Chapter 1
It’s nearly 3 A.M. I look at the clock for the last time. I will be gone soon, and then I will be there. Bits and pieces of the previous day bleed into this new space; people, events, and places, that I was and wasn’t thinking about as I drift. Some of them went before me- what had already been stuffed into my subconscious. The previous day is meeting with the close and distant past. I haven’t fully joined them yet, but I soon will. I start to see visions as I slide down the tunnel, like slipping through a vortex into a different dimension. Reality and imagination collide. I’m there.
I’ve been in this same gas station in dreamland previously, before I started letting you come with me. It’s based off a Hucks convenience store back home, but with a dark twist. It’s like a world halfway between here and the upside-down from Stranger Things. This Hucks is smaller and dingier than the real one. The bell rings as I walk in, but instead of going for the fried chicken near the back right of the store like I did in dreamland months ago, I set my eyes on the cookie display immediately to my right upon entrance. It’s one of those glass displays that should be filled with donuts too, but it’s only cookies. I know there were different kinds, but all I can focus on is the M&Ms ones. They aren’t any larger than a non-dream M&Ms cookie, but the M&Ms themselves are huge. It’s like they are in 3D sticking out of the top of the cookie begging me to eat them. I don’t grab any quiet yet. I want to go find some milk to go with it. I then realize I only have three dollars and fifty cents. That’s not enough for milk and cookies. Screw it. I’ll just get the cookies, but what are cookies without milk?
I walk back down the third aisle then cut right to go back to the 3D M&Ms, when, bam! Someone runs into me. For whatever reason, I still have the money in my hands, two-fifty in change and a one-dollar bill. I’m a dumbass. I should have put the money in my pocket. The quarters go flying and roll on the stained black and white tiled floor that is mostly black due to streaks. Why the hell was it in my hands? Usually, I’m better at realizing things while I’m dreaming and I correct them. Lucid. Vivid. Not now though, and it was about to cost me big and set the ball in motion.
It’s a bully. Oh, yeah, I forgot to tell you, I guess I’m back in high school, or maybe I just morphed into a high schooler right when the change started to fly. I don’t think I see who the dick head is. I don’t think it’s any one particular person. I just know how I feel when I look up at them. I think it’s a combo of many of the assholes from high school, not that I was picked on. I tried to be friends with everyone.
Somehow, we rewind. The change is back in my hand, or maybe I picked it all up and then the asshole bully made me give it to him. He punches me in the gut and disappears. It sucks, but I’m not mad at him. I’m determined to find another way to get at least two of those damn cookies.
That’s when my old friend, Brittany, from high school, shows up. She’s a little older though when she arrives, probably the age of the last time I saw her a few years back. Shit, I’m not sure how long ago that’s been. Five? Ten years? Anyway, she’s come to the rescue. I tell her what happened and all of a sudden, we’re like two detectives on a case trying to figure out a way to get the cookies out of the case and into our mouths without payment, and without notice. I guess she doesn’t have any money either. We are about to be thieves- cookie burglars if you will.
She causes a commotion back by the beer coolers, causing the attendant to come over to her, and whala! I successfully stuff two cookies in my pocket. They crumble a bit, but “it’s all good,” I tell myself. “We can still eat them.”
There’s no payoff. I don’t remember eating the cookie. Is it even possible? Can you taste things in your mind while you dream? I guess we got caught and kicked out of the store. Not sure. Next thing I know we are outside. It feels like we are back in the upside-down, the wind starts to blow, the mind flayer is coming to this world in between. Is that where dreams take place? In between.
Time to leave the bizzaro gas station and go home. One problem. I don’t have a car. Not to worry, Brittany does, but now she’s ashamed of me. Why? Will she give me a ride? Maybe she’s embarrassed by me because I roped her into stealing cookies, or because other kids show up as we are leaving, and she doesn’t want to be seen with me. I think it’s the latter. The kids go in, get what they need, and leave. I get Brittany to confess. It was because of the kids. I don’t understand. I wasn’t a geek or a loser in high school. I was friends with everyone. I’ve always been in the middle. It’s who I am. I’m mad at her, but I don’t show it. I have no wheels and I need a ride home. She finally agrees to take me. There’s a lapse. I either slipped out of REM or forgot what happened during that time. I don’t know how long I went without knowing. Then, all of a sudden, out of nowhere, as we are about to get in the car, demons appear. I can’t see them, but I can feel them. They claw at my back. I wince. The pain is real. Wake up! Wake up! I reach my arm over my shoulder and rub my back. I wince again. I bring my arm in front of me and look at my hand. It’s covered in blood. I get in and slam the car door shut. The Demons want in. They want me. They want us. All of us. “Go, Brittany! Go!” I yell, fearing for my life.
She starts her car and we hightail it out of there. We head south down one of the main side streets towards the bridge you take that leads you to the country, to my house. Home seems like the safest place. Doesn’t it always? The urge to get to my house intensifies. The chase is real. They are getting closer. I wake up. I look down at my hand, expecting it to be covered in blood, but it’s clean. My back aches from an invisible pain, but there’s no scratches.ing here…
