Word Count: 1,937
Warnings: None
Notes: Second Edit.
Created for the Tropetember Event - Plagued by Nightmares
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Before she opened her eyes, she could feel the wind on her face, swirling around her. It smelled sweet, almost hypnotizing. She was in the middle of a field of poppies, red, intense. ¿Dangerous?
Her fingers caressed the petals that swam between her fingers, a red velvet fluttering in the wind. Her movements were slow, as if she were still asleep. The flowers sang to her to stay and dance, but she could not hear them well.
The dreamy moment was broken by intelligible whispers that followed her wherever she went. No matter the distance, no matter the moment, she could not run away from them. She didn't even remember how or why she had come to that field, and continued with her eternal walk. She walked through the poppy field until she came to a shabby path. So hidden in the dirt and undergrowth, she wouldn't have noticed it if it weren't for the voices in her head.
She followed it until she came to a small hut on the top of a hill, surrounded by trees. The cabin looked simple, small, one-roomed, clear windows reflecting the sun at her back. The voices were happy, so was she. Maybe this was the destination of her eternal walk, it had to be. It had to be. The sunset sky painted it in reddish hues that signaled the inevitable onset of night. If she liked anything less than having voices in her head, it was being alone at night in a forest. Or so she thought.
She knocked on the door five times, as she had been taught, and waited and waited, but they never opened the door. Strange, they were waiting for her, for sure. She could feel the uneasiness of the voices, rarely quiet, and decided to pass without thinking too much about it. Without making noise, without waking up. She knew it was wrong, but she couldn't help it.
She checked the time and saw that it was 12:34. Of course, it was too early for them to be home. The interior of the cabin was truly to her taste, with rustic but fine details. She went to the kitchen for a cup of tea, familiar with the layout of the cabin. How did she know the location of the glass cups, the table, the owner?
Wasting time, time. The voices in her head used to try to get her attention more at night, time was always her favorite subject, so she always went to bed early. But she didn't dream. She didn't dream? She dreamed, a lot. How strange.
Seeing the glasses, the amount of silverware, and chairs around the table, she realized that she lived with someone. She was glad; she didn't mind being alone. Now that she was waiting for someone, she poured herself a calming tea. Hot so fast, what a nice booth. Calming the voices, she didn't want to be scared. Wait, to scare them, yeah.
Who was she going to meet again? Never mind, when they arrived she would remember.
She sat in the dining room, taking sips from her small cup as time passed, and the night covered everything in black. She looked at the time again, 32:10. Almost here, she thought. Suddenly her hands began to shake, she felt cold and the sensation of fear flooded every inch of her body. The voices shrieked like mad, and she felt she could almost understand what they were saying. Clear as water, clear as mirror. ¿Mirror? As she tried to concentrate on understanding the words in her chaotic mind, the entrance door slowly turned.
Strange, she hadn't heard their footsteps.
The door opened and from it a handsome man with brown hair and dark eyes walked in. He smiled, surprised to see her.
"Love, I had told you to wait for me in the poppy field. I know how much you don't like this place." The man spoke with a husky voice, a charming smile and soulful eyes. She felt like running, throwing up and fainting all at the same time. She couldn’t help but take a second look out of confusion. Since when had she ever dated someone this handsome? But the more she looked into his eyes, calm returned. Like a sweet poppy calming tea.
"Sorry, I just felt the need to come to the cabin. Oh! I'm sure you're thirsty, I'll make you some tea." She suddenly stood up and turned her back to him to go to the kitchen, however, she didn't even take three steps before he grabbed her arm and turned her around.
“Love! Don't bother, why don't we sit down, and you tell me about your day?” The words made sense, but instead of seeing his lover, he now saw a beautiful woman, with reddish hair and full lips. The only thing that remained the same were the eyes. Calming, almost hypnotizing eyes. “It's still early, let's talk and in a little while I'll make dinner.”
Early? She took a peek at the clock in the room. 14:18. She turned quickly to the window, it was still dark outside. It didn't make sense, last time she checked, it clearly said 32:10. How long had it been? Why was it still dark? Who was this woman?
An excruciating pain surged through her mind, so much so that she bent down, almost falling into the woman's arms. As her gaze was on the ground, looking at ‘her’ feet, she could see it steadily changing. High heels, boots, goat's feet.
“Honey, are you okay?” The voice as well as the body was changing. Honey, it said, and there she realized that she has never heard her name out loud. She has a name? Right? The voices in her head were now so loud that she had to use all her strength and concentration to stand up, look at them in the eye, and pretend, saying in a coy voice.
“Darling, why didn't you say my name? I feel kind of disappointed.” The voices suddenly dropped, leaving only a high-pitched whistle. The now blond man smiled angelically, longing for something. “What are you talking about honey, how can I if you won't tell me? Are you ready to share it to me?”
Her heart pounded at the top of her lungs. Bathroom. Bathroom. Bathroom. Go to the bathroom. The voices in her head sounded evenly, giving her an out. She smiled sweetly at that. “You're right, it's time. I'd like to touch up my makeup for the special occasion, I'll be back in a moment." He laughed, delighted, as he heads to the kitchen to prepare the promised dinner, the sounds of knives could be heard as she turns to go into the hallway of the cabin. She checked earlier, there were no knives in the kitchen. She, again, glances sideways at the clock. 9:85. There is no time either.
She walks briskly, letting her footsteps be heard as much as possible until, after walking who knows how far, she can see a door with a light. Assuming it was the bathroom, she rushes in, bolting the door. She turns to check, it's an ordinary bathroom, but the voices in her head start screaming once again. A set of denial and despair that almost makes her fall over again, so she grabs both hands on the sink and discovers the source of the agitation of the voices. There is no mirror.
What she feels were just seconds later, footsteps are heard towards her.
“Did you find what you were looking for, honey?”
The sounds of the knives, non-stopping. The shifting voice of the thing was approaching rapidly. Soon, a way out! Agitated, she began to check the bathroom, pulled back the bathroom curtain in search of something to defend herself with, and discovered another door.
Confused, she opened it when the voices echoed with joy, she continued running between corridors. Endless corridors and doors, no matter how much she ran, or how much she banged on the windows she found, she couldn't get out. A macabre laughter could be heard from time to time, and she was about to collapse from exhaustion. Just when she thought she could take no more, a door appeared that drove the voices that had been silent in the chase, totally mad.
She went running through the door and turned around to lock it. It was a bedroom, finally the endless corridors were over, however, there was only a bed and a couple of drawers. She opened the drawers and all she found was a rusty key. The voices screamed louder and louder, and she gasped. The door began to shake as if it were being hit on with a massive force, she panicked and hid under the bed. Down there, among cobwebs and dust she felt something circular, she took it in her right hand and saw that it was a small hand mirror. The door sounded about to crack, she opened the mirror, and looked through it. She could see a darkened room, and from the top of the mirror she catches a glimpse of a young woman asleep on a bed. Turning and gasping for air. Her.
“Love.” Hummed the now unrecognizable voice. “You can't escape.” The door had been broken, leaving a small gap. That thing was reaching its shoulder through the gap to get to the doorknob. The voices in her head had lost control once again, and she began banging on the mirror with all her might under the bed.
“Open up, open up!” The sound of the doorknob, while minuscule among so much noise, rang stridently to her ears. "Open your fucking mind!!!"
Her voice and the voices in her head synchronized as the mirror shattered into pieces, and her surroundings begins to spin uncontrollably, she felt a tremendous vertigo, while listening to a non-human growl in dissatisfaction. She opened her eyes.
A young woman wakes up in the space of her room, takes a deep breath and runs one of her hands across her sweaty forehead, touching a small fragment of mirror. Her mirror dangles above her head in tatters. She sighs as she stands up, walking to the mirror across her bed. She looks out and sees the star-filled nightscape outside her window. There are no voices.
“Ugh, again.” She tosses the broken mirror into a trash can beside her bed, filled with broken mirrors, and goes to the bathroom. The alarm clock on her drawer marking 95:02.
Wiping the sweat from her forehead with a towel under the yellowish light of that tiny bathroom, she stops to look at her hands, full of cuts, new and old. She guesses as she looks up, the vision she can't escape even in her wildest dreams. In a dream within a dream.
A mirror sits above the sink, inside a lockable glass box, with a completely rusted lock. She had been so close this time, if only she had screamed louder when she had the key in her hands, she might not have left it.
In the bathroom mirror there is not a reflection, but another 'her' asleep, in a hospital bed. Her monitors ticking slower and slower. She didn't know how much time she had left. “I need that key soon.” She opens the compartment under the sink, and where there should be bathroom accessories or tubs, dozens of mirrors of different sizes fill the compartment to the brim.
She pulls out another mirror, walks out the bathroom, and place it one more time above her bed.