IceShine

XI

The next morning, I get up and try to not fall on the ground, because of a throbbing pain in my head. Yesterday night, I slept only 2 hours, because I was thinking of my whole conversation with Greghory before he left.

One second, I think it’s only fair to tell them everything. The next I change my mind, and think that my silence will protect them. With all these thoughts on my head, how could I get even a wink of sleep?

At least, that meant no nightmares, so that’s something I guess…

I move to the bathroom, to take a shower. When I get out, I let my hair free and my eyes fall on my form on the mirror opposite the door of the bathtub. I stare at the mirror, and watch my reflection. A pale girl, with long hair, and heterochromic eyes, with dark circles under them.

I stay there totally n***d and cold until I hear a knock on my door. I sigh, take a towel and wrap it around myself. While getting out of the bathroom, I say:

“Who is it?”

“It’s me…”

John’s voice outside my door surprises me. It’s still 40 minutes away from breakfast time.

“Can I come in?”

Then I realize my very n***d form underneath my towel. I freak out and hurry to the closet, while saying aloud.

“Give me a moment!”

I just can’t understand what happens to me, when he is involved in anything. My heart starts beating faster and my hands become more and more moist. Not to mention the heat that rushes to my cheeks. But, right now, I don’t have time to think of that!

Quickly, I pull on my underwear, put some shorts and a tank top and hurry to the door. When I open the door, John is there with one of his hands on the door-frame. There it is again… the faster beating of my heart.

He gives me one of his crooked smiles and straightens up.

“Good morning…”

“Good morning to you too… Why are you here so early?”

I try to stop my voice from trembling by the rush of things, but if I understand correctly by his, now, ironic smile, he heard just right!

“I wanted to talk to you… if that’s okay with you…”

“Oh yeah… Of course… Come in.”

He gets inside and looks around. Then he spots the towel on top of the bed and turns to look at me, the ironic smile still on his face.

“Did I interrupt you from something?”

Ha! He has a nerve… I give him a sly smile.

“If you believe that knocking at just the time I got out of the shower is interrupting something, then be my guest!”

He gives me a wry laugh and sits on the office chair. I go and sit at the end of my bed, while trying to maintain a good distance from him.

For the next 1 or so minute, he just looks at me, without even blinking! How does he do that? His gaze makes me feel kind of uncomfortable, but I cant help looking at him straight in the eye.

“So, what was it you wanted to tell me?”

He seems to get out of his daze, and FINALLY blinks. I was starting to worry he became a wax figure. Then his eyes turn harder, even cold. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen him like that, in the time that I live here.

“I told you something yesterday…”

I look at him quizically…

“I mean before we got into training… That I had a feeling you were hiding something, but I let it go, because you told me everything is fine…”

Ah, yeah… Despite myself, I remember the way his hand touched me. The way his worried eyes looked at me… and the way his voice spoke, whispering, words of worry and consideration.

“But I’m not sure, you were saying the truth…”

I look at him curious… I believed that I completely fooled him, but I guess I was wrong.

“And no, it’s not because of our conversation that I understood something was up…”

My eyes got bigger in surprise and he just sighed.

“You really are a great actor you know… If Greghory wasn’t looking at you, like he was worried about something I wouldn’t have understood a thing…”

I sigh giving out a bitter laugh…

“Sometimes, you really are too intuitive for your own good…”

He clears his throat and leans forward putting his elbows on his knees.

“So, I was worried… and I did something that I really am not proud of…”

He looks me in the eyes and understanding dawns on me… I get up abruptly and look at him bewildered.

“You listened in on our conversation?”

My voice was at least three tones louder than the tone I usually speak in. John doesn’t try to hide and he continues to look at me in the eyes.

“Yes.”

His voice was firm… Not an ounce of guilt in his voice or eyes. I start pacing up and down on the room, trying to calm down my nerves… My anger is not a very good idea… especially not now inside the house. My powers can get out of control easily when I’m not in control of my feelings. I start breathing in and out, trying to stay calm.

John stays in his seat and gives me the time I need, to calm down without saying anything. When I stop I turn to face him, to see that his eyes were glued to me… They didn’t move even once.

I sigh and put a hand in my forehead.

“How much did you hear?”

“Enough to understand, that you have really strange nightmares, where the ancestor of the human Magician forces you to see things you don’t want to, that he’s the one that sends the Shadow Monsters to weaken you, that you’re really scared, and most important of all, that you lied to me when you said you were fine…”

I sit down on the bed and bring my hands on my face exhaling hard… he must have been at the door… I was not exactly speaking low while I was saying these things to Greghory. I feel him get up from the chair and sitting down beside me. He puts a hand on my back.

“And finally, I understood that you did not say anything to us about it, because you were afraid we would not be able to handle it… And our powers would get out of control…”

I open my eyes wide. His voice sounded very calm and easing on my ears. I slowly lifted my head and turned to look at him.

“You thought we could not handle the tension…”

I can only nod in response.

“I’m sorry…”

He smiles at me.

“Don’t worry about it… The only thing that made me angry, was that you told you were fine, when you were not! I wouldn’t have forced you to tell me the reason.”

Only when he hugs me, I feel the tears in my eyes fall down my cheeks. I put my arms around him and bury my face in his neck.

“I’m sorry…”

“Shh… everything is going to be all right…”

…

After a good five minutes, I finally stop crying. I try to get away from him, but he holds me to him, firmly.

“John, thank you… I’m better now…”

He slowly brings his face up to look at me.

“Are you sure?”

He seems worried again. I give him a knowing, reassuring smile. But this time, it’s real.

“I’m sure…”

At this, he relaxed under my arms and slowly starts to distance his arms from me, but still keeping me close to him.

“Now, I really want you to tell me… How bad are the nightmares?”

He may have let me go, but he still held on my arm. Tightly. As if he was afraid that I would again seclude myself. I look him in the eyes and let out a bitter laugh.

“Depends on what you count as bad… Some nights, it’s just unbearable so that even stopping myself from trembling out of fear is difficult…”

I feel his hand tighten its hold on mine. But not in a painful way. It’s gentle, even if it seems like a contradiction…

“And when did they start?”

“A week before my parents’ death…”

I take a deep breath, to calm the tears that made their way on my eyes before continuing.

“I woke up screaming at night. I saw my parents, hanged from a tree, both already dead. Then a shadow emerged behind me, and whispered in my ear, that I will be the next one.”

I don’t look at John, but I understand by the way his hand leaves mine, only to put in around my shoulders and replace it with his other hand. This time I take old of it, and clutch it, before I continue.

“I woke up, by my father shaking me awake. My mom was just behind him, looking worriedly at me. I’m sure she was scared…”

I force out a small laugh.

“Then next night, the same thing happened. Only this time, they weren’t hanged… they were decapitated by guillotine… The next day, they died via electrocution… and the same thing went on and on and on…”

I turn to look John in the eyes. Still holding my tears, not daring letting them fall down my cheeks.

“Every time I saw them die in front of me, the same voice said the same thing in my ears… and every day I felt like I died a little more on the inside.”

John still has a stoic look on his face. But I know he understands what I’m telling him because he holds me a little closer. I return my gaze to our hands and a tear falls from my eye.

“My father thought that it was just some bad dreams. He was afraid that he was putting me through too much for my age, and that training me from childhood had very bad effects on me. But I knew… It wasn’t that… I didn’t know at the time, but… I felt that something bad was going to happen.”

I stop, bring my free hand and wipe my tear away.

“That day, I had school, but I finished early. When I came back home, I called out to my parents, but they weren’t home. I thought they were just at work. For some reason that day I was extremely tired, so I decided to sleep a little before lunch. They should have been home by then.”

I turn to look at John.

“I saw the same nightmare again. But this time it was different. Yes… different… It didn’t begin with them already dead… It began with me standing at the side of some road of sorts. I saw my parents in our car. They were talking and laughing. Then, a car came out of nowhere and smashed the car and my parents. No, it wasn’t an actual car… It was a Shadow Monster in the form of a car.”

John’s eyes widen, his stoic mask falling. Then I start to cry hard again. He brings my face in his shoulder and brush his hand to my arm.

“Then the scene before me vanished and darkness surrounded me. The same voice that was always talking to me, came again, and said: ‘I told you… You will be the next one… And, like your parents’ death, you will see it, every day, every night that you fall asleep… And I’ll always be here reminding you so.’… After that I gasped awake. I thought that like all the other times, it was just a bad dream… nothing more, nothing less… just a bad dream. And then, the phone started ringing… and you know the rest of the story…”

By this time, I don’t know how he could understand me in between the sobs. But I know he heard me because of the way he treats me. He continues holding me in his arms and gently brushing my arm up and down in a try to calm me down. The hand that was holding mine in my lap, lets go and goes to grasp a tissue from my desk, and he gives it to me.

I take it gratefully and wipe my tears, without bringing my head up from his shoulder. After some time, I slowly start to detach myself from his arm, and continue wiping my tears. He brings his fingers under my chin and brings my face up, so as to look directly in his eyes. He wipes the remnants of my tears with his hands and looks me in the eyes.

“Tell me… these nightmares… that you have now… also include me and Miranda?”

I widen my eyes and take some distance from him.

“No… No… Of course not! If that were the case, I would already be out of here!”

His look turn stern.

“You won’t leave from this house, even when and IF you start seeing nightmares like this. From what I understand, you have these nightmares for almost three months. Right?”

I can only nod my head in response…

“Okay… So that means, that he’s changing his strategy and he wants something from you, before killing you…”

“Or he could be playing the cat and mouse game with you!”

I turn my head quickly towards my door to see it half open, and Miranda seated just outside of it.

“When the hell did you come here?”

John asks astounded, as Miranda gets up and comes inside the room and CLOSING the door behind here.

“Dear brother, three things… First, don’t ever think that I don’t know what happens in every little nook in this house, so when you got out of your room, I followed you. Second, I knew something was up with you both and yes, I was right, so don’t you dare make me the bad one here, when all I did was worry for both of you. And third, next time you want to have such important discussions, make sure that the door is properly closed.”

I bring my hands on my face, still in John’s arms.

“How much did you hear?”

“How about everything!”

I feel her coming down on her knees in front of me.

“I know you’re afraid… We are too. But we’re going to do this together. Also, it’s not like, it’s only us three… We have Greghory and the other girl. We can do it and we will do it.”

She takes my hands in hers.

“It doesn’t matter who he wants to kill because this time we will not let him. This time, you’re not alone. So, let him bring you nightmares every night. We will be there when the sun is up and you won’t have to worry about us. Because, unlike your parents, we will wait for him. And this time… it will be him, on his knees, asking for forgiveness before you tear him apart!”