Lucid (#wattys2016)

Three (Revised)

Isaac eventually found out that school was cancelled because of a gas leak, so he headed home. A few hours later, as he was thinking about Andre's words, he decided to take a break and watch T.V. He began to flip through the channels.

"Hey there kiddos! I'm guppy the walrus, and I will kill your pare-"

"OLD SPIICCCEEEEE II'MMM ONN DDRRUUUGGSS OOHH MMAAHH GGAWWDDDDDD!"

"Everywhere you look, everywhere there's a home-"

"Today on, Animal Planet, APES!"

"Earlier today, a local Hurlhurst Elementary school burned-"

"I can't believe you! This is Hell's Kitchen. Why did the chicken cross the road? Because you didn't fucking cook it!"

Wait.

Isaac turned back a channel to watch the news.

"Police aren't quite sure what caused the fire just yet, but arson seems to be the most plausible option."

This news was enormous to Isaac. It had all made sense. Andre had told him to go into school the next day, and his dream had come true. It was the same for the car, and Andre had been acting strange before that day as well. That couldn't all mean something, could it? Andre couldn't have predicted his dreams-that would be impossible. However, Andre was pretty smart and reclusive. What did it all mean?

Isaac decided that he needed some answers from Andre. The next day, he approached him in school, practically putting him in a choke hold. "Andre, what are you not telling me?" He had decided to use the passive-aggressive form, to seem like he wasn't hurting Andre, but he did mean business. Andre replied with his usual nervous speaking pattern. "I'm so sorry. I didn't know that the fire would happen. I just wanted to say that it would be... cold."

"Well, do you have anything else to tell me?"

"Yeah... so far your dreams have been happening, right? Well, um... I was thinking... that you could wake yourself up before it happened. That would stop it, right?"

That answer seemed plausible to Isaac. Andre told him to go inside because it would be cold, and who could predict an arson? He trusted Andre enough to know that he wouldn't do an arson. 

Right?

Isaac decided to take Andre's advice. Later that day, he found himself suddenly surrounded by darkness. He wasn't sure how he had gotten there, but he did remember finishing school. He looked to his left, then his right. He wasn't sure if this was real or fake, so he kept walking, feeling a bit nervous. Earlier, Andre had said told Isaac to trust his gut. He felt like right now was a time to see if he was dreaming. He pinched the skin on his left arm.

Isaac awoke. This time he wasn't sweating very much, and he guessed that this was because the dream hadn't started completely yet. He sat up, and was glad that it was warm again. He glanced at his clock, which read 6:30, but he decided to get up anyway. To him, this was better than being bored in bed. He decided to use his extra time to watch some more T.V, (Hell's Kitchen to be exact), and laughed at how terrible everyone was at cooking. Sometimes they did well, but he still found it funny. After everything that had happened in the past few days, he badly needed to relieve his mind, in any way possible.

The bus stop had been temporarily moved to the public park while they rebuilt the school, so Isaac had to walk a little bit further than usual. He hadn't talked to his friends for a couple days, so when he got there, he was a bit surprised that they weren't already there. Then, he remembered that they had gotten e-coli. He sat down on a nearby bench, pulling out his phone and chatting with Derek a bit.