A FAMILIAR TUNE plays and I recognize the sound of my own voice singing the words. Have you ever remembered a tune, yet not been able to recall any of the words for the life of you? That's how I feel right now. As each word escapes my lips, I know this is a song I should recognize. In fact, it's probably something I wrote in my journal.
But I have no power in this dream.
I can't control it. It's like watching a movie from the point of view of a character, not knowing what thoughts are provoking your own actions. It's torturous.
I must be having fun.
I can feel the skin stretch across my face, taut and sore from the wide smile plastered on me. It's not fake for cameras. It's genuine.
My head spins to a girl from one of my earlier memories.
She's beaming.
My heart jumps as we get to my favorite part of the song. The crowd has their arms in the air, swaying back and forth. Old-fashioned cameras are in their hands. I even see the occasional flip-phone.
What decade is this?
I wish I could get a good look around the room, but once again I am trapped in my own body. I am limited to what younger Lila sees.
The equipment is far from the latest. We're not wearing disco clothes or singing rock music so it's not the 80s. Maybe 90s? 2000s?
In the middle of the second chorus, I hear feedback that jolts the organs in my body.
Not in a good way.
I was already vibrating from the volume, but this is different. My hands are at my ears, removing the earpieces that threaten to burst my eardrums. Our backup band stops playing.
Sparks fly down. The crowd collectively intakes a breath and my heart pounds in my chest.
The thumping is so loud my mind focuses on that one sense: the feeling of my blood furiously pumping through my body. I know for sure that I have a stage high, but this is something different.
The audience murmurs amongst themselves, their attention focusing on one spot of the auditorium.
I follow their gaze up, up, up to what was at the level of the nosebleed balconies. This stadium is huge.
Glass particles rain down on the stage, glittering like little fairies.
That's when I spot the source. We're having technical difficulties. One of the lights has overheated and the glass shattered. The sound of the overheated system is what caused the feedback.
"Everybody calm, we'll have a short break to fix these technical difficulties," the girl who was singing with me says. "Take five."
The crowd releases the breaths they've been holding. The theater fills with sound as hundreds of people converse at normal volumes. Collectively their voices blended together are as loud as our music.
I remove my guitar and set it in its stand, strap and all. After that's secured, walk to the girl.
I hear something snap.
She's already on her way to speak to me. My eyes drift up and I realize she hasn't noticed what I see. The noise wasn't loud enough for her. She still has her earpieces in.
My voice catches in my throat and I'm rendered speechless as I try to scream her name.
The anticipation is killing me, but the sinking feeling in my stomach alludes to the fact that this story isn't going to end well.
The rod holding many of our stage lights comes crashing down. My hands are out towards the girl who I assume from my last memory is my sister. It swings like a pendulum, one side attached, barely hanging by a wire. She sees the fear in my eyes and her face goes slack.
I see her blue eyes open wide and her jaw drop in a silent yell, head pitched backward to gape in horror at the ceiling.
The cords are severed, bringing the entire set crashing down in her direction.
I feel like my lungs are a vacuum in space. Something has sucked all the air out of them. I can't breathe.
My body pitches forward. I'm not acting of my own decisions. It's natural that I want to save her. It feels natural.
She shifts her body to protect me. My alleged sister receives most of the blow, rendered unconscious.
Or worse.
A sharp pain ebbs through my left arm and tears well in my eyes.
The tears aren't because of the physical pain.
The girl is laying motionless on the ground. I'm motionless.
My body is frozen and I begin to feel a sudden agoraphobia. I feel incredibly exposed.
I don't want everyone to see this. I don't want their low resolution phones recording our pain.
Murmurs resound in the auditorium, hushed whispers fearfully commenting on our demise.
My bones are throbbing, screeching in protest. A glance at my arm confirms that I have a compact break. My arm is twisted in a way it isn't supposed to go. I think I see bone. Bile rises in my throat and I choke it down.
I fill ill.
Tremendously ill.
Like nausea, headache, migraine, cramps, all at once.
I'm unnaturally still. I feel myself drift away as people throw out phrases like "permanent damage" and "she's in shock."
A new sound fills the air, one I hadn't heard that night. Loud, long sirens cut through the shock of the atmosphere, silencing the worried chatter amongst fans.
Security is attempting to usher them out, clear the crime scene. That is, if this is a crime. We always double-check our equipment and that rod held no more than it usually did. I somehow know this fact. It's like the dam in my mind has broken and thoughts are rushing to the surface.
My initial thoughts. I'm thankful for the insight, but it scares me.
All I can do is lay here.
Utterly helpless.
A man dressed in a medical uniform checks on me, fingers wrapping around my wrist for a pulse.
Another one in similar dress is carting an empty body bag onto the stage.
It's empty. That's got to be something good, right?
He walks out of my vision and I am desperate to see who the bag belongs to.
Rather who now belongs in the bag.
A wave of illness sweeps my body a second time.
No, no no no no. This isn't real. I'm dreaming.
But the logical part of me knows that this isn't a dream from my imagination. This is real. I'm reliving the worst moments of my life.
Weight is lifted off my arm, but I'm alarmed to find I can't move it. I can't move anything.
A stretcher is rolled beside me and strong arms wrap around my body, hoisting me up. My head lolls to the side, limp.
In that amount of time I get a glimpse of the body bag as it's being zipped up.
A familiar face shocks me to my core.
I hear someone crying in the background. Sobbing like their heart has been ripped from their chest, put in a blender, then poured back into them.
I wonder who it is.
Leather straps encase my body across my chest, torso, and legs. I can feel them cutting into my skin, tugging against my clothing as I'm carted along. The bumps do nothing good for me as the medical workers bring me into an ambulance. The stretcher is then lifted and brought into the back.
A mask is placed over my nose and mouth. I can't help but inhale whatever chemicals they are feeding me. It reminds me of the "laughing gas" at the dentist they give you when you need a cavity filled.
I'm not laughing.
I drift from consciousness into unconsciousness and my tears and closing eyelids blur my view.
My sharp intake of air is so strong I inhale some dust, causing me to gasp and cough. I spring into a sitting position on my bed. Luke is in my room. My blue eyes dart over to him, capturing his brown ones in what could only have been a traumatized expression.
"What...what are you doing here?" I manage to sputter.
"I don't know," he says, equally confused. "I felt like something was wrong and I showed up. I promise I don't normally watch you sleep."
I furrow my eyebrows in disbelief.
"No, really! You can ask Reggie, I snore all night in the studio," he reassures me. "No more stalking for me."
Luke chuckles lightly.
"How attractive." My sarcasm is my only coping mechanism with what I just relived.
"Hey, what's going on?" His brown eyes soften. "You're trembling more than I've ever seen."
"It's only a nightmare," I reply, not wanting to talk.
"That wasn't a nightmare," he disagrees. "That was a mental attack."
"Is there a difference?" I sigh.
"Yes," he says, moving swiftly to sit next to me. "We can convince ourselves that nightmares aren't real when we wake up. They no longer haunt us outside of our dreams. But that...your whole body was violently shaking. That was no normal nightmare."
"It's just a night terror," I lie. "Nothing important."
Clearly it's the most important thing that's happened since I first lost my memory in May. This is the closest I've been to finding out the truth of what's happened to me. I don't know why, but I can't bring myself to tell Luke.
Not now.
After all he's been through with his parents, with his mother, I know this is not going to do him any good.
Maybe that's why I lied. Or maybe I'm terrified that if I tell the dream out loud, I'll have to accept it. The cold, hard truth.
"You know you can tell me, right?" he asks gently. "Or you can talk to Julie, Alex, even Reggie. We're here for you, Lils."
"That's not what I'm afraid of." My voice rises barely above a whisper. I tuck my legs into my arms, ignoring the throbbing pain.
"Then tell me...what are you afraid of?" he questions.
Luke is so close to me. Close enough that I can see the length of his individual eyelashes and a soft splash of freckles across the bridge of his nose otherwise hidden by his tan.
"I'm scared, Luke," I admit. "I think...I think I just remembered something."
"That's not good news this time is it?"
"No." My head whips to the side, staring blankly away from him as I blink away tears. "No, i-it's aw-ful."
My voice cracks on the last word, betraying the weakness I feel.
"Oh, Lila." He tries to wrap his arms around me, but I pull away.
I find myself at my keyboard, my safe haven. No one or nothing can hurt me here. It's just me in my music.
Luke spins so his legs are off the side of my bed, eyes warily searching for any signs of an emotional breakdown. I won't cry.
I don't cry.
I can't afford to because if I start, I'll never stop.
I begin playing something on the piano that I started writing last night. It was much more difficult to write than normal because I had to scoot over and record myself playing the keys that would have been played by my left hand. Then I would play the recording and compose the rest of my music. It was a lot of stop-and-go considering my broken arm. Took me a couple hours.
He's silent as he realizes I'm about to show him something.
Out of all of the songs I've sung for him, this one feels the most intimate. I'm baring my heart and soul at my weakest moment.
I sure hope he's worth it.
Hey y'all! Sorry that I may or may not be breaking your hearts. I've been planning this for a long time. I promise things will get better! Thanks so much for reading, have a lovely day.
xoxo,
Lynn