. I started hearing Dylan's voice.

But he was shouting for me. Really loud.

I didn't budge though. I just buried my head deeper into my mother's chest.

I closed my eyes and prayed his voice would just go away.

"Carmen!" He shouted for me again.

My eyes flew open.

Dylan was hovering over me with a concerned look in his eyes. He pulled me up into a tight hug as he started repeating something over and over again.

I couldn't really make out what he was saying. It sounded like he was apologizing but why? Why was he apologizing?

He pulled away and looked into my eyes. "Its okay, I'm here. Carmen, I'm here."

I couldn't bring myself to do anything but nod.

"It was only a dream, a bad dream but you're okay. You're okay, Carmen."

"I'm okay?"

"You're okay."

"I'm okay." I agreed.

He lay down next to me and rested my head on his chest.

I could hear his heart beating, it was beating quickly. I had no idea I had scared him so much. I didn't like scaring Dylan, I didn't like scaring anyone.

But I got scared easily. And when I got scared, Dylan got scared too. I could never tell if it was because I'd scared him or if he was scared for the same reason as I.