Imaginary Friend - Stephen Chbosky Page 0,207

father’s bathtub. The smell of the hospital.

“NO! NO!” he screamed.

Christopher dug his hands into the flesh of the tree. Hot like feverish skin. The hissing lady ripped his hands free. He squirmed out of her grasp. He planted his feet on both sides of the door. The mailbox people swarmed him. Christopher held on for dear life. He pushed the mailbox people back. He was too powerful for them. The hissing lady grabbed Christopher in her scarred hands. They were coarse like sandpaper. She held him tight to her body and brought his face to hers until their noses were touching. She looked him dead in the eye. Furious and insane.

“IT’S TIME!!!!!!!”

Christopher looked down at the clearing. He saw dozens of footprints materialize. The people themselves invisible to him. But they were there. He could feel them. The townspeople on the real side. Their eyes being stitched up. Being turned into mailbox people. The world screaming in pain. It was blinding. The worlds were blurring. The imaginary and the real. The glass was about to shatter.

Christopher looked up into the sky. He saw the stars shooting. Constellations falling apart like a puzzle dropped on the floor, shattering into a million pieces. It was six minutes to midnight. Six minutes to Christmas. Christopher closed his eyes. He let his mind go quiet. And he whispered,

“Please, God. Help me.”

Suddenly Christopher saw a cloud coming on the horizon. The face in the cloud. As big as the sky. In an instant Christopher felt a great calm wash over his body. It was as if someone hit the MUTE button around him, and there were no more screams. There was only the sound of his own heartbeat. The beeps of hospital machines. A voice on the wind.

“Christopherrrrrr,” the wind whispered.

The hissing lady shoved him. Christopher felt his left foot cross into the light.

“Don’t go into the light, Christopher. Fight her,” the whisper said.

I can’t. She’s too strong.

Christopher’s arms felt so heavy. His right foot crossed into the light. He just wanted to sleep. So sleepy.

“You have to kill her by midnight!” the wind screamed.

I can’t kill her by myself.

“Yes, you can. A nightmare is nothing but a dream gone sick. Say it, Christopher!”

“A nightmare is nothing but a dream gone sick,” Christopher said out loud.

Christopher saw the hissing lady’s eyes shift.

“Who are you talking to?!” she asked.

“Say it again!” the wind whispered.

“A nightmare is nothing but a dream gone sick,” Christopher shouted.

Christopher saw the hissing lady scream, “Who are you talking to?!” over and over, but he could not hear her. All of her screams were gone. There was only silence. There was only peace. The air was cool and fresh. He could only hear the whisper of the wind.

“And I can do anything in a dream!” the wind said.

“And I can do anything in a dream,” Christopher repeated.

“Because in here…” the wind said.

Christopher closed his eyes. In his mind’s eye, he imagined himself groping in the darkness behind his eyelids until he finally found the switch. He flipped on the light and there, laid before him, was more than knowledge. It was power. Raw and furious. Christopher opened his eyes and looked right at the hissing lady. Christopher saw her eyes move. She was terrified.

“…I am God,” Christopher said.

Christopher pushed back with all of his might, and the hissing lady went flying backward in the air. She landed on the edge of the clearing a hundred yards away. The deer and the mailbox people watched, stunned. Christopher looked at his hands as if they belonged to someone else. He couldn’t believe his own strength.

The hissing lady sat up. Insane with rage. Or was that surprise? The deer and the mailbox people turned to Christopher. A thousand eyes stared. Furious at him for harming their queen. But Christopher did not blink. He did not run. He did not hide. He just slowly reached into his pocket and pulled out the leather sheath. He unfolded it to reveal the dull, silver blade.

“You’re off the street,” Christopher said calmly.

He looked at the key buried in her neck. Then Christopher raised the silver blade above his head and charged right at her.

Chapter 97

Christopher’s mother raced down the highway. It had taken her fifteen minutes to run to Shady Pines, where Ambrose kept his old beaten-up Cadillac. Fifteen minutes passing burning stores and hiding behind cars left abandoned and smashed as frightening men looted in the shadows. There were no cabs. No police. She was all alone with

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