Dark One- The Khiara Banning Series Book 1

Twelve

“Goodbye child."  She places her thumb, middle and index finger in a triangle over my heart. "We’ll meet again, hopefully under much better circumstances.” She says.

The scene switches abruptly to Cara’s bedroom. I’m watching the events as if I were a bystander. Cara and I are sleeping together in her huge bed, curled up next to each other. We must be about five and six years old. I watch as my younger self begins to stir, and eventually wakes up. She looks around the room, and then her eyes focus on something and widen. I follow her line of sight and see a dark shape standing by the door. She tries to wake Cara up, but she’s a deep sleeper and just continues snoring.

Younger me then gets up and walks to the bathroom, hoping to escape whatever it is in there. Like I’m attached to her, I follow and step in before she closes the door. She walks over to the sink and washes her face and I feel myself being sucked into her body until we become one. I am five years old again, sleeping over for the very first time at my friend Cara’s house, and I don’t want to make a seen because I think I saw some kind of boogeyman. I splash some more water onto my face and look up into the mirror- and I scream.

 I wake up. Shakily I reach for my cell phone beside me on the couch, and shudder when I see the time. Midnight. I check outside and see that the rain is still going strong, and sigh. I stare down at my phone for a minute, debating what I should do. I pick it up and click Cael’s contact icon and hold my finger down until the text or call options pop up.

R u up? I send.

Two seconds later he replies. Yeah, just watching TV. You ok?

No. Can’t b here. 2 many nightmares…memories? I dunno.

My phone buzzes with his answer. I can send a cab over and you can come here if you want. Or I can send a cab to bring you home.

Can’t go home is my reply.

Forty-five minutes later, a cab comes to pick me up. I left a note on Cara’s TV where I know she’ll see it, and she knows how I feel about sleepovers.

“Well then” says the driver, who I quickly recognize as the guy who drove me to and from Cael’s house the night of Cara’s party. “You’re a regular, aren’t you Mrs. Banning?” I politely nod. I don’t question how he knows my last name; our town isn’t huge, so eventually you’re bound to know most of the workers.

 “You know my parents,” I state, as we turn down Mercury lane.

“Yes, ma’am!” he says brightly. “I’ve bought many of your mother’s paintings; she keeps a picture of you on her desk at the studio.” I smile at that. I already knew that she did, I mean I’ve seen it plenty of times, but it’s always nice to know she’s thinking of me wherever she’s working- I know for a fact that she has a picture of me on her desk at the museum too.

The driver’s nametag reads Fred, and his slight accent and beautiful coffee coloured skin tone hints at Middle Eastern descent. “Here we are,” he says as we pull up to Cael’s place. Cael is standing outside with an umbrella, and as soon as the car is parked, he opens the door for me and helps me out. He walks me to the door and gestures for me to go inside while he pays the fare, and I smile as I walk in and see that there’s a steaming hot cup of coffee waiting for me on the living room table in front of where I’ve sat the last couple of times I was here. I walk over to it, plunk down on the couch, and close my eyes and sigh.

The door closes and I open my eyes as Cael sits down next to me. He smiles. “Coffee’s for you, if you were wondering. Unless you wanted tea, or hot chocolate…” his smile falls a little but when I pick the coffee up and shake my head, it returns. 

“Coffee is absolutely fine with me.” I take a sip of the delicious stuff and place it back on the table.

“So,” I say, “what’s on the tube?”

“Late night re-runs and infomercials. It’s lady’s choice tonight.” He passes me the remote, his eyes filled with good humour.

“I’ll take infomercials for two hundred, please.” I flick through the channels until I find an infomercial worth watching. A lady is excitedly explaining how to cook with this new kitchen set we can get for only ten small payments of twenty-nine-ninety-nine!

“See,” I say, “It’s like watching a cooking show.” I take a sip of my coffee and smile at Cael, who nods. “Exactly. It’s entertaining.” 

We sit for a while, watching the lady cook with the “amazing” pots and pans, cutting things with the “just superb” knife set. Eventually, I find myself growing tired and I yawn.

“Tired?” asks Cael, who yawns himself right after. I nod my head, but then shake it. I don’t want to fall asleep and have such terrifying nightmares again. Cael’s eyes narrow and he asks, “Those dreams you had. How bad were they?”

I look down at my thighs and sigh. “Bad. I think they might have been memories, but they’re too strange to believe you know? But they feel so familiar…”

“What were they about? If you, you know, don’t mind me asking.” I wave my hand in a gesture I hope comes across as not at all.

“When I was in grade two, I was kidnapped. I never remembered much of how it happened. I always remember waking up in total darkness, and then being found not too long after by the police. They always said it must have been some stupid kids from out of town playing a prank because a call came in about my whereabouts.” Tears fill my eyes.

“Tonight, I dreamed that it was this man who’d kidnapped me. I can’t remember what he looked like anymore, but he seemed so familiar. He told me that he was working for…Satan, and that they wanted me dead.” Cael remains silent, looking pensive.

“And then” I continue, “there was this girl. She saved me…and somebody else. She said his name and it…it was the angel from the story you told me about. He was the one who phoned the police while the girl untied me.” Cael’s Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows some saliva. “That’s rather scary, isn’t it? I wonder what made you dream that?”

I shake my head and lean into him. At first he seems surprised, but then his arms entangle me and bring me closer. “I don’t know. It felt so real, like it really happened. But that’s impossible. He nods his head in agreement. “Impossible.”

“When that dream ended, another began. You know how I told you sleepovers give me anxiety? I think I remembered why…but I can’t remember much about that dream. Only that something scared me, I guess I saw a shadow in the mirror when I was washing my face and it traumatized me. That’s when I developed my fear of the dark.”

Cael kisses the top of my head. “I’ll keep you safe from your nightmares tonight, if you want.” I try to smile through a yawn. “How?” He gently pushes me aside and stands up. “Wait here,” he says as he leaves the room. He comes back a couple of minutes later with a huge fluffy duvet, a sheet, and some pillows. I giggle at the rather large load of things he’s carrying and offer to help him, but he promptly drops them on the floor.

“We can make a fort.”