Dine and Dash
*~*~* Chapter Twelve - "Echoes of
Demons" *~*~*
‘With a fierce
action of her hand, as if she sprinkled hatred on the ground, and with it
devoted those who were standing there to destruction, she looked up once at the
black sky, and strode out into the wild night.’ (Charles Dickens)
Run…
It was what I knew.
It was what I did.
Even in the nightmare, I ran.
The only difference between my reality and
my subconscious was that in my dream, I was running towards my demons…
I ran straight from my room, burst out the
front door and stumbled my way into the forest that would lead me to Dad and
Renee. My mental purgatory would always claim me come nightfall. But tonight,
even in my unconsciousness, I could tell it was different.
Like being submerged under water, I was lost
in a bubble of thoughts that pounded deafeningly in my semi-lucid state of
sleep. My chest heaved; desperate to draw breath for my burning lungs. But the
pain was bearable. The demon of pain that usually incapacitated me to the brink
of death almost every night held back slightly.
Bearable?… Change.
Somewhere in my subconscious there was a
safety net holding me. An elusive shadow that cloaked me and kept my head above
the tumultuous torrents of emotional tortures that would soon demand my life in
payment; A darkness that shielded me from the demon's view, hiding me in its
black depths.
One foot in front the other, I kept running,
each step turning me into the cursed child. Pushing myself to run faster, I
fought against the forces trying to keep me away.
I ignored the blistering of my feet on the
harsh ground, needing to get to the house to find something that I'd missed
before. Jake's child-like bellow, asking where I'm going, follows me as I cut
through the dark, unforgiving forest. I don't stop to answer the worried boy on
the porch. The house, I have to get to the house. But I had no time to answer,
something was calling me there and it made my soul tremble, an ominous feeling
telling me that there was more change… something waiting for me.
My heart pounded desperately, using my veins
to convey its message, Dad needed me. A whisper crept icily up my neck. One
word. Renee.
The bubble strained and contorted disturbed.
There was another change.
I didn't know how or why but I didn't
question it. I panted loudly, every lungful of air burning my chest. The evil
moss covered earth pierced my skin in punishing shards. But I couldn't let it
stop me. Even when I knew, for this first time… I was leaving a blood trail in
my wake. One more change.
Why was the dream changing?
I fought hard against the pain, needing to
see Renee for myself. The photograph of the woman holding me with loving arms
didn't match the woman who left hating me. I was desperate to see the woman
from the photo, to feel her warmth, even if it was just this once through a
fragmented dream in my own head. My heart would accept anything from her. I
missed her…
My breathing grew shallow as I watched a
cloud form. Rapid waves and a silhouette, the water broke and a voice flooded
my mind. "She's your mother"; I heard the familiar voice and
comforting words. "You're allowed to wonder about her, no one can hold
that against you".
Jacob.
My palm reached out towards it. I tried to
scream out to him for help, but it was useless. The cloud disappeared like
smoke between my fingers, leaving me with the memory of the simple words that
caused both immense relief and inner turmoil.
The thoughts I buried deep inside me a long
time ago, bubbles up to the surface like a volcano and threatens to erupt. What
would a normal family life have been like? Having a simple, normal family with
a mother who loved me? I watched as the smoke turned my vision hazy and slowly
the photograph I'd found came into focus. This time my fingers refused to lift
and touch it, fearing that it would disappear…
How could she leave after looking at me with
such love in the photograph? What made her stop loving me? The familiar feel of
my sides hurting and chest heaving welcomed me as I broke through the trees. I
was bulleting toward our house when the force of my admittance of my
desperation to see my mother breaks through my mental walls. My heart
constricts and my child self remembers Charlie is in pain. She's killing him. I
had to save him? Maybe save her? I had to do it; even if I was destined to die
here.
My first step on the porch sent me back to
my room. A sixteen year old girl lay in the bed instead of the three year old
that had lain there all those years ago. Now that Jake had told me, I
remembered and tasted the blood as I hid there. The irony was not lost on me.
It didn't matter how old I was, I thought to myself… the demons were still the
same.
The comforter kept me covered as Renee's
words filtered through the door, torturing me like they tortured my father. I
grabbed at the comforter trying to pry it off me. I had to get to the next
room! But it tangled and choked me, harboring my attempts and preventing me
from saving anyone.
In my mind's eye, I picture Charlie's tired
face. He'd pulled his double shift at the station. Now he stands quietly watching
her wreck the room and grabs her bags. He looks at the shattered glass pieces
on the floor and bed, and wonders what he's done to displease her, what had
gone wrong. He looks confused; he looks angry; he looks heartbroken. Her words
shock and hurt him, all while he tries to tell her to keep her voice down lest
she wake me. I hear her curse our family to the depths of hell in return. Her
words kill him slowly as he looks on, saying nothing to stop her as she dispels
her troubles onto his tired soul.
Fear for my father gripped me tightly. No
one would protect him when I died. I needed to get to him.
Putting my all into my fight, I cried out
when I couldn't win the battle. I screamed desperately for someone to help him.
Jake! Sarah! Edward! Anyone to stop Renee! Tell her she's hurting him! Ask her
why she's doing this! To tell her to stop!
The familiar feel of blood started to seep
from my body. I'd reached the point when I was supposed to die; when I close my
dream eyes forever, just to wake up covered in the issues of reality. But it
was taking longer, I realized with dread, there was another change happening.
There was more copper on my tongue. My cheek
stung where she had struck me. Two conflicting images bombarding my mind. One
of a woman who nursed, nurtured and doted on a baby in front of a Christmas
tree and one of a woman who not only turned her back on her family but tried to
destroy them before she left.
But the dream was finding sick pleasure in
the pain it was causing. I could practically hear its silent message to me,
telling me to bear witness. And so I did. Forcing myself to see I watched as
she fled, leaving us behind; her tears hidden from us in the night.
Nothing is happening the way it's supposed
to, I wasn't dying this time. Something was dreadfully wrong. I scream in
horror. It's impossible but I feel it
when my wrist is cut open.
Before Edward could come, the unknown that I
had felt approaching since the start of this nightmare seized its opportunity,
knowing his arrival would save me. Every change lead to this moment. This, the
part where I would normally wake up, instead grew blurry.
Suddenly, I still.
An icy whisper runs down my neck, making my
spine crawl. Renee. I looked
sporadically into the darkness trying to find the source. I breathed in, a
wasted breath; somehow knowing these would be my last. I felt the blood trail
slower.
"Edward..."
It was no longer a question.
I knew it was him.
I couldn't see him but I could feel him,
cocooning and protective. There is safety in his mere proximity. He's a savior
in the dark, my hero in a villain, a shadow shrouding me in his safe darkness.
My mind slowed, the blood trickling down my
fingers stopped. This was the drastic switch, one that was fierce, standing out
so plainly it couldn't be ignored. It
scared me so irrevocably in my subconscious that I knew for certain the after
effects of it would haunt my reality.
The dream
didn't end and even with the help from my loved ones
in reality, I was in this one alone.
The blood that would normally slowly leak
back into my wound and heal me, as I was lifted higher and higher didn't.
Instead it froze, a result of two conflicting forces - one preventing my death,
the other predicting it - an impasse.
My eyes are tired and wary. I'm in that
limbo between dying and living. My head slants to the side listlessly and I
watch the door to my bedroom as it fades out until I'm standing on the porch
facing the front door.
This was impossible. I wanted out! I wanted
the dream to stop.
Time itself had stilled. An eerie silence
engulfed the void outside my front door giving way to a whisper, a haunting
call, a thrilling sense of dying from the inside. Renee…
A silhouette appeared with tear stained
cheeks. They shattered and broke, soundlessly falling from her dark familiar
eyes to her broken daughter. The glassy tears that normally slit my wrist
splintered and disintegrated against my shield, allowing nothing more to harm
me.
I could see
her… with her heart-shaped face, laugh lines at the corners of her dark, beaded
eyes as she stares, unmoving. I shut down.
For a fleeting moment, before I could
analyze anything important, I was just a girl, looking at her mother. A simple
pleasure that made my throat run dry because I didn't actually have it at all.
My head went into a tailspin, horrified.
Iciness shoots down my spine like someone just walked across my grave. It's a
cursed premonition of something that could change everything…
She could
see me…
My body convulsed violently. I heaved for
breath. My heart tore open with a fierce force, shooting acid into my gut. Oh
god, what was happening?
"Isabella."
A spoken word.
My name.
I gasped for air feeling like I was
drowning. The sound left her lips,
red and matted, dry from her blatant venom and hidden tears. It wrapped around
my name in a way that hurt and warmed at the same time. The first memory of my
mother speaking my name and it's a figment of my imagination. The irony is not
lost on me.
"What?"I speak, not even
comprehending what I'm doing as yet. The sound is dull and my eyes are sharp.
If I was asking her to repeat my name or what she had called my name for, I had
no idea, but I held my chin still while my insides quivered. I'd never let her
see the damage she caused.
"What are you doing?"
She responds. I gasp quietly, unable to
believe it. She could hear me. It was horrifyingly unsettling.
My ears strained to burn this voice to
memory lest it never be heard again. Her voice was soft and sweet without being
too much; it reminded me of Sarah's. Her eyes were a dead, tired pool of warmth
and yearning that belied her purely evil presence. I could feel the hate
rolling of her in waves.
"I don't owe you anything." I
don't answer her question. Shaking my head to try to clear it, I blink away the
wetness blurring her form before me. I wanted them to go away so I could keep
seeing her. I hated her. But the masochistic part of me wanted to relish this
moment, the closest I'd ever been to her that I could remember.
She sneers, a smirk of hate and mocking,
taunting, brutal… need? "It's a
nightmare. You never survive. Why do you come back?" she asks. Her eyes
look older on her young face. It's heavy and doesn't match her wicked presence
and the evil she exudes.
"Life's a nightmare. But I'm still
living." I shoot back defiantly, my brows furrowing. As long as I have a
choice, I will keep living.
"Living Bella?" she asks, her voice
a soft kiss in the unreal, icy air around us. "You're dying."A
scoff of hurt and cruelty… at her or me, I'm not sure, but her eyes are
winning. Her face is still unreadable, but the tears still slip down her
cheeks.
I don't get her.
I take a step forward. It's unintentional.
She mirrors it. We stop in sync.
"You hate me so much, why are you
crying?" I ignore the heaviness building up in my throat as I force out
the cutting words.
"You can draw blood from a rock,
baby," she breaths out. More tears spill. She speaks in such riddles, but
it's soft and I wonder of the truth behind the words, questioning the
sentiments. I scrutinize her. Wondering if she's talking about me or
herself?"Wounds you give yourself bleed the most." She whispers, throatily.
Another riddle. She tips her head forward, and I realize with unease she's
possibly speaking of us both. "Look at your hand, Bella."
My eyes flitter down to myself.
Blood.
It's not just my wrist, I'm covered in it. It sticks my hair to my head. It
lines my arm. I taste it on my tongue. It's
everywhere! Unmoving. It's frozen in place by the unseen
force shielding me.
My wide eyes dart back to Renee, wondering
where she fits in, if she fits in at all. Her tears are flowing faster. So are
mine. I cry and wail and stare at my body, covered in deep, dark crimson. I'm
scared out of my mind and I desperately want it to stop. My tears move with
hers, piercing and ripping me open. Wound after wound, until the shield isn't
enough to save me. The blood holds still but the wounds grow too rapidly. Every
sob from her mixes with my terrified ones until I know she's right. I'm dying.
The only difference is I don't know what's killing me anymore. I wonder,
fleetingly, if her tears are against me or for me.
"Living child," she whispers, in a
melody. Her near black eyes lock on my fast fading brown ones, filled with pain
and warmth, contradicting the menacing, patronizing smirk stretching across her
face. She sobs softly and sings, familiar and rich in ache, each word bringing
me closer to death. I struggle and she just watches, shaking her head slowly
from side to side. My eyes close as my life seeps out my body and I hear the
fleeting notes carry out in the emptiness. "Nightmares in the garden, a
garden full of roses, strawberry kisses, Angel breath whispers, sleep baby,
sleep..."
"Bella?"
~.~.~D&D chap12 cont~.~.~
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