![]() |
edited by: DecipleoftheForest & Aenae Enjoy the journey of a young man lost through life |
Bear's Den Stories Page | Rising Wind Homepage | PREVIOUS | NEXT |
It was the same dream. The same damn dream. I kept trying to tell myself that it's just a dream, it's not real. Wake up now. WAKE UP! It didn't work, I couldn't wake up. I had to go through it. The ending was just slightly different each time, but the beginning was always the same. Floating in that stupid lonely ocean. Knowing that those ghosts were going to grab me, yet unable to change anything. I couldn't make myself swim away. I couldn't even make myself turn so I would be facing them. Always the same. Always facing the sky, watching those stupid clouds, knowing they were coming...
It was the twenty-fifth consecutive night that I had that dream. Each of the twenty-five slightly different in the ending than the one before, but always concluding with me waking up screaming in a pool of my own sweat. My screams were less and less violent now. At least this morning's "scream" was more of a shocked whelp than a scream. Even my parents were slowly growing used to it.
I rose up from my bed and took a shower. Got ready and went to school. The guys no longer came to my house to wait for me to go to school. It's not because they didn't want to, but because I had asked them not to. I told them that I needed a little space before coming back to our normal routine, unfortunately I don't think they understood very well. But they did accept it. Hell, to be honest with you, I don't even know if I understood myself very well on this subject. I think it's partly because I wasn't ready yet to deal with people. I wanted to get some aspects of my routine back before I ventured into it full-fledged.
Unfortunately, this didn't including school. Since I had already missed over four weeks I was falling too far behind not to go back as soon as I could. Naomi thought that was a great idea, and cleared me to return to school. She said it would be a good step to have me do "normal" things again.
School was hard to deal with. I wasn't Mr. Popular before, but at least I was well liked by many and known to most. Unfortunately, this also made me a large target for the rumor mill. I saw the stares. I heard the whispers. I knew what they were saying about me, and it hurt. But what could I do about it? Some of what they were saying was true. I was crazy. I did have some serious mental problems for a little while. But a lot of it was not true. Actually, some of it was ludicrous. I remember one day at lunch where I overheard the table next to me talking about how I was actually committed to a mental institution, but broke out. I had to laugh at that because if I escaped, don't you think people would be looking for me? And it wouldn't be too hard to find me at my old school! Besides which, why would I go back to school?
The hard part of all of this was being the pariah. I was no longer known as the friendly, fun-loving good guy. I was now known as the crazy guy. But I dealt with it as best as I could. Maybe after a few more weeks it would die down and be easier, but so far it really hasn't calmed down that much.
I go through my normal routine. I go to school. Return home and work on my assignments for a little bit. Then Naomi comes at around 5:00 and we have our one hour session. After that it's dinnertime. And then back to hitting the books before bedtime. It was starting to feel good doing things again. It was even enjoyable talking to Naomi, she made me realize a lot about myself. But today was not one of those enjoyable days. We were talking about one of the things that started all of this... Cynthia.
"Ok, so up until last week, we went through the reasons why you should live. Are you comfortable with that now?"
"Yeah. I get it. And I didn't realize before that when I made a vow to do something, like with my parents and Christmas, it was actually a reason to live."
"Yes Chris. When you promise to do something. And if you are serious about your promises, then those are some of the things that you can use to push yourself through the tough days. Especially with your personality, you like to accomplish things. You like to go through with the things that you say you are going to do. So a promise like the one you made to make Christmas special next year for your parents is really good for you."
"Yeah, I know that I wouldn't kill myself before I made my parents happy at Christmas again."
"Well, let's just keep on making more and more vows so that you don't EVER think about killing yourself."
I chuckled. "Aren't you supposed to make me happy enough to not even entertain the thought of killing myself, whether there are vows or not?"
She laughed with me. "Well, yes, but I figured this was the quicker route first."
We talked a little more about vows and keeping my mind busy with things to do, but then the mood of the conversation changed with her one question.
"Ok, now that we have that out of the way, let's deal with some of the problems you were having before that caused this. Tell me about Cynthia."
My smile turned downwards immediately. She noticed this and jotted a few things down on her notepad. How did she know about Cynthia? Well, during our sessions a couple of weeks ago she had asked me to tell her a short statement about all the people that I come in contact with (other than the slight acquaintances). So I began listing all the family members that I normally see. Then it was all the friends and fellow schoolmates. For the schoolmates I listed it by the classes that I have, and the people that I talked to in each class. Cynthia's name naturally popped up. But for some reason, Naomi keyed in on her name. I don't think I said Cynth's name any differently than any other person's, but somehow she must've heard something in the tone by which I mentioned her, because she stopped me immediately and asked me to describe Cynthia. I told her about Cynthia and it seemed to satisfy her. We never spoke about Cynthia again until today.
"I don't really want to talk about Cynthia."
"I know you don't. You get a sad look in your eyes every time that you mention her to me."
"Whatever. I just don't care to talk about her."
"Look, Chris. I'll be candid with you. We've made amazing progress, and you've really been opening up to me, so I'm a bit worried about Cynthia. She's the only thing you won't talk to me about, and I would like to know why."
I sighed and looked down on the floor. I didn't want to tell her. I didn't want to talk about it. And then I thought of something!
"I don't want to talk about Cynthia, but I do want to talk about my nightmares. You said last week that after we're finished with our sessions on reasons to live, that you would talk my nightmares over with me." I looked at her, hopeful that she would bite.
"You didn't seem so eager last week to discuss your nightmares. Why the sudden interest?"
I had to think of something quick. And I stumbled a little bit, but at least I thought of a good reason. "Well...umm... last week, I thought that my nightmares would eventually go away. But it doesn't seem to be going away. Also, it keeps being slightly different each night."
She looked at me, and I knew that she didn't believe what I was saying. Not about the nightmares, but about my interest in talking about them. "Ok, we'll discuss your nightmares. But we will have to discuss Cynthia sooner or later.
And with that I sighed heavily. It didn't go unnoticed by her. Well, at least I wouldn't have to talk about Cynthia now.
"So tell me what's different about the dreams each night."
"My dreams all start out the same. I'm in the middle of an ocean or something like that, all alone on my back looking up at the sky. The first time I had this nightmare, it surprised me about the ghosts dragging me down. Now, I know that they're coming for me. Still can't do anything about it. I cannot swim away. I cannot even turn into the water to face them. It's a really helpless feeling. That's all the same. What's different each time is who I ultimately look at when I am down there. The first time it happened..." I trailed off and stopped talking.
She looked at me, and said, "It was Cynthia that you saw. Right?"
"I actually see everyone all the time. But you're right in that it was Cynthia that I kept my gaze upon. Anyway. Each night is a different person. And each person is a different feeling of pulling. It's hard to describe. But I can feel that each of their grips is slightly different on me."
"Hmm, what do you mean by that? Can you give me an example?"
"Ok, take Coach Williams for example. He's always grabbing me by the shoulder. He pushes and pulls at the same time. And every time I look at him, his ghost-face looks angry. And another example is Ms. Calkins. She doesn't really grab me anywhere, but I can still feel a pull. It's a light pull, but I can feel it. It's almost as if she's pulling me just from her sheer will. Do you get it?"
"I think I do." She sat there and thought for a second. "You said, Coach Williams. He's your wrestling coach right?"
"He was. I no longer am on the team."
"Ok, and didn't you mention before that you broke your shoulder once in a match?"
"Well, not broke, but injured and yes, I did."
"Which shoulder did you injure?"
"My left one."
"And which shoulder does Coach Williams pull on you?"
That's when it dawned on me. She saw the recognition in my face. And we both said it at the same time. "The left one."
"Ok Miss Smarty Pants. So what does it all mean then?"
"Well, you're a smart guy, I kinda thought you would've figured it out already."
I smirked at her. "I was just checking to see if you knew."
She just stuck her tongue at me. I laughed.
"I take it that you want me to take a stab at this?"
She nodded and gestured for me to talk it through.
"Ok, so the same shoulder that I injure which then causes the big blow out with coach and me is the one that he is holding onto. Obviously his pulling/pushing has something to do with what went down between him and me."
"Good. So what can you extrapolate from that for the other 'ghosts' around you?"
"Well, obviously each person that grabs me, grabs me in a specific way that tells a little about that person."
"Exactly. This is what I want you to do. Tonight or tomorrow, work on writing down as many of the people you see and the description of how they are pulling you. Give me this list in our session tomorrow."
"Awww man. I get homework even from my shrink?!?"
"It's not so bad. I want you to pay special attention to Cynthia and write about her details very carefully."
"Not so bad? It just got a lot worse."
"Come on Chris. You can't avoid it. Discussing it will help you."
"Yeah, so will a lobotomy."
She chuckled at that. "Ok Chris, remember what I said. I'll see you tomorrow."
With that she left and I plopped down on my bed. I knew that dinner would be ready soon, so I didn't want to start on the list yet. But I was thinking about it and going over each person in my head. I would work on the list after dinner, luckily I had finished all of my homework for the night already.
Bear's Den Stories Page | Rising Wind Homepage | PREVIOUS | NEXT |