The Other Side - A Jamilton Fanfiction

Chapter Five

I glanced up at him. "Oh. I'm sorry. I didn't know."

He shrugged. "It's alright. It wasn't your fault, and it wasn't mine. I just tell myself that they're just dreams. That they can't hurt me."

"Does it work?"

Thomas grinned. "No. I usually go outside to catch my breath or talk to a friend to try and calm down."

I smiled in amusement. "Alright, well, in my dream, I was running away from something. Something dangerous. I felt like I was a panicked deer being chased by a hunter. I was afraid and hurt and breathless, but I kept running. Because it felt like if I stopped for even a second, it would get me. But I'm not sure what it is. It was like instinct powered my every move. I just had to run. I just had to escape whatever it was that was trying to get to me. And it was so cold. Unnaturally cold. Cold to the point where I was afraid I would drop dead and then whatever it was would take what it wanted."

The humor had drained from Thomas' eyes as I recounted the dream to him.

"Thomas?"

Suddenly, he snapped out of his state and an easy, reassuring smile appeared on his face. "It wasn't real. You're safe and you're okay."

I didn't know how to respond, so I just focused on the blanket.

"You know, one of my best friends always tells me that dreams are nothing more than twisted memories that your brain distorts and convolutes when you go to sleep."

"Your friend sounds like a smartass."

Thomas laughed, and I felt more at ease when he did. "That's a very accurate description of him, I think. Anyway, he told me that if you try to think of good, happy memories before you go to sleep, you're going to dream about them."

"Won't your brain just distort those memor—"

"Shut up."

"Sorry," I said, a smile tugging at my mouth.

"So I've tried it before. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. But I usually think of the games my family and I would play as a child."

"If I had to choose a happy memory..." I paused for a second and grinned. "God, it's kinda like I'm trying to fight back a dementor or something."

Thomas gave me a blank stare.

"You know, a dementor. From Harry Potter." I paused. "You've never read Harry Potter?"

"I don't even know what that is."

"You don't know what Harry Potter is?! What is wrong with you?!"

"I'm... sorry?" he said carefully.

"I have the books somewhere," I said as I flung the blanket off of me, turned on the lights, and went to retrieve the first one. "Here." I found it and handed it to him. "I won't tell you anything about it at all. But it's about this kid who finds out he has magical powers and it turns out he's a wizard celebrity and he goes to this school called Hogwarts so he can learn to control magic and his parents were killed by the evil wizard Voldemort and he was supposed to also be killed but the spell rebounded and Voldemort died but he didn't die and then he comes back to try and kill Harry and— wait. Uh, forget what I said, okay?"

Thomas was smiling at me as he accepted the book and set it to the side. "I'm assuming this is one of your happy memories?"

"Hmm? Oh! Yeah, I guess. My mom used to read me all sorts of stories before I went to bed. Harry Potter was one of my favorites, of course." I slipped back under the blanket and was quiet for a second. "Thanks for helping me calm down."