Courage

by Caitlyn
(Washington)

What inspired me to write my story is all the courage that people had to write theirs. The only other people who I trusted to tell this story to were my best friends Riley, John, Madeline. I swear this is so horrible for me I haven't even told my family about it at all. I don't think I ever will. Unless it tells me to.

My dreams always, always, always happen around my birthday. But the older I get, I notice that they are getting even more frequent. It's always the same dream, all of my friends in this windowless, white room. I'm also in the room, but I notice this glare, so I walk towards it and I bonk my head straight into the glass wall. Then these hooded figures walk into the room with my friends on the other side of the glass wall. There are five of them. I can't see their faces, and they are all men at exactly the same height. Around six feet. They move with this kind of unnaturalness that runs chills down my back whenever I think about it.

Then comes the worst part: all five men grow steely bronze talons and start slashing away at my friends, meanwhile I am drowning to my death while another hooded figure offers me cookies. No joke. While the my side of the room is filling up with water one of them offers me cookies on a silver tray.

I scream at him to go away but he stands there like a statue. I know that I can't break the thick wall of glass that separates me from my friends as it is too thick for my wiry arms. But now I'm completely submerged in water and my lungs are filling up with water, even when I try to hold my breath, the water pushes up my nose and into my lungs. I try to break the glass anyway, but I know it's no use. I get one last look from my friend Madeline, her mouth gaping open like she's screaming, then her body goes slack and there's a lifeless look in her eyes as blood trickles down the sides of her mouth, dripping onto the floor as she's being dragged away.

I can't breathe. I'm dying. I know I'm dying, but I can't die. And it's soooooo painful. All I want is for this to be over as I watch the lives of my friends get slashed away by these unknown people.

And then I wake up, but it's not over. I still can't breathe, nor can I move. Someone whispers in my ear, but I can't understand whatever it is its telling me. It continues to talk to me for what feels like thirty minutes. But I find out its only been thirty seconds because not even a whole minute has passed by or my little sister would've woken me up with her loud music.

Please tell me what to do, or how to get rid of these nightmares that haunt me. I have no idea how to get rid of them because I've tried everything I could think of. The more I try to get rid of them the more often they happen, and something tells me that these aren't any ordinary nightmares. Ever since I've moved to Washington they started to happen.