Slipping Into Darkness

by Rachel Wells

  Cheryl blinked at her, surprised at Sadie’s hostile tone right out of the gate. On a spiritual level relating to Sharon’s afterlife, she took this the most seriously between the four of them, while Sadie spent the least amount of time giving thought to the matter. Cheryl cleared her throat a couple times before she could raise her voice above a nervous whisper. She looked at each girl individually before speaking, “So, everyone had the dream, right?”

  This brought forth another unpreventable eye roll from Sadie. When Heather and Lisa both looked down before nodding, Sadie snapped at the delicacy of the whole thing. Her voice did nothing to hide her exasperation, “Of course we all had the fucking dream, Cheryl. Why the hell else would we meet here? I had the dream, Lisa had the dream, Heather had the dream, and judging by the way you’re tiptoeing around this, you had the dream, too. What of it?”

  Cheryl saw that she had run Sadie’s tolerance meter down to empty without broaching the real issue. She abandoned the careful lead up to her main point and suggestion of next steps; the veins twitching on Sadie’s neck and forehead forced her to jump into the middle of her explanation. “She’s not at peace! That’s what all of this—this bullshit means. We have to come clean. We know what happened and so does she. It’s her spirit, or soul, or whatever. We have to do something! Sharon would wa—”

  Sadie slapped her across the face so hard that the sound of the impact rang out in the room. Cheryl held her face with a permanent “O” formed by her mouth. The reaction to her question and afterthoughts felt outrageous by comparison. The sudden violence silenced her. As if she needed an alternative to closing her mouth, she covered it with the hand not pressed against her reddening cheek.

  Sadie spat when she spoke, “Shut. Up. Shut up! You don’t know anything, so stop acting like you’re the fucking authority on this!”

  Cheryl worked herself out of her stupor and closed her gaping mouth. She continued to rub her bright red cheek. Sadie was stronger than she realized; a bruise would form on Cheryl’s cheek over the course of the next couple days. Cheryl’s voice was quiet when she spoke again, almost at a whisper, “I’m sorry.”

  Sadie massaged the hand that had struck Cheryl. Her eyes glowed with simmering rage. This entire situation bothered her far more than she let on. She was sick of Cheryl’s mightier than thou attitude and Lisa’s tendency towards whining and crying in any high stress environment. Sadie had few issues with Heather, but she hated all of them for what was happening to her. She handled herself well, but it was tiresome for her to constantly quell a brewing storm of guilt, regret, and doubt. Now, with the intensity of the atmosphere around them after Sadie striking Cheryl across the face, they knew she was serious. The questions would stop from this point forth.

  Heather spoke first after another minute of silent tension and animosity brewing in the air. Her voice was even, but timid, “What do we do now?”

  Lisa jumped in, her whining replaced with a high buzz fervor. Her voice cracked at first and then carried on an octave higher than usual, “We just don’t sleep or we take short naps like that sleep cycling thing where you spend more time awake and only sleep for twenty minutes at a time like five times every day, right?” She looked around for approval from the others. Her eyes did not find anyone’s other than Sadie’s whose were still flush with anger. She continued despite the clear warning to shut up as Sadie had recently instructed Cheryl to do. “You know? That cycling thing? You go straight into REM sleep or whatever and it’s only twenty minutes and we could take turns and watch over each other and it’ll be fine. Plus! Plus we’ll have more time to do stuff during the day! We could get really productive as a side effect; wouldn’t that be great on top of all this? I think—” Heather cut her off by smacking Lisa upside the back of her head, like someone smacking their idiot cousin. Lisa whimpered, but did not cry as expected.

  “Lisa, shut the fuck up. You dream during REM sleep. If we only have twenty minutes of straight REM sleep five times a day, that’s five times every day that’s twenty minutes during which we experience intense nightmares without any shitty bookend sleep to help cope. Fucking think about it for two goddamned seconds, all right? Holy shit!” Heather huffed out a loud breath. She then took two more calming ones before planting her hands on her hips and turning back to Lisa. “Li, honey, it’s just a dream.” She turned to Sadie next, who met her eyes with cooling contempt. It appeared she was more willing to deal with Heather now that Cheryl and Lisa had both pissed her off in close measure to one another. Between the three of them, Heather had been the most reasonable throughout. She remained true to her growing reputation as such with her next address to Sadie, “Sadie, we play it cool, right? For all we know our dreams have synced up like our fucking periods, right?”

  Everyone breathed out nervous laughter, but only after Sadie did. A loose smile settled on her face. The fire in her eyes had burned down to coals by this point. This version of Heather—the one smacking Lisa and ignoring the lasting hurt Cheryl wore underneath her otherwise docile expression—was one she could deal with on a regular basis. “Right. Exactly right.” Sadie breathed deeply, noting how the others followed as though she were leading a yoga class. She was tempted to move into downward dog just to watch them mimic her movements. She admitted to herself that the boost in her power status since Sharon’s death was a nice perk alongside the sympathy from everyone else around them. Now that Heather understood the inconsequential value of the dreams and was making efforts to drill it into the heads of the others, Sadie felt she could relax somewhat. She held onto grudges with impressive commitment, but anything extending beyond some personal wrongdoing against her, she had no problem letting go of. So long as the girls around her held their shit together, this was something she would gladly scrape from her plate. In the end, she might even make efforts to transfuse out some of the bad blood that had cultivated between her and Cheryl. In the meantime, she would show them just how simple forgetting was. “I have the car, obviously. Who wants to go shopping downtown?” She swung the keys around her little finger in a few celebratory circles and beamed at the other girls. “Must keep up appearances.”

  ~ ~ ~

  The day was spent in lingering tension and discomfort amidst the girls. Without making an excuse, Sharon cut the trip short for the sake of escaping the tight ambience that filled her car. She was weary of wearing a smile when she still wanted to smack Cheryl a second or third time. The next few days would be spent with her phone off and her door locked. Sadie was done playing lawyer—or more accurately, Devil’s advocate—for the week. Her goodbyes to the other girls were short and curt. It was clear that she wanted them gone for the time being, so no plans for later in the week were made. The only person Sadie offered a genuine, but tired smile to was Heather. The last to be dropped off, she placed her hand on top of Sadie’s before exiting the car. It rested for a moment with comforting weight before disappearing to leave Sadie blissfully alone.

  With the day wasted away by Netflix and pointless surfing of the internet, Sadie decided it was time for bed. Thus far, she had kept the dream and all its pending horror out of her mind. Her awareness of it grew the further along she moved in her bedtime routine. She felt mostly fine brushing her teeth in front of the mirror and all right washing her face. Upon turning down the sheets, though, Sadie felt her heart speed up. Try as she might to ignore it, her body sensed her nerves and responded in kind. The hairs on the back of her neck and along her bare arms tingled a little as she crawled into bed. She took her time turning out the bedside lamp. The complete darkness meant she was committing to sleep and, most likely, to an encore of the tormenting dream. Despite being used to it after several nights, the constant menace of the dream and the knowledge that it would return gave it the power to retain an air of dread. Bit by bit, its reach grew each night; forever lurking in the back of Sadie’s mind and the dark of her bedroom. She flicked off the light with reluctance, but finally did so in response to her falling eyelids. Before drifting
off, she recalled wishing for a peaceful sleep by way of asking aloud for “that bitch to please leave her alone.” Her eyes shut with thoughts of Sharon creeping to the forefront of her mind.

  Sadie submitted to sleep in its entirety; and, as though she were conquering land left unmanned, Sharon covered and infested every part of Sadie’s mind. The dream swelled with an inarguable audacity and began to play out in Sadie’s subconscious.

  Sadie recognized her own room, even in her dream. The walls faded away into the background at Sharon’s appearance. The sound of her moist footsteps as they approached was familiar by now. Sadie observed, paralyzed. She waited for the horrible sound of Sharon digging into her own skin and opening herself up. She waited for the fish to fall from her gut and float away into the abyss of her flooding room. None of this occurred, though. Sharon stopped at the foot of Sadie’s bed and regarded her helpless form. Her unforgiving gaze matched the coolness of Sadie’s the night of Sharon’s drowning. A new level of fear wormed its way through Sadie’s core. It started when Sharon placed her molding hands on the foot of Sadie’s bed so that her feet were trapped underneath the blanket between them. Water oozed up from the imprints made by Sharon’s hands in the blanket. The longer she remained fixed in that position, the more water spurted up from Sadie’s bedding and enveloped her sleeping body. Sadie felt the water level rise as Sharon had felt it rise the night of her death. The liquid crept up until it slithered over her stomach and further covered her. She could feel debris grinding against her skin; mystery things floating by and grazing her. Her arms and legs cried out to move and pull herself out from the rising water. Her bed turned into a waterlogged coffin as it continued the ascent upward. The water reached the corners of Sadie’s parted lips. It was still a dream, but she could feel the water slipping inside of her and filling her lungs as though it had claim over them. All the while, Sharon loomed over Sadie and watched. She had never been this close to Sadie in the previous nights; now that she lurked just out of reach, Sadie could make out the more gruesome details of her sad, decomposing face. Along with chewing off the tips of her fingers and toes, small aquatic life had left multiple small punctures dotted along Sharon’s cheeks, as well. When she leaned further forward, it became clear that the flesh and soft cartilage of Sharon’s nose had been lost to hungry critters. Her nose appeared now as a triangular indent centered on her face. It gave Sharon a more skeletal, decaying aura than she had worn during previous evening encounters of this nature. Looking further down her face, chapped lips parted in a combination of a sneer and a snarl. It was as though Sharon could not decide between giving credence to her anger and betrayal, or to the perverse satisfaction she got from watching Sadie squirm. She resorted to a compromise of bearing her rotting teeth with a slight uptick in the corners of her mouth, indicating a degree of pleasure at the reversal of power roles. As she watched Sadie drown without protest, she lifted one of her hands from the foot of the bed. Remnants of loose flesh slid from Sharon’s hand when she removed it from its resting place. Her gray skin swirled around in the bottom of the handprint, which remained pressed into the sheets as though it had been pressed into mud. The hand moved closer and hovered above Sadie’s face, which was submerged below over a foot of water. With a heavy splash, Sharon brought her hand down to grip Sadie’s face. Sadie felt the skin slip back and forth on Sharon’s hand at every jostle. Her bony fingers found their way into Sadie’s mouth. With the same degree of difficult Sharon had experienced in manipulating her more intricate joints, she tried to do so now to grip Sadie’s lower jaw. The cracking sounds of her fingers echoed from within Sadie’s mouth and throughout her head. Sharon stopped wrestling with herself when tips of bone held a strong grasp on Sadie’s tongue, teeth, and one point below her chin. Had she been conscious and capable of responding in any way, Sadie’s gag reflex would have been working overtime to expel the alien extremities from her mouth. As it stood, she had no control anymore. She was but a babe in the woods with a wolf for a sitter. Sharon took full advantage of Sadie’s unusual level of exposure. She dug in and held fast, pulling Sadie’s head up a little bit to better look her in the eye. Even though she lifted her up, Sharon did not grant her the courtesy of entirely removing her face from the stale water. Sadie still drowned, trapped within herself. She met Sharon’s eyes, though. While the white of her eyes was clearly yellowed, the iris and pupil of her eyes were cloudy. She was staring at Sadie, but it was difficult to tell through the fog. Still holding her jaw, Sharon leaned in closer to Sadie so that, had Sadie been breathing, they would have shared the same air. Sharon stopped just above Sadie’s face, mere inches from her. Her dying hand had lost none of former strength. Sadie was unable to direct her eyes to any spot specifically, but she could take in everything and separate out the horrifying details. Right now, she focused on Sharon’s chapped lips. They were beyond chapped, though; they split and spit forth that familiar black tar blood of hers. Flakes of skin fell off without provocation and littered the water above Sadie like fish food. With her face at a horizontal angle, the blood from Sharon’s lips began to collect in a larger drop at the peak of her lips. It was a painstaking wait for Sadie as she took in the hovering angel of death—the one she was at least partially responsible for. If she could not admit to truths now, then the truth was too far gone from Sadie. Watching Sharon’s rotted, betrayed, incensed face above her, Sadie broke. Still fixated on the growing drop of thick blood on Sharon’s lips, Sadie admitted to her degree of culpability in the death of her friend. She knew that she had not, in fact, tried to save her. None of them had. As much as it pained her to do so, Sadie also admitted to the validation of Cheryl’s worry. Her self taught mantra of “It’s just a dream” was no comfort as she lay, trapped in the moment. Each time Sharon moved, she produced wet noises from her drowned corpse. Those sounds were more prominent now that she lingered so closely to Sadie’s face. They overpowered any thoughts left racing through Sadie’s head. It provided an appalling soundtrack as Sharon closed the remaining inches between her lips and those of Sadie. Sadie felt rough skin in contrast against a spongier backdrop. Sharon’s breath was overwhelmingly sour, even in the few seconds she spent connected to Sadie. When she lifted her head, she left behind the collected black blood on her lips to paint Sadie’s in a macabre game of dress up. She released Sadie’s jaw with the same difficulty with which she had latched on to it. When it came time to unbend her fingers, the cracks were like a long awaited response to the earlier bursts of bodily sound. Sharon righted herself and removed the hand still resting by Sadie’s covered feet. It, too, left a deep, muddied impression like the first. Sadie waited, still drowned and touched with a kiss of death, for Sharon’s next move. It happened without warning; but Sharon reenacted the dream of the five nights prior to this in quick time. She did not struggle with her failing body or go through the motions at a slow ceremonious pace. Instead, moments after standing, Sharon loosed a savage scream and abruptly tore herself open to spill the contents of her corpse into the water housing Sadie’s living corpse. It filled with sludge and other indistinguishable liquids before it gave home to the dead or dying, partly digested fish that fell from Sharon’s stomach.

  Sadie choked upon regaining consciousness along with control of her body and its functions. She sat up in bed, holding her hands around her throat as she continued to gag. She acknowledged the startling burden of water sloshing about in her formerly empty stomach as she coughed. Each hack brought a foreign body further up her throat, another mysterious appearance within herself in addition to the liquid. Sadie leaned over the side of the bed and continued to retch. Her stomach ached with the incredible effort it took for her to clear her throat. In a final push, she heaved, and vomited onto the floor. Sadie stayed tucked over the side of the bed, panting. When she found her breath, she then reached out to find the light switch. The illumination it emitted did not provide a pretty sight for Sadie to take in. Looking down to the hardwood floor, she inspected the departed contents of
her stomach. In the middle of a mouthful of dirty, lagoon water, Sadie saw one, loose, algae-covered tooth. “Oh, fuck.”

  END.