chapter four
the nightmares
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No!
Stop!
Ah!
Rory sprung up in her bed with a gasp. Her eyes grew the size of saucers, and her breathing made an uneven pattern, forcing her chest up and down in haste. Her baby hairs were stuck to the sides of her face on account of the thick layer of sweat coating her body, her bed covers long discarded on the other side of her bed. It was pitch black in her room, besides the moonlight that shined into her open bedroom window.
All the girl could see behind her closed eye lids while she slept was flashes of hands gripping sheets, then they clawed someone's throat or their own, the only sound being screams for help as the hands tried to crawl away from something or someone. There was a faint choking sound in the background, a hoarse breath trying to suck air into their body like they were so deprived of it.
When the flashes stopped and she was met with darkness, then as the image of a body dropping onto something white made an unsettling feeling form knots in her stomach, her eyes flew open and sleep felt like something she could never do again.
Rory's little flashes — or visions as she has called, were not a very normal occurrence, but frequent enough that she wasn't surprised by her sleep being interrupted. It was a nightmare, she would say to ease people's worries when they noticed the next day the slouch in her posture and her tired eyes half open.
Aurora sighed out deeply as her breath caught back up to her, running a hand through her blond locks that were thrown into a messy bun behind her head. She knew sleep wasn't in the picture anymore. She couldn't, not with all the screams, images and smells from that nightmare. Her body wouldn't even sit still, nor would her mind.
She checked the time. It was only two in the morning and the moon was low, signaling sunrise would be soon. Rory couldn't still and contemplate over her nightmare, that sent shivers down her spine, anymore. She got up to take a quick shower and change into clothes suitable for the warm weather that would quickly hit Bon Temps.
Rory needed to keep herself busy, it was the only way for the nightmare to be pushed to the back of her mind, the only way to feel sane. Rory decided to work on the front yard and garden this day, sense it was her day off of work.
She started with picking weeds from the garden, watering the flowers and plants to ensure they grew healthy and patted the soil, then she decided to pick up all the sticks off the yard so she could run the lawnmower on it. By this time, it was already 9 in the morning and she made a lot of progress.
Pushing the heavy machine made the muscles in her arms and legs burn, but is was just the right distraction she needed. It made the unsettling feeling of ominous despair and dread in her stomach vanish, or at least be pushed aside. She didn't even pay attention to the sweat dripping down the side of her face and kept pushing the machine.
"Rory!" Rory blinked, bringing her hand up to shield the sun from her eyes so she could see Gran walk out onto the front porch, calling her name. "You're gonna faint out here in this heat, honey. It's barely 9:00 and already 80 degrees." Rory shut off the lawnmower and met Gran halfway, who extended a glass of cold liquid towards her. "Here. I made you some lemonade. Fresh-squeezed."
"Thanks, Gran." Rory didn't even realize how parched she was until she grabbed the glass and almost downed it in one go, taking a breather so she didn't choke.
Gran looked around the yard that had been cleaned and the amount of garden tools laying around. "Goodness, what has got into you?"
Rory shrugged, swallowing a gulp of lemonade. "I just need to stay busy right now, that's all. Keep my mind busy."
"What? How long have you been —"
"I started, uh, when the sun came up." Rory replied before she could finish. "But I was up much earlier than that. I just stayed inside." Rory was about to take another sip but she noticed Gran's worried gaze on her.
"Are you having those dreams again?" Gran asked, eye brows pinched together. "Rory, is it the nightmares keeping you up?"
Rory let out a breath. "Yes, but, I'm fine, Gran, it's nothing out of the ordinary."
"Was it the same? Or was this one different?"
"The usual, I get the feeling of the stink of fear, like something bad is going to happen." Rory paused as she recalled the nightmare she spent all morning trying to forget. "But, this time I heard choking sounds as if someone was choking on something. And then, i felt like I couldn't breathe either, like the air was being ripped from my lungs, it's never been that bad before."
"Oh, dear." Gran breathed out in extreme concern for her granddaughter. It wasn't a good sign that the nightmares began to take it's toll on her physically like that, as if they were going to kill her. "Why don't you come on inside and let me make you something to eat? If you're gonna be out here, working like a horse, you ought to at least to have something in your stomach."
Rory shook her head as she handed Gran that now empty glass. "Oh, no, thanks. I'm not hungry."
Gran gave her a stern look, tone low. "I didn't ask if you were hungry." Rory frowned, before following her back into the house, knowing better than to defy Gran and the consequences.
Rory sat at the kitchen table as Gran filled her plate with all the food breakfast items. "Marthaville's getting a Starbucks." She informed her.
"I cannot for the life of me see why anybody would spend $3 on a cup of coffee with too much milk." Gran voice her opinion. Rory laughed, "Arlene told me that people are less calcium-deficient than they used to be because of all the fancy coffee they drink nowadays."
"You know, I'd never thought of that." Gran chuckled as she set Rory's filled plate in front of her, taking a seat beside her to resume her own breakfast. "But it does make sense."
Rory glanced down at her plate, hunger not being any of the things she was feeling in this moment. Rory watched as Gran filled her cup of coffee up. "Hey, Gran. Do you think something's wrong with me?"
Gran paused for a moment, a little shocked she would think that before her gaze softened. "Aurora. There is nothing wrong with you."
"Then why am I like this?" Rory asked, hands beginning to shake on the table so she placed them in her lap as if that would help. "Why do bad things always happen around me?"
"You are perfect, the best granddaughter I could have ever asked for, just don't tell Sookie that." Gran managed to get a small chuckle out of the blond. "I don't know why God does things sometimes, maybe to see how strong we are and how we face those challenges he throws at us. You've been handling with a brave face your whole life."
Rory pursed her lips, voice coming out quieter than she would like to think. "It scares me."
She hated how vulnerable she appeared right now, letting down a guard she put in order not to show the world who she really was; a freak. But, Gran was Gran, the kindest lady in this whole world with a soft spot for the undead and who's been looking out for her most of her life since her parents died. It didn't feel weird to finally show her true colors, it felt relieving to tell Gran all her bottled up feelings.
"Well, it is scary when you're different from everybody." Gran began with a soft tone in her voice. "But, it is what also makes you unique, Aurora. Being different isn't so different in this world, like with vampires, they're different and face backlash yet they live a life they see fit. I imagine that's not so different from you."
Rory nodded with her lips pressed together in a thin line before grabbing her empty glass of water and bringing it over to the sink. Gran watched her movements, feeling as though her words weren't enough to strike a cord in her.
She hesitated her next words. "You know, your grandfather used to know things." Rory's body stilled, back still to Gran as she asked, "What things?"
"If somebody was having money problems, running around behind their wife's back. Sick. Sometimes even when someone died before it happened. That kind of thing. Personal things they never would have told anybody about it." Gran paused before she continued, an ominous feeling crawling up Rory's spine as she turned back around.
"But then Earl's brother, your Great-Uncle Francis, came back from Korea in real bad shape. All torn up from the things he'd seen. Earl knew he was thinking about killing himself. He went over there in the middle of the night one night. Francis was just about to kick the chair out from underneath him. Already had the noose around his neck. But Earl talked him out of it."
"I just think there is a purpose for everything that God creates, whether it's a unique ability or a cup of overpriced coffee with too much milk. Or a vampire. God will reveal that purpose when the time is right." Gran finished.
Rory smiled softly before her phone rang. She dug it out of her pocket. "Hello?"
"Hey, Rory, it's Sam. Could you do me a favor?"
"Um, sure, maybe."
"Listen, I'm set to open for lunch in about 20 minutes and Dawn still hasn't shown up for her shift."
"Oh, Sam, I really need my day off." Rory complained, already thinking where this was going.
"No, I'm not asking you to come in." Rory sighed out in relief. "I just need you to run by Dawn's and wake her up. She probably just overslept."
"Why can't you ask Sookie?"
"Because she's already here and working, Rory."
"Okay." Rory hung up. She was about to head out the door with her keys when she stopped, turning around to face her Gran. "Wait. I thought Great-Uncle Francis did kill himself, with a shotgun."
Gran shrugged. "Oh, yes, he did. But that was years later."
Rory drove off after remembering that she didn't actually know where Dawn lived. She had never been over to the girl's house before, nor had ever stopped by.
But, as she was driving down the main road, she got a sense of dejva vu or some voodoo shit feeling that was telling her the way to go to reach her destination. For once, she listened to the feeling and dove until the feeling told her to go down one of the three streets.
That was when the whispers invaded her head, pressing up against her front lobe. Rory almost lost her grip on the steering wheel, her hand flying up to her forehead as she hissed through clenched teeth. As she drove closer and closer, the whispers grew louder, demanding. It was a fury of things running through her head.
Rory had to be careful driving and when her eyes fell onto a house, the voice pounded harder, telling her this was the one they wanted her at. Rory didn't wait as she got out of her car after pulling up the driveway, Dawn's car still there and walked up the porch, knocking on the door but received no answer.
"Dawn? It's me, Rory." Rory called out through the door, one hand pressed up against the side of her head. "Honey, you overslept."
Rory didn't expect for the front door to be unlocked when she tried it. It swung open and Rory could hear Dawn's annoying alarm going off. The air felt darker and colder just as she stepped inside the threshold and rubbed her arms when goosebumps formed. "Dawn? Are you here?"
Rory swallowed the lump in her throat, feeling a weird tether like a string pulling her towards Dawn's bedroom. It felt like it was pleading with her to follow its commands, forcefully pulling her in that direction. She decided to listen to the voices in her head directing her.
"Dawn?" Rory entered the bedroom. "Dawn?" Her eyes grew wide when she looked at the bed. Realization struck her and her jaw fell to the floor, yet nothing but a small whimper came out, she couldn't even scream.
There on the bed lay the lifeless body of Dawn.