Afterlife - Stephanie Hudson Page 0,41

his prey. Then something snapped. A link being broken. I noticed RJ’s eyes following him and then they turned to me, indicating that they were no longer in sight. I could finally breathe.

“What was all that about?” RJ was now on a mission. She eyed me curiously and then looked back at Lanie for back up.

“Yeah, what was that? Did he know you? Did you recognize him?” Lanie said now joining in the Spanish inquisition.

“No!” I said a bit too abruptly, like it had hit a nerve. But then my mind went into overload, when she had said “Did you recognize him?” that was the nerve that had hit.....I did recognize him! That’s the reason I had the reaction when I saw him. He was the man from my dreams. The dreams I was now starting to flow back into with a crashing wave. Yes, they were all so clear now, so clear in fact that it was hard to think of them as just dreams. They had seemed so real but why did I forget about them. And more importantly why was a man, who I had never seen before tonight, the exact same man that I had been so vividly dreaming about the last couple of days?

The girls didn’t look convinced but neither did the guys for that matter.

“Well, the way he was staring at you, maybe he knows you.” RJ shot Drew a look and he shrugged his shoulders replying “what?” to her dirty look.

“What did I miss?” Jack said as he came back holding a tray full of drinks.

“You will never guess what happened!” Chaz said in a high pitched voice trying to mimic one of the girls.

“Oh, please tell me this was finally the year that he tripped and fell on his rich ass!” he said raising his hand to the top of his head. I moved closer round to give him room as he resumed his place back next to me.

“Sorry dude, guess again”

“Oh I don’t know, some girl flashed him to get his attention and even then, I doubt he would have looked, he’s probably gay,” he said with a wicked smile. I just stayed quiet, still embarrassed from the memory. My mind doing ten to the dozen.

“No flashing needed, he took a fancy to Kaz though, couldn’t stop staring at her.” Ok I was going purple now and had to get away from everyone staring at me and it wasn’t just my table, it seemed like the entire club!

“I …I gotta go to the bathroom!” Was all I could manage. I felt like I was going to be sick. I know it was a silly reaction to have but I couldn’t help it. I just needed to get out of there. I pushed my way through the Gothic Draven fans over to the bathrooms. I knew the direction as Jack had pointed to them in reply to my rude exit. I saw the neon sign glowing like a beacon as it was near the bar on the same side of the wall as the entrance.

Once inside I could feel myself calming down like the air in here was clearer. There was no one in there apart from the refection of myself staring back at me. Horror struck. I looked terrible. No worse than terrible, I looked ill. I was so pale and my eyes looked almost black. I felt so ashamed, no wonder he was staring at me. He probably thought of me as riff-raff. Wondering what a plain, fragile little thing was doing in his club!

I ran into the cubicle not being able to stop what was coming next as I threw up the one bottle of Corona that I had consumed. Thankfully I heard the door open when I had finished. It sounded like two girls and no guessing who they were chatting about.

“And oh my god did you see his body, he gets finer every year. What I wouldn’t do to have a night alone with that man!”

“Tell me about it, now there’s a man that I bet has good equipment, if you know what I mean!” A girl's giggle followed.

“Yeah and I bet he knows how to use it!”

“Yeah baby!” They both giggled again stupidly like superficial teenagers. I found myself angry at them being so vulgar towards him. I was just about to leave when I heard more.

“Yeah but did you see that girl he was staring at... urgh.” The silly cow then made a gagging noise.