― do over

chapter | 5

TW// Panic attack, mention of destructive thoughts

(If you are uncomfortable with any of those topics, please skip to the next line break (.) I will provide a summary for the section you skipped at the end.)

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A loud boom shook Clay awake, as he sat straight up blinking in what he assumed was a desk. A few moments of confusion settled on him until he blinked up into the blaring and accusing gaze of his senior english teacher from where she stood looming over him.

"Sorry," he muttered, but the words weren't his. He numbly registered his mind as dreaming, or maybe some sort of flashback.

The teacher removed her boney palm off his desk, scoffing as if he was the most problematic student she had ever seen.

He rubbed his sleep deprived eyes, glancing at the clock on the wall. Dream suddenly remembered where he was, and what day it was, but he couldn't wake himself up in the real world. It was the dream he had long rid himself of, and he supposed it was because George was back in his life that it finally returned.

The bell rang and students skipped merrily down the halls, meeting with their friends by the lockers. Clay willed his feet to stop moving, but no matter how hard he tried, he was along for the ride.

He raced outside to his car, hazardously throwing the door open and throwing his bag into the passenger seat. He felt his dream's self buzz with excitement, and could already feel the dread creeping in. It was identical to every time he dreamed this dream, but it almost seemed worse considering the circumstances of the outside world.

During the drive to his desired location, Clay was trying his hardest to manipulate the dream, anything to wake up and forget, instead of reliving his worst nightmare come true.

Parking his car in the painfully familiar driveway he rushed to the front of the house, a grin on his face as he opened the door with the spare key he had securely hooked onto his key ring.

All was silent within the residence, which was a bit odd as they had planned for a movie night. But nothing could be seen or heard of the type, and his excitement dulled, whilst his real life self desperately tried to close his eyes.

But yet, it all seemed hauntingly reminiscent as he climbed the wooden stairs he dreaded, eyes on the white door he already knew what lie behind it.

His heart sunk into his chest as the dream turned agonizingly slow, his fingers brushing the doorknob of the already cracked open door.

He stared through the gap with unhinged shock, and devastation, unable to move, rooted in his spot. His hands clasped over his mouth, his forest green eyes pooling with crystal tears.

There sat the love of his life, the only thing he had ever treasured so greatly, the person he had sacrificed everything for, was there, taking it all for granted.

Like it was some kind of sick joke.

He wasn't alone in that room, far from it, as a girl he had never seen before was snuggled securely in his arms, their lips linked in a seamless kiss.

His heart shattered, especially when George's brown eyes caught his, his own shattered and crystallized ones, and showed no emotion. No regret, no guilt, absolutely nothing that would suggest he cared the slightest about Clay. It was all too much, all at once, his world falling to its end.

Dream had never fathomed true pain until then, frozen in the most torturous and tremendous hurricane as it tossed and turned around him, flinging his heart and soul out the window like they were the worthless piece of garbage George seemed to deem them as.