Intense relief rushed over me when I saw who was standing in the door frame of my room. His figure swallowed into the darkness, I squinted through my tears and rose into a sitting position on my soft quilt. I brushed my brown hair from my face, which only minutes before had been dripping with cold sweat.
I shivered although the room wasn't cold, I could feel the heat from the radiator wrapping around me but it didn't warm my skin.
My pulse rate slid back to normality and my breathing was no longer restricted. He moved towards me, through the clutter of my room.
Eventually, he reached the side of my bed and knelt down to take my shaking hand.
We sat in silence. No words needed to be said. We both knew what the other was thinking.
I felt my eyes well up with tears as I thought this. He was so far from understanding but so close to knowing how I felt.
I wanted him close, to comfort me but I also wanted to be alone at the same time.
I wanted to share my thoughts with him, as well as dwell upon them alone.
After a while of awkward silence I opened my mouth to speak, but he was a step ahead of me.
"I need you to..." He began, his eyes fixed on me.
"tell you what I saw?" I finished for him. We had been down this road many times before.
"Yes." He answered softly, removing his hand from mine.
I closed my eyes and tightened my grip on my bedsheets. This one had been the worst yet, I could still see the scene inside my head, playing back like an old black and white movie, the images flashing behind my eyelids causing me to remember all of the horrible events that had happened years ago.
My eyes snapped open.
"I can't." I breathed heaviliy, not wanting to look at him.
I avoided his watery eyed gaze and crossed my arms in a defensive way.
"I can't help you unless you help me first." He whispered calmly.
He turned his blonde head to look out of the uncurtained window where the full moon hung above the gnarled trees.
"I'm not an object in an experiment." I hissed, also turning to stare at the moon.
It cast soft rays on my face making my porcelain skin even more ghostly white.
"You know that I don't see you as that." He replied softly before sighing.
"I can try to prevent those dreams of yours Sadie;"
I felt anger rise inside me like a snake ready to strike.
"dreams!" I repeated in a shrill voice.
"How can you call these dreams." I knew my sentence was dripping with sarcasm but I didn't care. I felt alien to him and I felt so alone. If I was being childish I didn't care at the time.
"Ok, Sadie, Ok." He nodded getting up.
He began to cross the room again.
I slid off my bed into a standing position.
"Where... where are you going?" I stammered, standing there like a vulnerable child in nothing but a black silk nightdress my mother had given to me when I turned sixteen.
"To bed." He answered shortly. He stopped at the door and turned to face me.
"There's nothing more I can do." He shrugged before turning his back on my once again.
"And that's it?" I whispered, I knew he had heard me because he hesitated at the foot of the staircase.
"You won't even finish the battle you started."
"I never started a battle, Sadie." He answered softly.
"It was your own doing." And with that he descended the stairs.
I watched him go with a sinking feeling in my heart.
He had given up on me like many others who had tried to help me.
I had pushed him away for too long. Allowing him to get too close and then ruining it by closing up again. I decided to go after him but as I reached the top of the staircase a pain seared through my body and I collapsed in the hallway. Images flickered before me and before I knew it I found myself reliving the memories of many years ago.
