Chapter 1
KAE
Iam a ghost of myself, wasting my life away.
Of all the things that could have kept me from finishing my bachelor’s degree on time, I never expected relentless nightmares to rob me of my final semester.
Yet, here I am. Stuck on medical leave, waiting to see how long it takes to die from chronic insomnia.
It’s amazing I haven’t descended into full-blown psychosis—
Someone snaps their fingers in my face.
“Hmm?” I blink. The ambiance of the party seeps back into my perception. Lights low, music loud, too many drunken voices melding together.
And the judgmental fucking stares of three girls I’ve known since high school.
“Jesus, Kae.” The blonde finger-snapper rolls her eyes. “You’re acting like a complete zombie. Did you pop an Ambien before we got here or something?”
“Maybe that’s why she dropped out,” the second girl mutters to the third, as if she thinks I can’t hear her. “Drug problems, you know?”
My eyes narrow at her. At all three of them. We haven’t even been at this party for ten minutes, and they’re already being so catty? I do not have the energy for this. “Do any of you know where Jackie went?”
“Nope. Maybe she was thirsty.”
They all snicker, their voices running together. “Yeah, she’s definitely thirsty for something, alright. Did you see the outfit she had on? I’m telling you, she should just get an OnlyFans already. I bet she’d make so much money…”
I massage my temples, trying to remember why I still put up with them. Am I so bad at making new friends that they’ve become my only option, or am I just a miserable creature of habit? I swear, they weren’t anywhere near this insufferable on last year’s girls’ trip.
“…I’d literally kill for her genetics. It’s not even fair—”
“If you knew her parents,” I interrupt, “you probably wouldn’t be saying that.”
I’ll admit, Jackie’s Native American and East Asian heritage does give her the silkiest black hair, sun-kissed skin, and an hourglass figure. But her sperm donor is a complete piece of shit, and her mom could be a lot less absent.
“Okay, buzzkill.” Finger-snapper scans her eyes over me, her foul attitude poorly hidden behind the plastic cup she sips from. “Just because you stopped caring about appearances doesn’t mean you’re better than everyone else. Some of us actually want to get laid.”
Gee, I’m sorry I’ve barely slept for several months, and my body is breaking down, I want to tell her. But that would require giving them a touch of vulnerability, and clearly, they’ve become too cruel to handle such a thing. What an awakening experience this has been.
“…I’m going to go make sure Jackie’s okay.”
“Yeah, you do that.” I catch sight of her eyeroll the moment I turn to walk away, but I ignore it. They’re energy vampires, and I have nothing to spare them. Not anymore. I’m hanging by a thread as it is.
It takes me a minute to make it through the packed beach house, between all the sweaty bodies dancing and my sweep for Jackie, but I finally slip out the back door. It’s quieter than expected, with only a few stray smokers hanging out on the deck.
No sign of my best friend.
I frown, pausing at the hedges to check my phone for any missed notifications, but it’s fruitless.
It’s not that I fear for Jackie’s safety, necessarily.
I know she’s more than capable of handling herself around people with bad intentions.
It’s her mental state I worry about; it’s not like her to dip out like this.
Beneath the vibrations of the party inside, I can hear the distant whisper of the ocean waves, beckoning me like a beautiful siren’s call. I oblige, slipping off my sandals to follow the gentle rhythm down the wooden path winding through the sand dunes.
A moderate ocean breeze, warmed by the mid-May temperatures, whips my long hair around and into my face. Anywhere else, I’d likely be annoyed enough to pull it back. But the touch of chaos in the serenity is simply part of the natural beauty of this place.
The moon is full tonight, giving me just enough light to make it to the open beach.
It doesn’t take me long to spot Jackie’s familiar silhouette, sitting on a towel near the coastline. She’s as still as a statue, lost to the ocean’s call. Judging by the spot left open on the towel, she may already be expecting me.
Without a word, I settle down beside her. Waves roll in and out on the shore, yet the water seems so still in the distance, its darkness melding into the night sky without a horizon. It is the best natural medicine for the troubles of our young, old souls.
“I wish I could stay here forever,” Jackie finally says, her voice unusually soft and somber.
“Yeah. It almost makes you forget everything else for a while and just… exist.”
“Kae.” She sits up, level with me. “You look like complete ass.”
I blink, taken aback. Here I was, thinking she might talk about whatever is bothering her. “Wow, thanks—”
“Are you ever going to tell me why you’re not graduating on time?”
My lip purses. She’s not going to let this go. “I have told you. Medical reasons. I’m not sleeping well.”
“Yes, but I’ve never known you to get so stressed out that it affects you like this.” Jackie narrows her brown eyes, almost black in this lighting. “What am I missing?”
“I just… I’ve been having bad dreams. That’s all.”
“Why? Did something happen? Do I need to kill someone?”
“No.” I release a heavy sigh. “I don’t know what started it. They came out of nowhere one day and never left me alone. If I do fall asleep, they wake me up after a few hours. And then I can’t go back to sleep.”
“Well, tell me about them. What are they about? They might have some meaning I can help you figure out.”
I don’t believe in the woo-woo pseudoscience of dream interpretation, but the nature of mine is exactly the problem. They make me question my reality. “It’s going to sound crazy out loud.”
“Kae. I’ve been fucked up in the head ever since I was in diapers. In the decade or so we’ve known each other, I’ve always been the crazy one. You can handle the spotlight for a moment. Now spill.”
Outside of my father and my psychologist, I haven’t told anyone about the nightmares. It takes me a moment to work up the courage. “They’re all about the end of the world. Or, more specifically… Well… They’re all perfect replicas of Revelation. The biblical apocalypse prophecy.”
“What?”
“I know. My psychologist is convinced I’m holding onto some kind of religious trauma, as if I had biblical horror stories force-fed to me when I was a child.
But you know me. You know my parents. They took a ‘find religion at your own pace’ approach.
I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve sat for a church service.
There’s no fucking way I memorized a whole book of the Bible. ”
“Yeah, no.” She frowns, watching me nervously toy with a loose thread on my shorts. “So what is it? You’re being possessed by an evil spirit?”
I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t considered it. “Demons aren’t real.”
“My grandmother has some stories that might change your mind. Shit gets really weird in rural Appalachia.”
“Jackie.” I give her a deadpan stare. I am a woman of science and logic. If this world had spirits, there would be evidence of it somewhere. “Are you forgetting who you’re talking to here?”
“Fine. Surely you’ve tried your beloved medical route, then. What did the doctors say? Can you get a prescription for some sleeping pills?”
“I’ve tried quite a few already. The milder ones don’t work, and the heavy hitters keep me stoned most of the following day.
If I’m desperate, like ‘dancing dangerously close to organ failure if I don’t sleep’ desperate, I take one.
But despite what our mutual friends think, I have no desire to be drugged up and incapacitated all the time. ”
She glances back toward the beachhouse, seeming to contemplate chewing out those girls. Ultimately, her focus turns back to me with renewed vigor. “How long have these nightmares been going on?”
I bite my lip.
“Kae,” she warns.
“…Since January.”
“What the fuck? You should have told me sooner!” She gapes at me, looking like she wants to hit something.
Not me, not really—but certainly something.
“Is this why you’ve been avoiding me? You knew I’d clock you on your bullshit?
Hell, Kae. I genuinely believed you were too busy with work and school stress to see me. ”
“In my defense, I have been shadowing at the hospital more. And with your own busy schedule…” I trail off, swallowing the rest of my pathetic excuse. She’s right. When I should have confided in her, I distanced myself from her. “I know. I’m sorry.”
She continues to glare at me in her version of shock, and I can’t bring myself to look her in the eyes. Shame mingles with my exhaustion in a confusing jumble of emotions until they all blur together, falling into the same dull void I’ve been living in, day in and day out.
A wave crashes nearby, significantly louder than the others. For a moment, our conversation pauses, as if it’s reset itself. The anger dissipates from my friend like a snuffed fire. “You’re really in a bad place, aren’t you?”
My face burns with emotion. “I tried everything I could to tough it out and graduate this semester, but I was going to fail all my classes. Taking a medical leave was the only thing I could do to save my GPA.”
“You can’t tell me you’re still planning to do the Peace Corps in this state.”
I hesitate, unsure of what to say—because I was, in fact, still planning to make the most of my time off and do some medical volunteering where it’s most needed.
Jackie groans, running a hand through her hair at the scalp. “Absolutely not, Kae.”
“If I take the pills on my off days, I get by long enough to—”