What He Wouldn't Give (Unedited Version)

Chapter Fifteen: The Middle

The future of this contest seemed like so far away, but he knew that sooner than he would think the competition would be over and he did not have a clue what his future after the contest entailed. As long as Luke was away the nightmare and fear subsided into the dark corner of his mind, but having the man back in the house tonight was a night where nightmares ruled over the dreams.

His breathing was heavy and he felt like he couldn't take another step as he pushed his legs past the point of exhaustion to get away. However, running in the dark he could never escape. He turned left and then right. The monster was always on Eli's tail claws scraping the backs of his legs. Ready to collapse and give in the scene changed and Eli's stamina was renewed. This time the monster chasing him was ten times bigger than the last and he started to run, but found out he couldn't move. Why couldn't he just wake up. This was the point in the nightmare where he knew that he was dreaming, but still couldn't wake up. The beast roared causing goosebumps to appear on the skin of Eli's arms as he involuntarily shuttered and flinched. It raised its hand sending crystal shards at Eli...

Waking up, Eli sat up in his bed running hands through his hair with the lasting image of the most recent dream freshly on his mind. God, he just wished the nightmares would disappear as for the longest of times he never could remember whether or not if he had a dream. Climbing out of the bed Eli stumbled over clothes and shoes to his desk where the laptop he managed to buy with his work money laid as he sold the desktop as it no longer suited his needs.

Logging in was enough trouble for the half awake zombie that sat at the chair at three in the morning. Once he realized the number lock was off he turned it on and retyped in his password getting the login finally right. The first thing he did was pull up iTunes and hit play on his music letting it shuffle the almost three thousand songs he had. He pulled up the email app he had connected with Windows and his account checking it to see if he would have an email from Danny and JoBell the couple who were hosting the competition.

He had a couple of spam emails and in the midst of deleting emails he saw that he almost deleted the one from Danny. Unclicking the delete box by the side of the email he deleted the rest of the spam emails before opening the email and reading it.

"Hello Eli,

Congrats on your progress in the competition and your partner is Chester..."

As Eli read the email the name Chester seemed familiar and he texted Jeremy to ask if he knew who the kid was. Getting a response almost immediately, Eli first wondered why he was still up and secondly his gut told him he had known who this person was.

"The guy you replaced when Anthem Falls was still a thing."

"Perfect this persons going to hate me and this competition will end for me most likely."

Eli spoke to himself in the dark room. Groaning Eli spent the rest of the night watching Netflix on the laptop as he sat comfily on his bed. This was a moment in time when he wished he had a dog. He had work that morning at half past seven and it was already half past five and he had not gone back to sleep since he woke up. Knowing bags would be predominately showing on his face he got out of his bed getting a shower before grabbing his long board and hitting the streets. By six he was at the gym and he lifted weights for an hour trying to clear his mind.

Working from seven thirty until four thirty, today was the last time he would have to go into work before his hours changed by half an hour as they found another newbie to allow Eli to shift his hours. Today the paycheck came and Eli would barely see the money as it went directly to bills and groceries.