A Whisper in the Night
The ticking of the wall clock is soft, marking these silent moments of night. Lying supine on her bed, covers pulled tight up to her chin, Emily held her gaze at the ceiling. It was one of those nights where sleep seemed to avoid her, as it did more often than not lately. Tonight, though, seemed different. It was a sense of weird expectation, feeling something just beyond the veil of consciousness waiting.
She closed her eyes to will herself into sleep, and minutes turned into hours, slowly spiraling her into the misty half-world of dreams. Instead of the usual jumble of images and half-formed ideas, Emily found herself standing in a tall grass field under the casting of silver-glow light by the moonlight.
Air cool, breeze soft, rustling grasses around her. Slowly, she turned, drinking in the scene with a sense of wonder. So vivid, so real, she almost forgot it was a dream. Almost.
And then she saw him.
He stood at the edge of the field, barely perceptible in the dim light. Her heart skipped a beat as she took a tentative step forward. There was something familiar about him—a presence tugging softly at the edges of memory.
His features came into focus as she approached him: soul-deep, dark blue eyes hitting hers like a harnessed emotion, making her breathless. She knew him, but from where?
An easy, soft smile etched its way across his face, easing her mind that everything was all right. He didn't speak, yet the thoughts were there in Emily's mind, almost like they were her own. I've been waiting for you.
The words echoed in her mind and warmed up her body in a manner that she could hardly explain. She wanted to know who he was, where they were, and why she felt such a strong connection towards him, but words just wouldn't come out of her mouth. So, all she did was stand there, staring at him, trapped in the moment.
The whole world seemed to slow and blur, leaving them quite lonely there in the moonlit field. Her heart was pounding like mad inside her chest, almost in time with the pulse she could feel in her hand as he reached out and took it.
Her hands on him had been so charged up that the feeling from her head to her toe ran down her spine. She did not want anything and everything in the dream to end because the very thought was enough to make her get lost in the dream. The stout outlines of her periphery dimmed and became lost in the blackness of the field.
"No," she whispered; the dB level of her speech was almost inaudible. "Please don't go.".
Yet again, as it always is, the action was all over by the time the decision was made. The dream was fading now, and she was slowly reminded that she's alive and that it was a dream. She woke up to perceive once more that she found herself in her room, surrounded by the early morning light that penetrated the curtains as the last residue of the dream disappeared.
Slowly, she sat up in bed. The palpitation in her chest was still there, and her mind was still thinking of what she had dreamed. Who was he? Why was it like she had known him all her life?
That dream was lucid and had just lingered in her mind like a haunting memory. She woke up, unable to shake off the feeling that it was just a dream, a figment of her imagination. Yet there was some kind of truth to it—a shard of life she rarely knew—in which she could recognize herself.
When she got up from the bed and became functional in society, this was the time she realized she had dreamt that. The feeling was still lingering in her, but as a background, she was lowly murmuring. He said it meant he did not want to see her anymore, whatever it was meant; Karen was determined to understand it.
It was the first time in a really long while that Emily was standing on the brink of something great, waiting for hope to come. As it did, all started with this dream.
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