by Nour Zikra
Devin. I could picture the blonde from his Facebook photos. At every second of my day, images of them bombarded my brain. All I saw was blond hair covering Devin’s face as they kissed while she straddled him, blond hair floating over his bed, blond hair moving over his chest when she trailed kisses down his body. I didn’t know how to get the nightmare out of my brain, how to tuck it away and pretend that it didn’t exist.
That was the secret Lizzy and the rest of my friends didn’t know. For the past week, I’d faked a happy face in front of them only to go to my room later and cry myself to sleep. How could I tell them that Devin, who had been with me for two years, broke up with me out of the blue? How could I tell them I suspected he cheated on me?
My brother was the only one I really cared to be with and talk to about this. He wouldn’t push me with questions.
I raced through the short ten-minute drive to Saint Vincent College, my brother’s school. Faint light illuminated the road. I passed by acres of cornfields, the corn leaves pale and short with the fall season, then turned right onto Beatty County Road. Eastern white pine trees stood guard on either side of the street.
Inescapable in its grandness, Saint Vincent Basilica loomed in the distance. Even when the road curved, the basilica remained the center of attention, as if the tranquil trees were guiding any passersby toward the house of worship.
Within a few minutes, I had Lucy parked under a shaded area next to Saint Benedict Hall and was walking over to the building’s entrance with my duffle bag in hand. I texted Reed to come downstairs and open the door for me, since I couldn’t enter without a student ID.
When he emerged from the main doors, he flashed his old childish grin that made the corners of his eyes crinkle. Even though he was my baby brother by three years, he threw his arms around me and lifted me into the air as if I were the younger one. He was wearing his favorite navy-blue sweatshirt, the same one he’d had since high school; it smelled like fresh, clean laundry.
Reed was my half brother. We shared the same mother. Unfortunately, we had no idea who either of our fathers were. Though we did know we were both the products of one-night stands.
After putting me down, Reed touched his ID to the sensor by the door and pulled me into the building, taking my bag from me. “You only visit when you need something. But it’s okay, I forgive you.” The big smile remained on his face. “I’ve really missed you.”
I smiled back and pulled him in for another hug while we waited for the elevator to reach the lobby. “I’ve missed you too.”
In just a few minutes, we had reached the third floor and turned the corner down the hall from the elevator. We entered Pod F, where Reed’s dorm room was located. He peeked in, scoping the place, before gesturing for me to follow. A moldy smell hit me as we walked into the heated common area.
Within the pod were eight dorms, four on the right wall and another four on the left, all parallel to one another. In the middle of the pod was a shared living space with a dull brown sofa, wooden chairs, a wooden table, a big-screen TV mounted to the wall, an Xbox, and a stereo. There were two community bathrooms, one by the entrance and one on the far end of the pod right behind the living space.
One guy slumped on the sofa with headphones in his ears, his eyes closed. I could hear a low beat coming from his direction. We walked past without him noticing.
The TV was on, but no one was watching. The news anchor of the local Latrobe channel spoke as graphic images of a wreckage played. I slowed down to listen.
“This morning in Syria, fighter jets bombed the University of Aleppo. At least eighty-two people, most of them faculty and students, are dead, and many more are injured.”
What’s new? I shook my head.
Reed’s room was the last one on the right. While he was unlocking his door, the bathroom door flew open and a tall guy with sandy blond hair and light freckles stepped out and paused to study me. He had a young face. His eyes narrowed, then he cocked his head and smirked. “Aren’t you that girl Reed snuck in last semester?”
Reed rolled his eyes. “Shut it, Sam. This is my sister.” He got the door open and yanked me in. Though before he closed the door again, he stuck his head out and, grinning, said, “Come near her and I’ll tell everyone how you’ve already wet your bed seven times in the year we’ve known each other.”
I caught a glimpse of Sam blushing as Reed slammed the door.
“Woah, that poor guy,” I said. “I guess I taught you well.”
Reed sank onto his bed and frowned, dropping my duffle bag beside him. He kept his eyes fixed on the Avenged Sevenfold poster taped to the wall across from him above the second bed in the room and said, “Addy, you won’t tell Erica I sneak girls in, right?”
Erica, our mother, was someone I hadn’t spoken to in a long time. “Nah, I won’t tell her.”
A Swiss Army knife lay on the bed beside him. He moved it out of my way so I could sit next to him.
“Nice knife,” I said, but he didn’t seem to hear me.
I slumped down on the mattress and looked at the poster he was so intent on scrutinizing. The image illustrated a gravestone with a skull carving on it. A pair of hands tunneled out from the ground beneath the stone.
“Hey.” I nudged him with my shoulder. “First off, it’s not like Erica has a right to judge us; she’s done worse things. In fact, both of our very existences are the results of her bad choices.” I lay back on the bed and stared at the white popcorn ceiling. “Second off, I have been avoiding that woman for months. So, your secret is safe.”
He threaded a hand through his hair. “No, that’s not what I meant.” He stood up and paced the room. The legs of his baggy cotton pajama pants flapped against each other. “Remember in eighth grade when I had my first date, and Erica got so happy she started saying shit like how I’m obviously the fun child, just like her?”
“Yeah, I think I remember that.”
“Well, I don’t want her to ever say that again. I’m not like her. If she finds out, she’ll probably send me boxes of condoms or want to go clubbing with me.”
Too much information, I wanted to shout.
On my thirteenth birthday, I told a few of my friends to wait for me while I went to ask Erica where the candles were. It was the only birthday party I’d ever had at home. It was also the first birthday party that Erica had ever allowed. I reached her bedroom door and knocked. After a moment of silence, I yanked the door open and found her in her bed making unusual noises. Clothes were scattered all over the bed and floor. Her back faced me, and I saw her legs wrapped around the hips of a naked man. She yelled at me to leave.
I sat up, cringing at pretty much everything Reed had said and reminded me of. “Reed . . .” I put my hand up to stop him from talking. “I said I won’t tell her. Now please stop sharing info about your sex life.”
A small, innocent smile pulled at the corners of his mouth. “Sorry.” He slumped against the bed again and looked at me with his hazel eyes, a feature we didn’t share. “How are you feeling?”
I tried to give the most genuine smile I could fake. “I’ve been better, but, you know, life goes on.” My throat tightened as I pushed back tears.
I reached for my duffle bag and rummaged through the contents, searching for my pajamas. I had come here in a hurry, stuffing the first items from my closet I’d laid eyes on into the bag.
“You sure you’re okay? We can talk about what happened.”
Half of what I’d packed now lay in a pile on the floor, and the rest just looked like a blur in the black hole that was my bag. I tried to calm myself because, after all, I did pack my pajamas. I was sure of it. They had to be somewhere in there.
“Yeah, I’m okay,” I said.
I picked through the shirts and pants on the floor again, making sure the pajamas hadn’t slipped through somehow without me noticing. I could tell Reed was watching me, still trying to figure out if I was all right. I flipped my du
ffle bag upside down and dumped everything on the floor. And there, right on top of my mountain of clothes, lay my flannel pajamas.
I exhaled and sat up, knowing full well some tears had crept out.
“It’s been a long day.” I avoided Reed’s worried eyes. “I’m just going to bed, but we’ll talk about everything tomorrow.”
“Okay.” Reed grabbed my hand and squeezed. When he let go, he stood and walked out of the room.
After changing into my pajamas and using the bathroom, I turned the light off and tucked myself into the second bed in the room. Light coming through the window behind me exposed four ants pacing across the windowsill. I watched them for a second, wondering why they weren’t asleep like their friends. Maybe, like me, they weren’t pleased with the mold in the building.
Cell phone in hand, I scrolled through Devin’s recent pictures on Instagram. Him and that blonde out at a club. That blonde sitting in his lap. That blonde with her hand on his chest.
Tears poured down my cheeks. They dripped onto the pillow, dampening my ear and matting my hair. A sob lingered in the back of my throat; I pushed my face into the pillow and let it out. Devin and I were supposed to be together. We were in love—or at least one of us was. Had I been delusional to think everything was going well?
Stop! I shut my phone off and threw it onto the corner of the bed. No more. No more looking at Devin’s new girlfriend.
I closed my eyes and let the tears shower me.
H
Light kisses trailed across my cheeks to the edge of my lips just as a hand brushed my hair out of my face.
“Hey,” a quiet, masculine voice said, firing warm breath against my ear.
My hand stroked the soft cotton of the bedsheets underneath me. When I opened my eyes, blue eyes stared back at me.
“Hi,” I said, smiling at the handsome face of my boyfriend. “What are you doing here?”
Devin’s lips brushed mine. When he withdrew, he had a dimpled smile on his face. “Why wouldn’t I be here?” He sat at the edge of my bed inside my apartment, as if nothing had changed in the past week.
“Because . . .” I sat up and put my arm around his neck. His silky, short strands tickled my skin. Unable to help it, I pulled him closer. “You’re with that other girl. The . . . the blonde.”
He smirked and leaned down to give my forehead a gentle kiss. “You’re dreaming, silly.”
Moisture trickled down my cheeks, but instead of continuing past my chin, it glided over my ears. I peeled the bed covers off me and put my feet down on the tiled floor. My hand moved to my face, but I didn’t feel any wetness on my cheeks.
Devin grabbed my thigh, squeezing through the fabric of my pajamas. He no longer smiled. He just looked at me like a statue forever in deep, silent thought. The ocean in his eyes danced in waves, flickering left and right in front of my own dark ones.
I pushed his hand away. “So, this isn’t real?”
He smiled again. “It’s as real as you want it to be.”
Shaking my head, I stood up and put distance between us. “Then I want you to get out of my dream. I don’t want to see you.”
Confusion swept his face. “Why?” He moved toward me, but when I inched away, he stopped. With a sad look in his eyes and a small nod of the head, his body began to vaporize, his limbs turning into steam and puffing out of existence. “If that’s what you want.” His voice trailed after him. Then, just like that, he was gone.
I felt a tear dribble from my eye, but when I tried to touch it, my fingers came up dry again.
The queen-size bed called out to me once more, its sheets as welcoming as a hug. I threw myself onto it facedown and waited for sleep that never came. In the silence, the sound of banging on the door made my heart leap. Turning, I saw not my bedroom door, but a wooden gate that rose high and mighty all the way to the ceiling. In the place of the normal doorknob was a handle in the shape of a slithering snake, its tongue splitting off and pointing in separate directions.
That gate. I knew that gate. I’d seen it in my dreams for as long as I could remember. Always a closed door with a giant shadow emanating from the crack at the bottom, just like one was now. From the way the shadow altered in shape, becoming small then big again, it was obvious that whatever was casting it was in constant motion.
The unknown creature on the other side of the gate knocked for a second time. The walls of my room shook. Taking a deep breath, I decided it was time to see what was back there.
I took wary steps toward the giant door, my arm reaching for the ice-cold metal of the slithering snake and pulling the handle down. The gate thrust open, shoving me to the floor with great force.
I fell on my back and sat there, stock-still, for a moment. Through the strands of hair that covered my eyes, I saw smoke surging toward me. When I lifted my head up, bright yellow-and-red flames bolted at me.
Around me, the walls shook, the floor vibrated, and picture frames fell from the wall and off my corner desk. Even the wooden gate rattled against its hinges, almost as if the inanimate object was having a seizure. I pressed my hands to the tiled floor, feeling the tremor deep in the earth. The taste of burning charcoal and meat infiltrated my mouth amidst the smell of smoke.
The shaking jolted me awake. I found myself in Reed’s dorm. I could feel tears on my face, so I wiped them off with the back of my hand. The curtains of the window behind me were parted to the side, just as I’d left them before I went to bed. Through it, the campus’s lights shone in, illuminating bits of the room. I let my eyes adjust to the dimness.
And then I heard it.
A crash outside Reed’s dorm brought me to my feet. I ran to the door, shoving it open and making my way to the center of the common area.
When I got past the bathroom, I noticed the cracked TV screen. Right on the carpet beside the TV lay a game controller, as if someone had thrown it around like a Frisbee. My first thought was that someone got too aggravated by his video game and took his anger out on the screen.
But then I noticed the shirtless burly man in the corner of the room. He wasn’t anyone I recognized, though I didn’t really know enough people at this school to recognize many. He wrestled with someone on the carpet at an angle that blocked the other guy from view.
“Get off me!” the helpless guy lying on his back screamed.
It was Reed. He made the sound he’d once made when he was nine and had bounced off his bed and landed on the floor, his leg sloped in an awkward direction. Instinct kicked in. I threw myself on the shirtless man, grabbing his shoulders and pulling him away from my brother.
Reed crawled backward and yelled, “Addy, get back!”
“What’s going on?” I wrapped my arms tightly around the man’s torso, keeping his arms by his side. “Who is this guy?”
“Addy . . .” There was warning in Reed’s tone. His eyes grew wide a second before the shirtless man moved his head back, slamming it against my skull.
“Ow!” I let go.
The man, not waiting for me to get back up, jumped to his feet and went straight for Reed. With him so close and facing away from me, I noticed that his bare back was scarred, much like Adriel’s. The skin wrinkled around his shoulder blades, looking like two crescents that faced opposite each other.
My heart raced faster, pulsating in my ears. My legs felt like water. I muttered with a quavering voice, “What are you doing?”
The man grabbed Reed in what looked like an embrace, and then they both vanished from the room, reminding me of how Devin had disappeared in my dream.
“Reed!” I shouted, running over to the spot where they had both been struggling just a second ago. I patted the carpet as if they had shrunk and hid in the dusty, old material and my patting would make them come out.
While I crouched on the floor without any obvious answers, it occurred to me that it had to be a magician’s trick. How else could they have become invisible?
Behin
d me, a door opened and someone stepped out into the living area. I looked over my shoulder and saw Sam. His hand shielded his eyes from the bright light in the room.
“I’m trying to sleep, guys,” he said. “Why are you screaming?”
I got up and ran past him into Reed’s room. I took off my pajamas and pulled jeans and a random shirt on. To top off my mismatched outfit, I wore a hoodie to protect myself from the October cold, though I had never been the type to mind the chilly air.
On top of Reed’s bed, the Swiss Army knife caught my attention. I tucked it into my back pocket. I grabbed my duffle bag, stuffing everything back inside it before I looked for Reed’s Saint Vincent ID and keys. They were hanging on a pin by the door. I yanked them off and dashed outside.
Back in my car, I threw the duffle bag on the seat beside me and started the engine. I needed to find Adriel. He and my brother’s kidnapper both had the same back wounds. I couldn’t help but think they were somehow related. What were the odds of seeing two men with the same horrible burns and scars in one night? Not to mention that Adriel never told me what had happened to him. He never actually denied being in a cult, either.
Driving to the hospital didn’t take long. I parked in the guest parking lot and sprinted inside the big brown building. At the reception desk, a middle-aged lady in a green scrub suit sat typing on her computer. She must have been blind as a bat, because she wore glasses so thick they looked like they were bulletproof. As soon as I reached her, she looked up.
“Hello,” she said, a kind smile on her face.
I didn’t have time to greet her, so I just dove right in to the matter at hand. “I want to check up on a man I dropped off a few hours ago. He had back burns and said his name was Adriel. Is he still here?”
She blinked a couple of times, her eyes huge behind the glass lenses. She kind of had the face of the big bad wolf from “Little Red Riding Hood,” only sweeter and more grandmotherly.
