At 4:15 a.m. Margaret woke up from her sleep just to realize she had a nightmare. One of those crazy dreams that used to freak her out in her youth. Although fully awake, she was still shaken. Her bad dream had a tremendous effect on her. Everything seemed so real. This was the first sign that bad news was brewing.
She thought again of her dream and tried to recall as many details as possible, hoping to write down every single detail before she would forget them. She spent the following three minutes laying still in bed with her eyes open, replaying the end of her dream.
She was going down the steps of a building, carrying a clear bag of garbage. Those steps seemed familiar, though she was not sure where they were located. She looked at the bag and saw its content.
As soon as her eyes laid on a lock of hair that she had recently cut, she heard a song. It felt as if she was the one singing it, as in her dream, her lips were moving, but the voice was not hers. It sounded like a sort of demonic voice performing a spell. A low and creepy voice that would give cold chills on anyone's back.
"Nothing to give, nothing to share. All to be thrown and never touched again. Not to be played with or used. Not by my hands or anyone else`s. Forever gone..."
The voice was getting louder and louder to the point that she felt the need to cover her ears. With one hand she covered her left ear. It felt warm and wet which seemed weird. She had a quick glance at her fingers and noticed there was blood on them.
At the same time, a loud noise filled the air and the next second her entire body collapsed. That's when she woke up. All her senses were alert. A few meters away from her room, someone or something was moving.
For a second she feared that her dream became real, but she knew that was not possible. It had to be a logical explanation for the sounds she was hearing.
All this was happening so fast, that she had no time to get dressed when she jumped out of bed and went to check the source of the unknown sound. Through the half open door she was able to hear a shredded breath.
She knew that she could not let her imagination run wild. Whatever was there, she needed to face it alone and protect her child. She could not afford to have him hurt or traumatised. Not now when she had just managed to have him go over his fear of the darkness. Right before leaving the bedroom, she had a look at him sleeping peacefully, with one knee out of the bed sheets, hugging his little soft toy.
She took a deep breath and braced herself. She had to act quickly and quietly. On her way to the corridor she grabbed her son`s baseball bat. Her fingers gripped the handle and clenched on it.
Quiet as a mouse, she tipped toed along the wall, holding on to the baseball bat with both hands, ready to strike the intruder. She heard someone dragging his steps on the floor. He could not have been more than six feet away. He was panting and mumbling something.
The corridor was pitch black but she was familiar with the house. She was just about to strike him from behind with the baseball when all of the sudden the washroom light was turned on. He had turned it on. Right away she recognized the man standing in front of her. The sight of those old grey pyjama bottoms and the red t-shirt reassured her she was not wrong.
It was him, Chris, her partner. All of the sudden a lot of questions were forming into her mind. When did he come? He was supposed to return from his trip only on Tuesday. Why did he come back early? How did he get in? How come she did not hear him entering the house?
The cloud of confusion was instantly chased away when she saw him losing his balance, about to fall down. She grabbed his arm and helped him lean against the wall. He was in pain. The expression on his face told her that something was wrong with him. She had witnessed many of the episodes of his battle against MS, to recognize an attack. This was not one of them. It was something else.
All that he could mumble was: “my eye”. Pointing with his index finger at his left eye, made her understand he was having pain in his eye. When she took a closer look at his face, she got a shock.
He had a black eye. His eyelid was swollen so much that it was preventing him from opening his eye. The eyelid had tripled in size. She lifted it up to check if his eye was affected too. The small blood vessels beneath the skin had broken. The white of his eye was all red. His subconjunctival hemorrhage looked scary.
She had never seen such an injury before and wondered if he needed any medical assistance. A trip to the hospital was the last thing she wanted to do, but if it was necessary, she would not have mind. As if he read her mind, he whispered: "No hospital!"
Since he was in too much pain and incapable to say anything else, she decided to use sign language in order to communicate with him. She pointed at the toilet, inquiring if he needed to use it. He nodded his head affirmatively. She helped him pull down his pants and sit down.
Before he was ready to head back to his bed, she had taken some ice cubes from the freezer, put them in a zip lock bag and wrapped it with a soft small towel. She handed him the ice pad and provided him with the support he needed to walk back to his room.
She asked him if there was anything that she could do for him. He shocked his head as a no. Once he was tucked in bed, in a position that eased his pain, her thoughts ran to her dream. As she was heading back to her bedroom, she was more convinced than ever that her dream was more than a premonition.
It was strange how within seconds, her pain from the nightmare transcended into reality and found a host in her partner. Deep down inside she was aware that it was intended for her and not him. He was just an innocent victim. Collateral damage. She remembered her dad and one of his lectures: Evil never stops working.
Margaret sighted and tried to mask a yawn. She had slept only a few hours. She was tired but could no longer sleep. Not after this morning`s events.
When she entered her room, in the moonlight, she noticed that her offspring was right on the edge of the bed. A few minutes more and he would have fallen off. She placed her hands under his neck and his legs and gently lifted him up to make enough space for her to lay down next to him. The boy did not utter a sound. He was in a deep sleep. She placed a kiss upon his forehead, hugged him with her right arm. A small smile curled upon her worried face.
As she was laying in bed thinking of her nightmare, she could not stop wondering who was behind it. Throughout her life she had seen enough bad things happening to good folks. She had witnessed many so-called “coincidences” which enabled her to see danger laid ahead. She had learnt long time ago that dark magic was not a myth.
Someone was playing with her. Someone had sent a message. Her past experiences taught her that there was more to come. For some reason, in her mind, there was no doubt that the Wanderer, was behind this story.
She remembered his wicked mind, constant crave for power and weakness for Italian puppets. Instantly, the dryness of her throat, made her feel nauseated. She shook her body, hoping to throw away the nasty memory, that was making all cells in her body revolt.
Although twenty years passed and she had got far stronger, this was a man that she was not willing to cross paths with. Or at least, not yet! In her mind she had played this scenario a thousand times. She had imagined all possibilities and even forged back up plans. She was convinced she could defeat him, though not without sacrificing her family. In order to save them, she had to be away from them.
Only the thought of not having her little bundle of love next to her was pure torture for both of them. The connection they had was really strong. Their bond was beyond the regular mother-child relationship, as he had inherited her gift.
He did not know yet how special he was and she had never revealed it to him, nor mentioned anything that could jeopardize him. He was way too young to understand the magnitude of this power, what was in stake or even how to control his gift. She had always treated him like a regular child without giving him the slightest idea that he was a "balancer".
She wanted him to enjoy that innocence as much as possible. There was no point on getting the child worried at such a young age about things that were beyond his comprehension. One day, she will have to sit down with him and have a long conversation with him on this topic. She hoped that moment won`t come earlier than his eleventh anniversary. By that age, she imagined that he would have the ability to fully understand what was in store for him.
Image by Syaibatul Hamdi from Pixabay
What a wonderfully creepy story!
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Those dreams that make you fully aware of events to come, leaving one pondering by the reality that remains.
Excellent telling of the story line, very real for many experiencing these dark night dreams.
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Thanks for this dark but beautiful story. It seems that the life of that child won't be easy... but with good parenting like that, he might be able to at least have a happy and carefree childhood! 😉
So I find myself wondering how much of this is fantasy and how much might be steeped in reality. I've had really vivid dreams before, enough to wake up me sitting straight in a deep sweat. I don't like them. Once I was absolutely positive there was a devil waiting for me in the front room. I'd hate for any of these to turn into reality.
I don`t think anyone likes those vivid dreams. ;0)