was demanding of me. I pulled the plug letting the water drain, watching it in slow motion as if the water symbolized my life. I then started to drag the shirt over my head, and unzip the back of my skirt, before letting it slip to the floor. There should have been a bruise on my knee from using it to break that guy’s face, but I knew that, like my hand and my head, I had healed already. Thanks to Lucius’ blood in my system, I couldn’t help but wonder how long that piece of him would last within me? Days, weeks…maybe a month or two?
Maybe if I just started running…maybe if I just ran and ran and ran until I could run no more, maybe then I could get him out of my system? I looked behind me around the incessant space and asked myself if I started now, would I ever find the end, or would I die long before?
“Back to the room,” Lucius said in a strained clipped tone that told me he was losing his hold on controlling this Void of mine. But even so, I couldn’t hold myself back from doing as I was told. Which meant that the moment I turned around, he stepped back so I could take a step forward, and in doing so my surroundings changed. The Void morphed into the room I was staying in and like I had done before passing out, I walked towards the bed in just my underwear. Then just before I was about to get into bed, mimicking reality, he spoke.
“Stop. Now take a good look around.”
“Why?”
“Look around the room, Amelia,” he said but this time the whispered voice was one of seduction in my ear and I looked down to see his arm held at the front of me, a palm to my naked belly. But it was one that didn’t make contact, just one acting as though it wanted to. So, I looked up and as I did the pieces of the room started to emerge from the shadows as my mind brought each piece of it forward into the light. It was like accessing a memory…or should I say, Lucius was.
Which was when something started to niggle at the back of my mind. It was that small voice of doubt asking myself why? Asking myself why he would want this…why he was here now, asking to see the room?
“Focus, Amelia…focus solely on my voice.”
“But I…” I tried to argue, bringing back my own voice of doubt.
“No! Only on my voice…now walk over to the desk.” I frowned as I did as he asked, but the moment I started to waver he growled angrily,
“Fuck! You didn’t even look at it,” he hissed irritably to himself.
“Alright, now walk over to the window,” he ordered next and again I wanted to hold back, seeing it now as it started to emerge, beginning with the edges. Pieces of it started to knit together, like time was merely a thread that could be woven just as easily as it could be unraveled. The blue curtains, ones that matched the carpet beneath my feet started to come into focus.
“Go on…a little closer…a little bit more…” he urged, and his voice was becoming so strained, it was almost too painful to hear.
“Quickly now…quickly Amelia, run towards it now!” he said panicked and I did, I ran and the second I saw what he wanted me to see I screamed, now knowing that it was all a plot to find me! I knew it the second I saw that sign and felt the promised threat whispered in my ear,
“Finally… I’ve got you now!”
After this I woke up and screamed one name,
“Kingston plaza!” I bolted upright and before even giving it thought I jumped out of bed, tripping up over the bedding that tumbled out with me. I grabbed a hand to my pounding chest and tried to breathe through my panic. The sun was blaring through the window telling me it was some point during the day, and I bent forward to try and ward off the nausea I felt starting to rise. I also found myself stumbling towards the wall so I could hold myself up against the light-headedness. One I knew was from lack of food and water and no doubt the remnants of the dream.
I found my way to the bathroom and without looking at anything else found myself bent over the sink so I could