contorted in agony. And then he went still.
“NOOOO!” I screamed.
My eyes flew open and I gasped for air. I looked around wildly as my eyes adjusted to the abrupt change. Darkness surrounded me. My fists clamped the bed sheet to my chest. The duvet hung off the edge of the bed, kicked to the side. I forced myself to pull in a long, controlled breath, and then let the air out just as slowly. My breaths eventually became even and my heart finally settled. I looked at the clock, already knowing it was around 3:45 a.m. The blue lights glowed 3:51.
Every night was the same as the one before. Regardless of what time I would finally fall asleep, around 3:45 I would awake screaming and gasping for breath. My imagination created the last part of the memory-dream, but the rest was real and very precious. Some nights, when my subconscious knew my soul needed more, I relived some of our other times together.
I threw myself back on the pillow and squeezed my eyes shut, trying to remember in my conscious mind what my subconscious could so easily play back. I struggled to pull the image of the beautiful face back into clarity. The edges blurred, as if an oily film coated the lens I looked through. I’m losing him. The image had become dim, faded with time. I can’t forget. I can’t forget, damn it! But remembering had become so hard. My dreams showed Tristan perfectly, but my waking mind had lost the clarity, unable to focus on the details.
I tried to recreate the scenes—the good ones—in my mind, focusing on the background, the feels, the smells, hoping my wandering mind could bring his face into view naturally. My scheme began to work. The blurry edges started to sharpen, the light on his face grew brighter, the hazel eyes came into focus….
My consciousness drifted off as I held onto his face. And then I heard his lovely voice, distant and muffled: “I’ll come back. I promise.”
My dream-self felt surprised and confused. This is new.
Then clear and close: “Alexis.”
It wasn’t the same voice.
Evil! Daemoni! Evil!
The alarms of my sixth sense rang in my head. The beautiful face disappeared as my heart nearly jumped out of my chest. I shot up and realized I sat on my bed again. I glanced around the darkness for the source of the gravelly voice.
“Who’s there?” I asked, my voice thundering through the silence.
A shadow shifted in the corner. Two small, red lights glowed from about two-thirds up the wall. I realized they were eyes. It can’t really be Daemoni—can it? We hadn’t been bothered for over seven years. Not a single visit or even a threat. Nothing at all. They had what they wanted.
“Don’t you know?”
The shadow moved forward, just enough for the light from my clock to slightly illuminate a face—pale, bluish-white in the clock’s glare, glowing eyes and…fangs. The light reflected off his glimmering teeth, bared in an evil grin, if that’s what you could call it, and I knew for sure those were fangs. And I knew immediately what he was. From what I could see, he favored some of my characters, as if he’d stepped out of the pages of the books I wrote.
Such a strange feeling—to feel as though I’d awakened in my usual way but know I was dreaming again. I had to be. Monsters were real, but vampires were not.
“C-Claudius?” My voice shook. I knew this dream was about to become a terrible nightmare. With his dark hair floating around the sides of his face, this visitor looked similar to my Claudius, leader of the evilest vampire nest in my make-believe world.
“Ha!” the shadow barked. “So you do see the resemblance.”
I didn’t respond. I stared wide-eyed at the barely visible face, wondering what would come next. My heart pounded in my ears and my lungs seemed unable to pull in any air. I wanted to scream myself awake. But I couldn’t. I was frozen.
The vampire came closer, almost near enough to touch…if I dared to reach out.
“I am not your dim-witted Claudius,” he growled, “but my world and my ways are very similar. In fact, too similar. You are bold—and foolish—to tell the humans.”
In a strange way, the dream made him more real. More frightening than any of my characters, even Claudius. The timbre of his voice held promises of horror, the sound more terrifying than I ever imagined when I wrote.
But his words made no sense.
“I-I d-don’t understand.”
“I am not stupid, woman, and I know you are not entirely ignorant. I know who you are. You know what I am. You have crossed the line in revealing our truths. You must stop writing and exposing us, Alexis. Or we will stop you ourselves.”
The flaming red eyes narrowed. The nostrils flared.
The vampire cocked his head and growled again. “No more, Alexis, or we will come for you!”
Pop! The overhead light suddenly flooded the bedroom with brightness. I was sitting bolt upright in my bed, my heart hammering again, wide awake with the sound and light. I blinked at Mom’s figure standing at the foot of my bed.
“Are you okay?” she demanded.
My eyes adjusted and now I could see her looking anything but vulnerable, though she only wore a short, baby-doll nightgown. Petite, but tough. She stood with her body tense, coiled and ready to fight, as her narrowed eyes scanned the room. Then she rushed to my side and braced her hands on each side of my face. She seemed to appraise every inch of me.
“I’m fine,” I muttered, pulling my face from her grip.
“You don’t sound or look fine.”
“You scared the crap out of me.” I lay back down and closed my eyes. “And I had a bad dream. That’s all.”
She stood there for a long moment and I could feel her eyes still on me. I never heard her footsteps, but the light switched off and the door clicked softly in the latch when she left. Mom was used to me having bad dreams. She had no need to question me.
When I awoke again, sunlight streamed under the blinds, creating narrow lines of light on the boring beige carpet by my bed. I lay on my stomach and stared at the floor for a while, not wanting to be awake. Then I remembered the dream—not the usual memory-dream, but the new one. I turned over and looked around the room. Of course, no evidence of the vampire. He was just a dream, but it had felt so real and was just so uncharacteristic. Last night was the first time I’d dreamt of anything but those memories since the day my husband disappeared into enemy hands.
Then I remembered the other anomaly of the night. The whispered promise. But neither the lovely voice nor the memory-dream had returned the rest of the night. Damn vampire. I closed my eyes and tried to pull the face I wanted to see into my vision. A pointless effort. Only a vague image appeared. I was forgetting.
As time had passed on, as the conscious memories faded, the feeling Tristan was still alive weakened. For the first few years, I’d felt his presence and the grief of living without him nearly consumed me. Eventually, a fog drifted in and settled, dulling the pain…and the memories. Foggy Alexis arrived and I liked her. She kept me numb during the day, allowing memories only at night, when I slept. But now the dullness seemed to be permanently obscuring my conscious memories and dissolving our connection.
Forcing myself to let it go, I focused my mind on the only things I’d been able to focus on for the last seven years: my son and my writing. Dorian served as the bright spot in my otherwise black life. He lit my path, keeping me from straying away into the complete darkness of insanity. If his father hadn’t already set precedence, it would be hard to believe I could love anyone as much as I loved Dorian.
I sighed heavily and made myself stand up. I already felt today was not a good day. I felt all wrong. Something inside ticked, like a time bomb. I had a warped sense of time, but I was sure it had been a while since I’d had a really bad day. Since Psycho Alexis had made an appearance. Perhaps those two new dreams had something to do with my mood. Or maybe I had too many pent-up emotions, making me ready to blow.
Suck it up for now. Need to say good-bye.
