Chapter 8
Chapter
Eight
Iwake to the sound of Tia trying to be quiet as she gets ready for the day. When she notices I’m up, she pauses, makeup brush in hand.
“Hey,” she says, her voice carefully neutral. “How are you feeling?”
I groan and clutch my pillow. “Like death warmed over. Like I’ve been run over by a truck. Like every euphemism for a hangover, only without the fun part of actually getting drunk.”
“At least you still have your sense of humor.”
I scowl, then push myself up—which makes my achy head ache even more.
“Do you want to talk about it?”
I start to shake my head, then wince. “Just a bad dream. Probably stress. You know. College. Dorm life. New roomie.”
She flashes a wide grin. “Go ahead. Dump it all on me. I can totally handle it.”
The thing is, I believe her. And I almost—almost—do exactly that.
Fortunately, sanity kicks in, and I realize that there is no way to explain that scorpion things and baby monsters and other creatures in my dreams are trying to kill me, just like they killed my mother.
And that the dream warrior who saved me looks a hell of a lot like Chase.
Not and sound sane, anyway.
Instead of trying, I grab my bathroom basket and shuffle toward the door, hoping a shower stall is free. I need a few moments alone to get my head straight again.
“Cora,” she says as I’m reaching for the doorknob.
I turn and look back over my shoulder.
“Are you sure you don’t want to talk?”
I do. I really do. But if I tell her the truth, she’ll probably bolt. And I already know she’s a friend I don’t want to lose.
I manage a tiny smile. “I’m good. Really.”
She nods. “Okay. I’ll grab us coffee from the dining hall while you shower. Cream and sugar, right?”
The simple kindness nearly breaks me. “Yeah. Thanks.”
In the shared bathroom, I lock myself in a shower stall, then turn on the water and allow myself thirty seconds to cower in the spray, my palms against my eyes as I breathe through the rising panic.
Thirty seconds. That’s all I get. Then I soap myself up and let the hot water run over me, forcing breath back into my lungs until I almost feel human again.
The moment I’m back in the room, Tia hands me my coffee and a small envelope. There’s no return address, just my name in elegant calligraphy.
“Came about five minutes ago. Someone slid it under the door.”
The faintest scent of smoke clings to the envelope, and for no reason I can name, my pulse jumps.
“Uncle Finn probably put me on a list for some event,” I say, since I can’t think of what else it could be. I open it, then pull out an invitation, the paper heavy and textured beneath my fingertips.
Your presence is requested at Whitehall House. Friday, 10 p.m. Come if you want answers about your dreams.
My body goes completely cold.
“Okay, what’s with the face?” Tia asks, bopping to my side. “You look like someone just walked over your grave.”
“It’s nothing,” I say, trying to tuck the invitation away, but she’s too quick and snatches it from my fingers. “Tia! Boundaries much?”
“Answers about your dreams?” She studies me with new interest. “This isn’t just about night terrors, is it?”
I force myself not to cringe as I mentally debate how much to tell her.
We’ve been roommates for all of one night, but there’s something about Tia that inspires trust—her straightforward nature, her complete lack of judgment about, well, anything.
Her utter inability to see boundaries. And, yeah, the fact that I just freaking like her.
“Hey, look, if you don’t want to tell me, that’s—”
“My dreams are fucked up,” I blurt. “Like, they’re not, well, normal.
” I bite my lower lip, hoping she won’t freak out.
Because in the same moment that I’d word-vomited my dream angst all over her, I also realized that I really need a friend.
Someone I can talk to. About my dreams. About school. About Chase.
About everything.
And I think—I hope—that friend is Tia.
“Fucked up,” she repeats. “Yeah, well, I got that from the screaming. You know I understand, right? I told you about my cousin.”
I nod. Uncle Finn had already spilled the beans, but Tia had told me about her cousin’s night terrors over coffee yesterday.
“I know,” I say. “It’s just that, well, what happens to me—it’s a lot more complicated.”
“So, explain it to me. I mean, if you need to talk about it, you can talk to me. Because, hello? I’m your favorite roomie, right? That makes us practically sisters.”
She waggles her eyebrows, and I can’t help but laugh. “It might help,” she adds, her voice suddenly soft. Even a little maternal.
I draw in a long breath. I don’t want to talk. I want to run. I want to race far, far away to where the dreams can’t find me. But I don’t. Because I’m tired of keeping it all inside. Tired of feeling so alone.
“My mom had them too,” I whisper to the floor, the words coming before I can stop them. “The same kind of dreams.”
I force myself to look at her as I tell her the rest. “That’s how she died. Something in the dream killed her.”
“You mean she had a heart attack? Or—”
“No.” I swallow, then shake my head firmly. “That’s the official cause of death, but she was having a nightmare when it happened. She was screaming…and then she wasn’t.”
The memory still cuts, even four years later. I let it flow over me as I tell Tia everything. Finding her writhing in bed, her body contorted. How she spasmed. And then how she was still.
I’d watched through tears and terror as the paramedics tried and failed to revive her.
And after, I’d heard the whispers about how unusual it was for a healthy thirty-eight-year-old woman to thrash around like that and then to die in her sleep.
I heard whispers that maybe she was a user.
That she’d somehow OD’d. But the tox report was clean, and I knew better than that, anyway.
Mom had told me, hadn’t she? About the women in our family.
About how I’m going to die the same way too.
“I’m so sorry,” Tia says, genuine compassion in her voice. “That must have been terrible.” She hugs herself. “To see something so scary in your dreams that your heart gives out.”
“It’s not—she wasn’t just scared,” I say, trying to make her understand. “Something in her nightmare killed her.”
Tia starts to speak, but I hold up a finger to silence her. “I can prove it,” I say. “Well, sort of.”
I open my treasure box and hand her mom’s taped-together letter about our female line. “I’ve never shown it to anyone. Not even Uncle Finn.”
Tia takes it but doesn’t unfold it. Instead, she sits on her bed, facing me, all traces of her usual manic energy gone. “What’s in it?”
“My heritage.” I nod for her to go ahead, then watch as she reads the letter, her posture going stiffer and stiffer.
“Whoa,” she says, her voice like a whisper. “And you believe it’s true?”
I nod. “She had a notebook too. It had sketches of monsters she saw in her nightmares. I see the same monsters now in my dreams.” I watch her face, looking for signs that she thinks I’m crazy, but all I see is sympathy.
“The monsters were hunting her. I’m sure of it.”
“And you think they caught her.”
I nod. “And killed her.”
“But if you see the same places and the same monsters, then it must be a real place. Like you’re traveling there. Kind of like one of those out-of-body experiences, right?”
Relief washes over me. She actually believes me. “Yeah. I know it sounds crazy, but yes.”
Tia shudders. “Scorpions sand monsters and lava people. That’s terrifying.”
“To the power of a billion.” I draw in a breath, realizing most of the tension has left my body. It’s good to finally talk to someone about this.
“And the, well, plot?” she asks. “I mean, do the same things happen in your dreams as in your mom’s?”
“I’m not sure. She didn’t really give details.
But the cast and the sets sure overlap.” I tell her the rest of it.
About the Hunter and the Nightmare King.
“And lately my dreams have been getting more intense. More vivid.” I swallow.
“I can’t help but think it’s building to something, you know? Like to whatever finally killed Mom.”
“Oh, god, Cora. You must be terrified.”
My laugh sounds a little hysterical. “Yeah. That’s a fair statement.”
She squeezes my hands. “I believe you. Truly. And I’m going to help you. You’re not in this alone. Not anymore.”
I only realize I’m crying when I taste the tears. She pulls me into a hug. “Okay, none of that, or I’ll start, and then I’ll have to blame you for smudging my eyeliner. Although who cares? I can always fix it. Cry all you want.”
I choke out a laugh and sit back as she squeezes my hands once again. “We’re going to figure this out,” she says. “Your dreams are not going to kill you. And we’re going to start with this.” She waves the Whitehall invitation. “Who knows about your dreams other than you, me, and your uncle?”
“No one,” I say. “Well, maybe Professor Valdez. Uncle Finn may have told her. But even he doesn’t know all of it. He just knows I have really intense nightmares.”
She nods slowly, as if working out a puzzle. “And that’s it? No one else? What about your doctor? You have meds, right?”
I shake my head.
“Anyone from back home going to school here now?”
“No, there’s no one.” I’m about to add, except maybe Chase, but snap my mouth shut before I sound truly whacko. I mean, that tell your bestie everything rule must have a few boundaries, right?
“You really can’t think of anyone who’d send that invite?”
She goes all blurry, and I realize I’m teary-eyed again. “You really believe me.” I push the words out past a throat clogged with tears.
“Well, yeah. I mean, you’d be nuts to make all that up, right?”
I choke out a laugh. “Maybe I am.”
“Oh, please. You’re not crazy. But you are someone who knows how to open the door. Or maybe it opens for you.”
I wipe away my tears. “What door?”
“Into dreams. My abuela said that dreams aren’t just stories. They’re a doorway between worlds. And some people can walk through them.”
“You believe that?”
“Well, sure. I’m a witch, right? Of course, I believe in magic.”
“Will you show me?”
She frowns. “Show you what?”
“Duh. Magic.”
She looks away, but not before I see the shadow in her eyes. “Yeah, well, one of these days. Right now, I have to book.”
Her back’s still to me, and I worry that I’d said something wrong, but not sure what. I watch as she pulls clothes out of her dresser, then starts to change, totally unabashed about completely stripping down in front of me, then yanking on jeans and a tee.
That’s when I realize that it’s almost nine. There’s a freshman fair on the quad today—booths and presentations from all the various clubs on campus—and Tia signed up to hand out fliers for the Wiccan club.
“I can’t wrap my head around you believing me,” I say as she runs a brush through her rainbow-colored hair.
“Why wouldn’t I? I mean, all sorts of people across all sorts of cultures across all of time have believed that dreams are more than just brain noise. Who am I to say they were wrong?”
“I kind of love you right now.”
“Well, I’m exceptionally lovable.”
I grin, feeling lighter than I have in years.
“About this Whitehall party,” Tia continues, shoving her feet into a pair of Doc Martins. “Are we going?”
“We?”
“No way are you going alone to some cryptic dream-answer party. That’s how horror movies start. Besides,” she adds, “I’ve been dying for an excuse to break out my good eyeliner.”
“You’re really not freaked out?”
“Oh, I’m totally freaked out,” she assures me cheerfully. “But in an excited way. Not only do I have a damn cool roomie, but Friday night’s going to be way better than the standard freshman kegger. I mean, it’s a Whitehall party. They’re legendary.”
“Really? Why?”
She gapes at me. “You haven’t heard about Whitehall parties yet?
I was on campus for only about forty-five seconds and heard probably a dozen people talking them up or praying they’d get an invite.
I mean, it’s nutso the way upperclassmen talk about them.
Like the parties are some sort of religious experience.
Amazing music, drinks that are totally next level, and the house itself is this gorgeous old mansion that’s only opened for the parties.
Otherwise, it’s locked up tight. Plus, nobody’s allowed in with a phone, so it’s all just word of mouth.
Which obviously makes everyone want to go even more.
” She points to herself. “And by everyone, I mean me. So, we’re going, right? ”
I laugh, shaking my head at her enthusiasm. “We’re going,” I say. “Even though you’re clearly insane.”
“Daring,” she corrects. “You’re all caution and suspicion. I’m curiosity and adventure. Together, we average out to something approaching normal.”
“Okay, then. Friday night, we head to Whitehall. But at the first sign of trouble—”
“We bail,” she finishes for me. “I’ve seen enough horror movies to know the rules. Don’t split up, don’t investigate strange noises, don’t dance with anyone with three sixes tattooed on his arm. And on that note, I’m outta here.”
I watch her go, wrapping her easy acceptance around me like a warm and fuzzy blanket. And, more important, feeling like maybe—just maybe—I’m not alone in this anymore.