Seer Of Dreams - Chapter One

by OceanEyes
  • June 26, 2012
  • Novel / Chapter
  • Action / Adventure · Romantic
  • Nano, 2011
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“Consider yourself warned Ms. Phantoma. You only have four days left on this earth, spend them wisely.”

My eyes pop open! My body coated in a layer of sweat, shaking violently. I have no idea why, it was a voice, only a voice.  How many of my dreams have come true already? At least the last ten. No, I cannot think like that, my mind cannot physically take my life. I try to put on a little music and go back to sleep, after about an hour of laying there in fear of my own subconscious I get up and walk into the kitchen. A glass of milk and then back to bed, I think.
So I drink the milk and it soothes my throat. I must have been screaming last night, wouldn't be surprising. I slowly get up out of the chair and walk back to the bed in a daze and collapse on top of it. I crawl under the warm covers and try to clear my mind so I can get some Zzzzz’s.
I have never lain bed like this before, absolutely still, wanting sleep so badly, but wide awake. After another half hour of laying in this bed staring at the same spot I decide that it isn’t going to do me any good. I stand up, and walk into the bathroom for a shower to clear my head. I jump as the cold water splashes against my hot skin, I just stand there for a while. Finally I regain my senses and lather up, rinse, and repeat. Maybe this will just be a sleepless night I decide feeling exactly the same as before,  I turn off the ice cold water and grab a towel from the rack. As I dry off I try to think of things a girl can do without waking anyone else in the household to get her mind off of things. The only thing I ever do when I’m stressed is vent, mostly on poor Axel, my little nerd (and best friend) he never seems to tire of listening to me. That’s what I’ll do, if I have to stay up all night he can as well. I walk over to get my phone and move to the back of my walk-in closet, it is the only place I found gives me real privacy from prying ears in the entire house. I dial his number. “What?” He says, obviously still in a sleeping state.
“Axel, wake up!” I shout as quietly as I can.
“It’s you. What do you need at 3 a.m.?” He asks me, slightly more aware of this conversation than before.
“I woke up a couple of hours ago, my body was coated in a layer of sticky sweat, I was screaming, and shaking. Do you have a minute?” I ask him, already knowing his answer.
“I have until time for school, go on. What was the dream about this time?” He says, hiding the concern in his voice well, for him.
“This one was nothing like the others, it was simply a voice. It’s exact words were: Consider yourself warned Ms. Phantoma. You only have four days left on this earth, spend them wisely.” I tell him.
“Where were you? Who gave the threat?” He asks in such a rush the words come out completely backwards.
“It was a man, but other than that I have no idea. I wasn’t really there, it was all black and the only thing I could hear was that loud, booming voice of his. Who ever he is, honestly I don’t know why it scared me so much.” I say, feeling a little weird being shaken this much by a voice.
“Mhmm... What have you been doing since?” He replies.
“I stared at the the same spot on the wall for over a half an hour wanting so desperately to go back to sleep, but fearing it just as much, if that tells you anything.” I tell him, shaking now.
“I see. I would suggest, like always we change topics. I was having a wonderful dream about being able morph my body into a bouncy-ball and squish people.” He says with a satisfied tone.
“Really?” I ask.
“No, but did you smile?” He asks me.
“A little.” I reply.
“That’s what I was going for. Anyway, what else has been happening at the Phantoma house lately?”Asks the guy who seems to be full of questions tonight.
“Nothing much, we watched soul surfer last night. It was actually pretty good, despite my fear and hatred of sharks.” I say, shaking a little less now that we are off the subject.
“Never seen it, can’t  say I have any desire to. Just out of curiosity, how many bags of popcorn did you guys put away in in less than two hours?” He asks with a sleepy laugh. Apparently my family eats way more popcorn than most others and my friend here gets a kick out of it.
“We didn’t eat more than three bags, thank you very much!” I say a little louder than I should have, hearing movement across the hall I quiet down to a whisper.
“Axel, I knew a conversation with you about popcorn would help me go to sleep, that's exactly why I called. I have to go, though. I’m afraid I’m going to wake my parents, that would be a nightmare but what’s even worse is that I’d have to tell them why I cannot possibly go back to sleep.” I tell him between yawns.
“Thank goodness, I need sleep you know. Why don’t you want to tell them?” He asks me.
“They would call me crazy and sign me up for a shrink somewhere, you know my mom always looking for the signs as she calls them. Hoping I won’t end up like my grandmother. You know I think she could use one herself but I gotta go. I hear her turning over in her bed. Thanks for bringing a smile to my face at 2 a.m. in the morning. Bye!” I say in a hushed tone and quickly hang up the phone before he can answer me, I hop into the bed, laying my phone on the nightstand so mom will see that I’m not using it in bed. I lay their and await her quiet foot steps across the hall way and into my room. She never does come, so maybe  I didn’t wake her completely. I think as I drift off to a thankfully dreamless sleep.

I wake up, lick my chapped lips and taste something awful on them. Must be drool, I think as I begin to get up to wash it off. I scream a little bit when, in the mirror I see puke all over my tee shirt and then the smell, the awful bitter smell reaches my nose. I feel tears welling up in my eyes, stress tears, the only kind that ever form. They make their way down my cheeks as I strip off my stained clothes, put them inside a dirty towel, and throw them into the laundry shoot. I then proceed to turn on the bathroom fan, hoping to the get rid of the dreadful stench, and step into the shower.

Day One

My eyes flutter open, I look around only to realize I have absolutely no idea where I am. Then I see my father’s face, asleep in a chair beside my bed. I am in the hospital, no doubt my mother’s doing. How did I get here though? The last thing I remember is scrubbing my face with the hot water in the shower, trying to get all the dried puke off. I wonder where she is? I do hate to do this but since she is gone this would be the perfect time to ask daddy what is going on, I’ll have to wake him.
“Dad? Daddy wake up!” I say as reach out for his arm, he is just about an inch away from my fingertips.
“DADDY WHERE AM I?” I say louder.
“What? Oh, Aislyn! Your awake. We are at Thomas Memorial, honey. Your mother found you unconscious this morning, lying in the shower. She wrapped you up and I carried you to the couch, thinking you had just overheated or something. You never came around so we brought you to the emergency room. It is 7 p.m., you have been unconscious for 12 hours-- at the least.” He explains.
“I have? What happened to me? Have they told you anything? Where’s my mother?” I ask.
“They haven’t figured out what went wrong just yet, your mom is out finding my dinner.” He says back.
While my dad mumbles on about doctor’s tests I drift back to sleep.

Day Two

I wake up screaming, pushing, kicking, trying to escape what I soon realize is nothing. I throw the remote against the wall in frustration, then my cup of water, then I shove the table on wheels across the room and it hits the door with a loud bang. On that note a bunch of nurses come in. One must have given me an immediate sedative, some hold me down until I pass out, I guess the others cleaned up my mess.

Day Three

This morning I wake up to my father’s smiling face. This day is going to be better, I want out of here so I have to show signs of improvement.
“Good morning Daddy.” I say with a forced smile.
“Morning, my love. How are you feeling?” He says back.
“A lot better!” I say with somewhat fake enthusiasm.
As I get up to go to the bathroom I trip over all the cords and land on the floor, flat on my face. I put my hands in front of me to push myself up and that's when I notice how sticky they are. Once again the smell of dried puke reaches my nostrils and the tears form in my eyes. My dad picks me up, and wipes off my face. Mom comes in to change my gown and she puts me back in bed and go back to sleep.

Day Four

I never wake up. On day four I am dead.
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IcyFlame
Review
IcyFlame wrote a review · Sat Jul 28, 2012 6:34 pm

Icy here for a review!
Firstly, I'd suggest separating your paragraphs by double spacing them. It makes it a whole lot more appealing and easier to read. It's a preference thing more than anything else. Just something to consider.

Onto the review!
My eyes pop open!
It's probably a personal preference of mine again, but I really don't like the use of exclamation marks. I sometimes use them too often myself, but I can see why they can seem annoying.. It’s just that exclamation marks can sometimes come across as a little bit cheesy and just don’t really work in specific scenes and situations. I've been told that unless it’s to portray a raised voice in dialogue, you should only ever have one exclamation mark in every chapter of a novel, if that.

Also, this sentence needs to either be connected to the next with an 'and' or the latter needs the word 'is' between 'body' and 'covered' to make it make sense.


get some Zzzzz’s. It sounds more professional just to say sleep or rest. Try not to use slang unless someone is talking or it's a diary entry. I wouldn't even use it in a diary entry, personally.

I think your first day moves too quickly here. If this is the first chapter we want to really get a feel for the characters. Especially this Axel character. I don't feel you do him justice. He's not there to fill space, make him meaningful . I know it can be tempting to skip things out because you want to get on with your story and you know the character well but you have to remember that the reader doesn't. The reader needs to get to know them. The MC too.

Having said that your pace is too fast I particularly like the end. I'm interested to see where you'll go with it.

- Icy.



If all pulled in one direction, the world would keel over.
— Yiddish proverb