Shadowed Dreams & Rippled Water

Alternative Reality

Chapter 11

Alternative Reality

It was Friday, and it had been a week since Stacey was admitted to the hospital with a virus. The doctors were still investigating what type of virus it was, but it was resistant to antibiotics. She was bedridden with a high fever that they couldn’t bring down, but she was conscious. Mum stayed by her side constantly, leaving Valery and Malcolm responsible for everything at home. This included driving me to and from school and assisting with household chores. Valery followed me around the house like a constant, suffocating shadow.

After school, I raced out of Valery’s car and ran to my bedroom, finding the tears I had cried most of the day had drained my energy. I attempted to do homework, but my mind continued to go back to how Stacey had looked before she was taken to hospital and how weak she had looked Wednesday when I visited her after school.

Dean came home early from work to check on me, as he had been all week. He brought cakes from the restaurant and entertained me with a story about his friend, Adam Fuller, who had his first brush with the police that morning. I was thankful he did.

A little while later, after Dean had gone to the hospital to see Stacey and a cold night had descended over the house, Kane stuck his head in the room, dangling a bag of red liquorice straps in front of him.

“I brought these for you…” He said, tossing them to me.

I fumbled to catch them but dropped them on my bed. Red liquorice spilled over my schoolbooks and bed covers.

“Thank Kane…” I sighed, gathering them up.

“Anytime…” He said, walking away.

Of course, I didn’t expect to see Dylan. He was either at the hospital with Stacey or at work, avoiding the house and me.

Chewing on the liquorice, I stared at my schoolbooks, blankly reading over my English assignment. When I could no longer handle the words staring back at me, I slammed the books shut and headed downstairs. I needed to hear a friendly voice, and Lorrie was the right friend for the job.

In the living room, I headed for the cordless phone on a table beside Dad’s old recliner. Mum bought it a year ago but resigned to using her mobile instead. I was still months away from having a mobile of my own once I turned eighteen.

My breath skipped as I dropped into Dad’s chair, inhaling the scent of sawdust. I ran my hands over the cracked leather arms, reached for the phone and dialled Lorrie’s number—which I knew by heart.

“Lucy!” Lorrie screeched as she answered. “I was just thinking about you… How are you? Any news from Stacey?”

“Dean’s gone to see her…” I said, rubbing my ear. “I’ll know more later…”

“I’m thinking about her…” She added. Her sweet voice was like music to my ears. “And you… How are you holding up?”

“I can’t focus on my English homework,” I admitted, standing. I started walking back towards the stairs. “It’s all a jumble of letters that makes no sense right now.”

“You’re under a lot of stress…” she sighed deeply. “I wouldn’t be surprised you couldn’t concentrate.”

In my room, I sat on my bed and spoke with Lorrie for two straight hours. By the time I hung up, my jaw was aching from yawning so much. I desperately needed sleep.

“Lucy, would you like a hot drink?” Valery asked, peeking through my half-opened door.

“No, please go away,” I replied, turning my back to her.

It was rude, and I knew I had upset her, but I was tired and wanted to be alone. As it was, I had tried my hardest to avoid her. Whenever she could, she would find a way to irritate me with her snobby remarks—Stop frowning... Frowning causes wrinkles… Stop rolling your eyes…. Stand straight and stop slouching… Lucy, tears are like acid on fair skin like yours. Wipe them away.

Not once did she cry or tell me it was expected to cry. Everything she did and said was to stop me from mourning because—Young ladies need to stay strong. Tears are a sign of weakness.

Without speaking, Valery left my room. I switched off my lamp and lay on my back, staring at the ceiling. As tired as I was, sleep evaded me. For hours, I tossed and turned, attempting to fight off the image of Stacey’s withering body so I could sleep.

***

It was torture to open my eyes, swollen and glued shut by sticky, clustered sleep. My head swam. I wiped away the sleep, and four blinding white walls came into focus, so bright I had to shield my face from the view. This was no ordinary, the kind of sharp light as distracting as sunlight reflected off the cross hanging from the rear-vision mirror in Mum’s car.

Squinting, I stumbled to my knees and felt my way around the floor, feeling cool tiles against my fingertips. The air was odd—between thick and thin, but not exactly what I had come to know as normal and effortless to breathe, with a hint of sweetness. I reached a wall. Instead of brick or wood, I found what could only be described as silk. I patted the wall, then caressed it. They were surprisingly tougher and smoother than anything I had ever felt before.

What was going on? Where was I? My thoughts rebounded around my head.

“Hello?” I called out in a voice that sounded foreign in the unusual air.

I clambered to my feet and patted my way around, searching for a door or any way out, but the room was endless. Panic bubbled in the pit of my stomach. I was trapped. A panic began to build, staring in my stomach and swelling up my chest. With each second, it grew increasingly difficult to breathe.

“Someone, help me, please,” I pleaded. “Anyone?”

There was no reply.

With all my strength, I sucked in a tightening breath and pounded my fists against the walls until they throbbed, bruising the skin across my knuckles. The blood under my skin pulsed and writhed.

I held my hand against my chest and hissed through clenched teeth. “Ow, this can’t be a dream.” This was a dream… Wasn’t it? And this was silk… But the pain was there—it was real.

Every inch of me grew weaker until I collapsed against the wall, drained and unable to continue. A vice-like grip squeezed my chest. “Someone help me. I can’t breathe. I want to go home!”

Slowly, the air thickened, my eyelids grew heavy, and my breaths became fewer. All I longed to do was curl up and sleep. Yawning, I buried my head in my arms. After a few dragged-out seconds, sleep won out.

“Wake up, my darling, don’t give in…”

A voice woke me. I lifted my weary head to find a small archway had been carved into a nearby wall. Beyond the narrow doorway, a strange room curved around a rippling, murky grey river. From here, it appeared to be the inside of some globe-like building.

“Help... please…” I pleaded. A fresh, soothing breeze drifted in from the other room, beckoning me forward. I sniffed the air, catching a hint of wood and sawdust. “Dad?”

I crawled on all fours through the child-size door until the frigid river swept over my hands. “What is going on? Where am I?”

I skimmed my fingers through the strange water. It didn’t run between my fingers like water usually did—it was thick, gluggy, and metallic, more like liquid iron. I raised my hands and watched in amazement as it transformed into a kaleidoscope of blues, greens, silvers, golds and greys.

Chewing on my bottom lip, I shook the liquid from my hands and skimmed the room. The edge of the river coasted around me, lapping against the outside of the white room. I glanced up as lightning zapped and coiled silently through a veil of storm clouds across the dome-like sky. I had never known a ceiling as astounding yet terrifying as this. In the distance, tiny streaks of beige light broke through the dense fog, dancing across the distant walls.

“Where am I?” My voice crackled through the distorted air around me. “Is anybody here? Dad?”

I shuffled my first few steps forward, the river rippling around my ankles. “What am I doing here? Hello? Please, can someone help me?”

“Lucy, my dear sweet child.” The haunting voice startled me, making my heart race. “Lucy...”

“Dad?” I gasped, trembling, and edged towards the door. “Dad…?”

“Sweet child, please don’t be afraid…”

“Dad?” I clapped my hands over my mouth so I wouldn’t scream. “Not possible... it can’t be...”

“Yes, my darling…” he replied softly and hauntingly. “My body is gone, but my spirit lives in here…”

I studied the dome room, searching everywhere for Dad. I stepped back until something warm brushed against my shoulder. I whipped around and came face to face with the white walls. “Where are you...?”

A tug at my chest urged me back into the river. Before my very eyes, the strange water transformed into turquoise blue.

“D–Dad,” I swallowed, my heart sinking to the bottom of my chest. “Dad, where are you?”

There was no reply. I began to doubt the reality of what I had heard.

“Dad, if that was you, please say something. I’m terrified.” I collapsed to my knees. Beads of the blue liquid splashed over my face and through my hair.

A livid spark of electricity pulsated through the sky, branching off in different directions. A misty shadow rose from the river before me, flickering in static waves until a solid human figure materialised. Around it, the water changed, dancing in swirls of maroon.

“Don’t be afraid, my sweet child.”

It was Dad’s voice urging me to my feet. The figure moved closer, rippling through the river, and Dad’s face started to clear through the shadow.

I reached for him, my chest about ready to explode with sorrow, joy, and a mixture of every emotion in between. When our fingers touched, his face smiled lovingly back.

“It is you!”

He smiled at me, his bright blue eyes dissolving away my fears.

“Dad!” I cried as I stroked his blonde hair, poked his cheeks and squeezed his arms. I need to feel him—to know he was there. “It is you. How is this possible?”

“My beautiful Lucy,” he said, holding my hand against his face and sinking into it. “Don’t be afraid of this place... You have been here before.”

“How... When?” I asked between sobs. “I don’t remember this place...”

He was warm—alive, his chest rising and falling with every breath. As I stroked the side of his face, the world around me devolved away momentarily, and it was him and me.

“I don’t understand how this is possible…” I sniffled.

Suddenly, a coolness enveloped my hands as Dad began to fade away.

“No, don’t go!” I shouted, grabbing at his arms. “Don’t leave me...”

He was gone in a haze of white, leaving fragments of dust floating in the air.

“Come back.” I ran through the room, my feet hitting the water with such force that it sent tingles up my legs. “Dad, don’t leave me! Please, come back!”

No matter where I started, I was back at the narrow doorway to the white room. Every muscle ached, throbbing as though I had run for days.

I wiped away tears, and the room began to change. The shift of walls and floors was so quick I blinked, and a hospital began to take shape, turning the floor into pale green linoleum. The room calmed, and a shadow moved beyond the hospital room doorway.

“Who’s there?” I called. “Hello...?”

I stepped into the room and was overtaken by the scent of eucalyptus disinfectant. As Dad had done, everything flickered with grey static.

“Hello? Dad?”

The unmistakable rustle of bed sheets came from behind a dull curtain in the middle of the room. Carefully, I slid it across. Stacey’s tiny body was lying motionless on a bed, hooked to monitors. A straight line blinked across a black screen. I almost fainted at the sight but caught myself against the doorframe.

“Stacey!” I shrieked.

Once I found my footing, I ran to her side and tried to hold her against me. But each time I did, my hands slipped through her. I tried again and failed. Stacey had become a ghost.

“What’s going on?” Tears fell from my eyes. “Wake up my Sissy, please! I beg you... please wake up!”

She didn’t move.

“No! No!” I collapsed to my knees. “Stacey…”

“Lucy, wake up, you’re dreaming…”