The Nightmare

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My heavy breaths caught in my throat as deep, rumbling thunder almost drowned out the high-pitched, piercing screams filling my ears. Lightning flashed down around me, knocking people to the ground and casting shadows in the red light. Disoriented, I tried to take in the red sky and chaos around me. Everyone around me was running and pushing each other to the ground. Unable to think straight, it took me a moment to realise that I was running too. Trying to block out the haunting screams around me, I kept pushing my feet forward, one foot in front of the other. I could see tears falling on my blue shirt and bloodstains splattered up my jeans. I didn't know where they had come from. Was I bleeding? No, it was from the puddles of blood on the floor. Suddenly, reality came crashing down alongside the lightning as I fell to my knees in horror. Thick, sticky, red liquid rested in pools along the tree-lined path as far as the eye could see.

"A-Ava?" I heard a shaky voice stutter my name. As everyone around me kept running and trampling over me, I slowly turned my head whilst trembling. How did they know my name?

"Kat!" I screamed louder when I saw her, lying still on the floor. It was only then that I realised I had already been wailing this entire time, alongside everybody else. "Kat. Kat, what happened?"

"Run."

"No, no I won't leave you here. I don't even know what's happening but I'm not leaving without you," I cried, soaking her red-stained blonde hair with my tears.

"Run. Before it gets you," she whispered in a fading voice.

"It? What do you mean by it?"

"Run," she croaked, and I watched the life leave her eyes. Their emerald colour faded to a dull, lifeless green in my mind.

With no idea what else to do, I pushed myself to my feet and ran. I ran like my life depended on it. Which it did, I was assuming. Filled with confusion, helplessness and panic, I kept pushing forwards and ignored the ringing in my ears. I didn't flinch when the sleeve of my shirt tore off on a tree branch, and I hardly paused for a second to drag myself back up when I slipped on another patch of red. Refusing to let myself think about what it was, I didn't falter and kept my mind focused on surviving. Because I needed to survive. I didn't know why, because I knew that I would never live again. Not after what I had just seen. Not after who I had just seen in her last moments. I just knew that I had to run to survive.

My heavy breaths caught in my throat as deep, thundering heartbeats almost drowned out the high-pitched, piercing ringing filling my ears.

Frantically throwing my hands at the air around me and thrashing around wildly, I breathed a heavy sigh of relief as my eyes adjusted to the light and I realised that I was in my bedroom. My panting quickly slowed to deep, heavy drags of air that burned my lungs. It was just a dream, it was just a dream, it was just-

“Ugh, are you still not ready? We’re gonna be late,” my best friend, Kat, stormed into my room, her voice fading when she saw that I wasn’t even out of bed yet. “Dammit, Ava, get up!”

Dodging to avoid the pillow being thrown at my face, I laughed hysterically with relief and began my usual daily routine before school. After twenty minutes, we were out of the house and walking to school along the same tree-lined path, this time bathed in sunlight. Just a dream, just a dream.

"You okay? You're being really weird," Kat asked.

"Weird how? Aren't I always weird?" I laughed tensely.

"Yeah, but you're quieter than normal today. And you're like, I dunno, on edge or something."

"I'm fine, really, I just, uh, had a bad dream," I admitted, feeling like a helpless child. She turned around to face me and her hair glimmered in the warm light.

“Hey, what, what happened to your hair?” My voice trembled as I noticed the red streaking through the tips of her golden hair that I had been too busy to notice this morning.

“I dyed it,” her voice faltered sadly, “do you not like it?” she asked in a disappointed whisper, looking heartbroken.

“No, no, I love it,” I reassured.

Stopping in my tracks, I felt my knees start to buckle beneath me as I noticed something opposite me. Fighting just to stand upright, I took a trembling, shaky step forward. Hanging from a bush devoid of leaves opposite, a scrap of blue fabric swayed in the wind, taunting me. Looking down at my t-shirt, I saw a patch of bare flesh glaring at me through a hole in my sleeve. A hole the same size that I remembered losing last night in my dream. And perfectly suited to the patch dangling from the tree in front of me.

“What’s wrong?” Kat asked, but all I could focus on was that scrap of blue fabric over her shoulder. Just a dream, just a dream, just a dream.

Blinded by grief and guilt and trauma, all my thoughts and memories seemed to leave my mind and I couldn’t think. I was in a state of total hysteria.

I screamed. She ran.

And that was when it started.

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