Anchoridge University

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Darren’s POV:

“I knew it she had seen is back then!” “We’ll just have to be a little more careful from now on no biggie! Besides she didn’t seem 100% sure anyway.” I sighed. Well at least one us is confident.” I wonder what this thing is that she wants to check out.” “Who knows, at least she won’t be going alone so we know she’ll be safe.”” True.” She’d have Felix and me looking out for her, whatever she was up to. We had left the dining hall and were headed out to the woods surrounding the school. I turned to look at her. She was smiling and had a pep in her step so her curls were extra bouncy. She was adorable.

“So, what is this thing that you wanted to check out?” She hesitated looked like she was being careful with her words. “Well I’m not even sure if it’s really there or not.” “Huh?” I raised my eyebrow at her. “Explain.” She sighed and twiddled her thumbs. “Well I told you about that recurring nightmare of myself running through the woods and hiding in a cabin.” “Does she have prophetic dreams maybe?” I know Felix wanted me to question her more, but I didn’t want to press to much incase she decided to shut me out.

“So what does this nightmare have to do with what we’re doing in the woods now?” We had reached the tree line and she hesitated before taking a step in. “Well.” She sighed and turned to look up at me. “Promise you won’t think I’m crazy?” I was intrigued now and I could feel Felix’s anticipation as well. I held out my pinky to her. “Pinky promise.” She laughed a little and wrapped her small pinky around my own.

She took a deep breath in. “Ok so sometimes I have these dreams that come true, like when my friend broke her leg skiing or when my mom got in a car accident. Basically I just want to figure out if the woods from my dream is the one around the school…And to do that I need to figure out if that cabin is real or not.” I nodded my head. “I don’t think you’re crazy.” She sighed in relief, looked up at me and gave me a big smile that damn near stopped my heart. “Thank you!” “So it would seem we have a little prophetess on our hands after all.”

We had entered the woods by then, it was a beautiful day out. The sky was blue and it was warm outside. We followed the trail for a ways in before she suddenly stopped. “Everything ok?” She stood there for a minute before answering, she was examining something. She pushed some branches to the side and revealed another path. She looked up at me. “This looks familiar.” I raised my eyebrow at her. “You recognize it from your dream?” She nodded her head yes. “Lets go.” Before I could even say anything she took off down the small hidden path.

The path was so well hidden even I hadn’t noticed it. “She must have really good eyes.” “Yes she does, I didn’t even notice it.” The path was narrow so I had to walk behind her now as it wasn’t wide enough for us to walk side by side. We walked for a few minutes when the path took a sharp turn to the right. She quickly followed it picking up the pace a little bit. We walked for maybe another 10 minutes when we came to what looked like the end of the path.

It was blocked by some more large branches that she pushed aside to reveal a small clearing with low and behold a cabin.

Celeste POV:

I got to the end of the path that was blocked by some more tree branches. I quickly pushed them aside and took a step forward. Before me was a small clearing with the cabin! I couldn’t believe it I felt my heart drop. My nightmares were real. I heard Darren come out from behind me. “Is this it? The cabin?” I looked up at him, I was speechless all I could do was nod my head yes. I took a shaky deep breath. I slowly started walking towards the cabin.

I had to touch it to be sure it was real, that I wasn’t just seeing things. I got to the cabin door and reached for the handle. My heart was racing and my hand was shaky. It felt like I was back in the dream all over again. I took a deep breath and released it as a slowly turned the handle opening the door. The cabin looked exactly as it had from my dreams. The was a small chair sitting in one corner with a table next to it. And on the other side there was a cot with a few boxes next to it. One of the windows was cracked and everything was covered in a thick layer of dust. It looked like no one had been here for sometime.

Darren stood there watching me silently as if he was studying my reaction. “Are you ok?” He asked me. I sat down on the cot. “This means my dream wasn’t just a dream.” I wrapped my arms around myself. “Someone was chasing me here. I don’t know who and I don’t know why. But I intend to figure it out.” He sat down next to me on the cot. He hesitated but he wrapped his arm around me to comfort me. He was so warm, it felt nice. I let out a sigh and rested my head on his shoulder. “Thank you for coming with me.”

He gave my shoulder a squeeze. “It’s no problem at all. Do you have any ideas how to figure out who’s been chasing you in your dreams?” I lifted my head and looked up at him. “Honestly, I have no idea. But how about we start by looking through these boxes” I gestured to the boxes to the right of me. He nodded his head releasing me. “Sounds like a good idea to me.”

We went through the boxes and didn’t find anything of significance. Mainly just some camping supplies. A small hatchet, some rope, a blanket, and a tarp. I let out a sigh. “Well that was no help.” I looked outside and realized we had been gone at least a couple of hours now. “We should probably head back, I’ve had a long night and would like to get a nice long nap in.” He nodded at me. “Alright I’ll walk you back to your dorm.” We made our way out of the woods mostly in silence. I couldn’t stop thinking about my dream and what it meant now that I knew that the cabin was real.

Who was after me? And what did they want? Before I knew it we were back to the dorms. Darren walked me up to my room and surprising even myself I turned and gave him a hug. He hesitated at first but he quickly hugged me back and gave me a big squeeze. I stepped back and looked down, now embarrassed. “Um thank you again for coming with me today.” I tucked my a curl behind my ear and looked up at him. “I’ll see you at the party tonight?” He gave me a nod before he walked away. “Count on it.”