The In-Between

Introduction

I am awake, though my brain does not know it. I see, but my eyes are not open. I hear, but my ears are not attentive. I feel, and yet my body is under warm covers, soundly resting until the morning comes again. I am in a dream, and yet it feels so real.

I take in my surroundings and realize that I am in Daniel's house. Of all the places I could be in, I am at Daniel's house. I look around the living room, and decide to go wake him up. I talk quietly to myself as I walk. "Down the hall, third door on the right." I peer into his room and see that he is not asleep, but instead on his phone texting someone. He looks up for a fleeting moment, and puts his phone down when he realizes that it is me at the door. "Selena, hey. How's my girl doing?"

"YOUR GIRL?" I sneer. "I am not your girl. You cheated on me. You made me fall in love with you, and then you cheated on me. Don't ever call me your girl again."

Daniel stares at me with a look of shock on his face. "I am not cheating on you, Selena. Where in the world did you get that idea?"

"Like you don't know," I growl.

One look at his face and I realize that he doesn't know. The confusion on his face says it all. "You don't know..." I trail off.

"I would never cheat on you, Selena. You know that. I love you. There is nothing that you can do to change that." He slides off of his bed and tiptoes over to me, wrapping his arms around my waist. "You do know that right?"

I just stare at him, incredulous. Maybe he didn't cheat on me. Maybe I am not in a dream. Maybe him cheating on me was the actual dream. I surprise myself by whispering, "Yeah."

Suddenly he is kissing me, and everything else just melts away. I forget that this is probably just a dream, and that in the real world, he is dating another girl, because I apparently wasn't enough for him. I pull away. "Is this a dream?" I stare into his hazel eyes.

"No, it's not. This is real. This is not the dream. Me cheating on you was the dream. No. Not a dream. A nightmare. And it's over now."

Am I really in the dream world? Under warm covers, or am I in the real world, thinking it was in the dream world? I don't even know anymore!

"I hate to do this to you, Daniel...but can you show me proof? That you aren't cheating? It just...it felt so real and I don't want it to be real because if it is I don't want to be living some lie. Just please, give me some proof," I cry. "Please," I whisper the last word as a plea.