It's kryptonite, Superman. Little souvenir from the home town. I spared no expense to make you feel right at home.~ Lex Luthor
Dedication: To Rey-From-Jakku for the massive influx of votes and comments she gave me, along with her huge support. You left a wonderful comment the other day. Thank you so much!
Siena
I'm gonna put it on record: I officially hate sleepwalking. Ok, it's really not ideal, and it's really weird. Most people don't end up sleepwalking out of their house, let alone hundreds of miles away. So then how the hell did I end up here, in a field back home? Why was I back home. This was evidence of my sleepwalking. I would never go back on my own. Voluntarily, at least.
Jolting awake, this time I found myself in a field, surrounded by hundreds of ripped out plants and broken branches. I staggered back in surprise; my eyes had shot open while I was standing, not lying down. I held out my hands in front of me. They were covered in dirt, and it was underneath my fingernails, in the lines, everywhere, up to my elbows. I rubbed the thumb of my right hand against the palm of my left, to try and rub away some of the dirt. Rubbing through, I saw the remnants of dried blood hidden behind the drt that had caked on my skin.
Horrified, I stared at my hands once again. It would have been better had the blood been coming from me. But instead, there were no cuts, no sharp bites of stinging pain where the dirt should have hurt. So the blood wasn't mine. But who's was it?
I was scared. Scared of myself, scared of what I could do, scared of what I was capable of when I couldn't control it.
Once I freaked myself out thoroughly, I decided to actually see where I was. Unlike the previous times I had been sleepwalking, this one seemed to hold clues at to what I was doing there. I was standing in the middle of an orchard, with apple trees surrounding me on both sides. I wrapped my arms around myself, trying to get as warm as I could, and enveloped my body in a light cocoon, so that it kept in the warmth and kept out the cold. Everywhere I walked, light beams shone on the surrounding area.
Trees were ripped out, not too many, just a few, but their bodies looked mangled and horrible, branches stark, the trunks frozen and barren. To my left was the peach trees, and a few of them looked the same. Understanding dawned on me. I had done this. I had ripped out these trees. But why? It was winter, it wasn't like anything was going to be of much help. Nothing was growing.
I shook my head and walked towards the front of the rows, the only way I knew where to go. Looking around, I realized that I knew this place. It was where my family and I went apple-picking every year when I was younger. Well, where my parents dropped Alessia and I off for apple-picking while they went to work, and then picked us up.
I gingerly stepped out onto the dirt path road, looking both left and right for anyone coming my way. After all, I was quite literally a beacon in an otherwise pitch black field. There was no one, so I closed my eyes and tried to teleport. However, the second I attempted to do so, I feeling a massive pain spiral through my head, and nearly blacked out from the pain. I collapsed to the ground, clutching my head, and breathing heavily.
I looked up, black spots dancing across my vision, and sucked in a few deep breaths, trying to clear my head and blink away the spots. Once I felt I had gathered my bearings enough, I decided to try once more, and at least get close to my home. I got rid of my energy shell, feeling the cold seep in instantly. I needed every bit of energy I had left to even get me anywhere near my home.
Instantly, I felt the free falling sensation that was a tell-tale sign of me traveling through space. When I opened my eyes, I was on the roof of my building. I shrugged. What the hell. I'd take it.
Carefully walking over to the edge, I saw the fire escape that led right d\to the hallway on our floor. Jumping over the roof, I landed loudly on the metal. I winced at the harsh sound, hoping I hadn't woken up anybody. But we lived in Manhattan. Chances were they were still sleeping.
I scurried down the fire escape until I came to our floor, which I knew, since I had been on the fire escape countless times since we had moved in. I always liked to go out there in the summer and just look over the city. I opened the door and walked in stealthily, coming to my apartment, Fishing through my pockets, I unearthed a key and quietly unlocked the door. Ever since my sleepwalked escapade, I had made sure to wear clothes that had pockets and keep a key on me at all times, just in case something like this started becoming more frequent and happening again.
There wasn't much of a chance of it occurring, but i had obviously been in the right to do so.
I slipped quietly into my apartment, noticing how the darkness seemed even more pronounced now that I was alone, and it was quiet. I breathed it in, the sense of familiarity and home welcoming. I had always been a travel junkie, but I did enjoy my apartment.
I sat on the couch and wrapped a blanket around myself, not caring about the dirt that I was tracking into the apartment. Tears silently slid down my face before I took a deep breath, and stopped them. Would Dylan even care anymore, after how I had treated him? It was my fault, all of this was my fault, and the further I was from him, the better it was. I knew I was hurting him, I was hurting just as much. But maybe all he needed was a bit of time away from me, to get better. But how could I avoid him for another 5 months, until June? It was only February.
I wrapped the blanket even tighter and laid down on the couch, staring into nothingness. The room was pitch black, and for hours, all I did was stare at a wall. Until the room steadily began to lighten, and the first drops of sunlight started to peek through the kitchen window.
Looking at the shafts of light splayed over the wall, I was pulled back into a memory, or maybe I was falling into a dream. I couldn't tell the difference anymore.
They were sitting on a hill back home. They had woken up extra early and wanted to see the sunrise, a topic of eternal debate between the two of us. Dylan preferred sunrises, she sunsets. But she never found out why until today.
"Why do you prefer sunrises over sunsets?" She asked him , plucking threads of grass from the hill and threading them together.
"So I can piss you off by waking you up at 5:30." He replied cheekily.
She smacked his shoulder. "As I recall, I am the one who convinced you to sneak out of the house and run to the park so that we could see it better."
He shrugged, conceding defeat. "Good point."
She smiled. "No, but seriously. Why?"
He sighed, and looked towards the sky, which, instead of black, was now a deep blue, showing hints that the sun was about to rise.
"I don't know. There's always been something so incredibly promising about a sunrise, you know? Like how so many things haven't even started yet, how so many possibilities haven't been explored. A fresh new start. A new day." He started, propping his chin on his hand. Continuing, he said, "The colors of a sunrise too. Bright yellows and oranges, startling blues. All happy colors that show that there is some good in the world. That we have to move on, because another day is just around the corner."
As he spoke, the sun rose, engulfing them in sharp amount of light. Glancing over at him, she found him staring at me, and suddenly, her mouth went dry. "What?" He asked defensively.
He struggled to speak before he turned away. "Nothing." He eventually spat out. She raised her eyebrow but decided not to push it any further.
"Come on, let's go back." he insisted, standing up and walking back to the house. she grabbed his wrist and pulled him down. "No. Let's stay here."
He looked at her incredulously. "You realize it's Friday. We have school today."
She shrugged once again, looking at the sun. "Yeah, won't kill you to take a day off."
He looked at her with wide eyes, but sighed. "I know you're gonna push me until I'm going to give in." He pulled out his phone and texted his mom that he had left the house already, then sent an email to the school saying he was sick and he would be missing the rest of the day. Jake had figured how to do this from his mom's account.
"You're a bad influence on me, you know?" He remarked, sliding the phone back into his pockets.
She grinned devilishly. "I know."
"What about you?" She waved him off. "My parents won't care, since Alessia left, I've kinda become invisible to them. Though as soon as I leave for college, I'll imagine they'll become helicopter parents."
"What about the school?" He asked.
Again, she waved her hand. "To be honest, I don't really care. I'm just here to enjoy the sunset."
They chatted for the entire day, once running back to her house to grab some food, before going back to the hill and having a picnic. Being 14 and best friends wasn't like it was anymore. Nowadays, everyone asked if they were boyfriend and girlfriend, despite their fierce insistence that there was nothing between them.
They sat there, on the hill, while they waited for the sun to set. Numerous times, they both got pings on their phones, parents wondering where they had went. A simple walk had sufficed for explanation, claiming that they would be home once the sun set.
Chatting easily had always come to them, and soon they found time slipping away, until just before the sun was about to set.
"So," he began, "why do you like sunsets, and not sunrises?"
She sighed, mirroring his actions that morning.
"Sunsets are so full of mystery, intrigue. People say they like sunsets because they usher in a new day, a new time when thousands of things can happen. Can't the same happen at night? Night have always been the best part of 24 hours. So interesting, so unprecedented. Sunsets, to me, are about so much more than the closing of a day. It's about the opening of a night, and a thousand new possibilities on the horizon. Plus, the colors are so cool. Darker oranges, pinks, and reds, mixing and turning into black." She shrugged. "It's a different kind of start."
He started at her mesmerized, and noticed the exact way the sun seemed to fall on her, casting her in an ethereal glow. The light encased her ently, like a hazy glow that emitted from her skin.
"What?" she said again. He shook his head and turned back to watch the sunset, which was now deepening into the exact colors she had described.
The dream melted, turning back into black nothingness.
Jolted awake, sitting upright on the couch. Touching my cheek, I saw that it was streaked with tears. Tears I didn't know that I had cried. Glancing outside, I saw that almost no time had passed, or the dream had rushed through my head faster than I had anticipated.
Clambering out of the blankets, I went instantly to my room. I grabbed a few clothes from my dresser and closet, and stumbled into the bathroom, blinking in the intensity of the light. I dropped the clothes on the countertop, somewhere, and climbed into the cold, tiled shower.
With shaking hands, I turned the dial on the shower wall, then jumped back in surprise when it emitted of jet of piercing cold water. I stayed back until the water was scalding hot, then stood underneath it, letting the warmth cascading over my skin. The shower attacked my entire body, running massive amounts of dirt and blood down the drain. I took a look at my hands. The dirt turned the water a thin, light brown, and it streamed, dripping off my hands. Then, when all the dirt was washed off my body, the water turned light pink, showing that I was bleeding, or that there was blood somewhere on my body. I turned around, letting the water soak my hair, and felt a sharp stab of pain in my upper shoulder.
I turned my head, and discovered a large gash on my right shoulder. And by large, I mean both deep and long, stretching from where the top of where my shoulder met my arm to the bottom of my shoulder blade on the opposite side. It was seeping crimson red, running in thin blood diluted by water down my back. The water prevented it from clotting, but I didn't care. The pain was a reminder of what I had done. And that was ok.
The pink water ran down the drain, and I stared at it, flashes running through my brain. At this point, all I could process was the blood. The more I stared at it, the more I felt the urge to break.
Something flashed in front of my eyes. A knife wound, the blade ripping across my shoulder. I slapped a hand on the wet tiled wall of the shower, trying to steady my breathing. That didn't make any sense. I had a stab wound on my waist, but not on my shoulder. What the hell was going on?
I sat down, and tried to avoid crying. Everything came rushing in on me, and it felt like my heart was made of fragile, spun glass. It only took a little chink for it to shatter. I remembered the dream I had, how it was like when Dylan and I were younger and more innocent.
I swallowed, avoiding the tears threatening to drip down my face, and shut the water off. I stood up and wrapped myself in a towel, drying my hair. I grabbed my clothes and walked out. I would have to change in my room and grab a few bandage supplies to help my arm. I dumped my clothes in my room and wrapped my hair in a towel, after grabbing a few bandage supplies from my room. Shutting the door momentarily, I changed into a comfortable pair of leggings and a low tank top, so my shoulder was exposed enough for me to wrap the bandage around it.
I sighed, and unraveled the bandage. This was the best I could do. I was going to have to figure out how to do this one on my own. First, I applied antiseptic to the wound. Just because it was cut didn't mean I wanted it to get infected.
I winced as I pulled my arm forwards, wrapping the bandage around it. No matter how many times I tried it, I couldn't, so I gave up on the wrapping and just applied a large bandage there, which absorbed the blood instantly. I sighed, and slipped on a warm sweatshirt over my tank top, ignoring the rushing stab of pain that occurred when I moved my arms. Since I hadn't been aware of the wound's presence before, it didn't hurt, but now that it was, it killed.
I couldn't move my arm above my head, and I bite back tears of pain that rose to my eyes.
If Dylan was here, he would reprimand me for dealing with this on my own. And even though I could hear him in the kitchen, moving around, I was a coward. I couldn't find the courage to even talk to him. What kind of person was I? He was stronger than I ever could have been. He would have asked for help, he would have apologized and been friends again by now. So why couldn't I?
I staggered over to my desk and pulled out the glass photograph I had slammed in the drawer after our fight, shattering the glass panel covering it. It had been a pic of me, Calli, Jake, and Dylan, right before we entered college campus this summer. I traced my fingers over the glass, careful not to cut myself on any of it. How had it all gone so wrong so quickly?
I looked away and stuffed the photo back in the drawer, for it was becoming too painful to look at. Walking out of the kitchen, I grimaced when I knocked my arms into the door, but played it off as a yawn.
"Hey." He greeted softly, setting out lunch in front of me. I looked at the clock, and saw that half of the day had slipped away from me, through my fingertips.
I nodded at him and attacked my food, eating it as fast as I could. Unlike Dylan, who ate his food slowly and methodically, I ate mine as fast as I could, for I always had somewhere to be. I finished within five minutes, the awkward silence becoming too much. When I was done,I washed my plate and put it away, then cleaned up the table, part of our agreement. I would clean up the table and put the food away, he would wash the dishes.
Once I was done, I grabbed Charlotte, who squeaked in surprised before barking with happiness once she saw who it was. I took her into my room and sat her next to me, and opened my laptop, getting to work. However, I couldn't get more than three words down before my mind shut off, and all I could do was stare at the blank screen, haunting me. Next to me, almost as if she could sense my sadness, (which she probably could) Charlotte burrowed into me, giving me warmth and comfort.
I stroked her back and stared at the screen, before finally slamming the laptop shut. I left the apartment, climbed up the fire escape, and stood on the roof, watching all the colors of the sunset.
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Heyyyyyyyyyyy guys. Finally, a chapter over 3000 words. I'm so happy with myself, and I actually think I can pull this off in Dylan's too. I've been having a bit of trouble with his storyline, but now I think I've got it down, so yay!! If you noticed the symbolism behind the sunrise vs. sunset thing, good for you. See if you can find the other clues! Next update tomorrow!
*signing off happy and tired*
Don't forget to vote, comment and hit that recommend button! Pleas tell me about the spelling and grammar mistakes!
Love from a swimmer!
~Vi