Watchers of the Night

by Matthew Keith

  Chapter 5

  Paul opened his eyes. He was back his bedroom. Closing them, he squeezed his eyelids as tight as he could. He took a deep breath and opened them again. He was still in his room, but the memory of the dream was as vivid as if it had really happened.

  Please let it be true.

  Reeling in the revelations of the night, he felt disoriented. He had to force himself to calm down and mentally adjust to his surroundings. He’d just been standing on a country road with a beautiful girl. Now, literally in the blink of an eye, he found himself lying on his back in his bedroom, over twenty miles away.

  Had it really happened?

  There was only one way to find out.

  He dressed quickly, smoothed his hair down with the palms of his hands, and left the house without eating breakfast or even wiping the sleep out of his eyes. He jogged, ran, or fast-walked the entire way to school, not realizing it was Saturday until he was in the parking lot wondering why there were no cars.

  He stood there breathing heavily, feeling foolish, his head spinning both from the run and from the thoughts tumbling around in his head. Memories of the past thirty-six hours flashed through his mind in random order, his excitement making it impossible to put any of them into coherent thought. He bent over, put both his hands on his knees and closed his eyes, waiting until his breathing became normal again.

  Now what should he do? Lisa had been in his dream two nights ago, he was sure of that. In that dream, she’d come to his bench and said the exact same words he’d found written on a note the next day. That note had been left under his lunch tray, right where she’d been standing. He’d followed the instructions on the note and found her waiting for him in the cemetery, so it was safe to assume she was the one who’d written it. But still…

  It could all just be an elaborate trick his mind was playing. He’d seen Lisa that day in the office when she was registering for classes, and a few times afterward. She was absolutely gorgeous, of that there was no doubt, and had been on his mind on and off since that first day. It was possible he’d simply conjured her image into his mind and dreamed that she’d spoken to him that night on the bench. He could have imagined that and, through the reading of a note that may or may not have actually been intended for him, created last night’s dream as a result of his own wishful thinking. All of the rest, all of the things that she’d ‘said’ to him in his dream about being special, could have come from his imagination. His mind may have created a reason for her to be there, meeting him at a place that just happened to be right down the road from the same party that Steven and Stephanie had said they were going to.

  It all boiled down to today. He had to find Lisa before dark and find out if everything had really happened. If she confirmed it in the daytime, then it had to be true.

  Stephanie. Stephanie was the key. He’d never seen Lisa anywhere but school and had no idea where to find her. He didn’t even know what her last name was. But Stephanie knew. Stephanie had given Lisa a ride home two nights ago, so Stephanie was who Paul needed to see.