Trapped (þrumuveður)

I listen to her shallow breathing until it evens out and I feel that she's finally fallen asleep. I turn around, shoving my fists under my head to create a makeshift pillow for my head. I fall into a deep but rather troubled sleep, darkened silhouettes slipping in and out of them, talking in blurred voices that I can't recognize. Then I am transported back to my childhood.

----

Tammy's gone. I know she is, otherwise she would have come around tonight. I sit on my window sill, having pushed my shutters and the window wide open. I look up, facing the nightsky as if the answer to all my questions lies there. Somehow, somewhere. But I also know that it is childish to think so and that it is stupid to dream my life away. I should be asleep already, I have school tomorrow, but I am afraid that if I curl up in my bed now, she'll swing up on the branches as I am so used to her doing. That she'll see my closed window and turn right around again.

Or that she'll find me asleep and think that I've already forgotten. But I won't forget, I'll keep my window open now. Until she comes and finds me. But my father, I can't see his face. Why can't I see his face? He stands in the doorway and he sees me by the window. I can't see his face but I imagine it darkening in disgust. He comes right over to me and yells something. I hear him yell, right in my ear. But I can only hear a whirring sound where his voice should have been. It's like the sound a mosquito makes. It's loud and obtrusive and annoying. He shakes me, I believe that my brain has dislodged itself and is now hitting the walls of my head.

He doesn't stop shaking me, even as I begin to scream. But no sound leaves my throat. In fact, it's like I am underwater... I'm drowing, I'm drowning. I'm going under, my lungs fill with water. Help! I don't want to die. I can't just die. I see the surface, it's bright and friendly and I see the sun. But, oh, it's so far away. I reach, I kick, but to no avail. I keep slipping, my throat constricting as the salty water... why is it salty?

Can water even be salty? I have no idea? But the water fills my lungs, choking me. I'm dead. I'm dying. It feels good to be dead. There's no more pain here. But it's dark. And I'm alone. So alone. I breathe, I'm hyperventilating. So I'm not choking, but it's even worse now. Breathing hurts. Then I see her.

But I'm not by my window... not anymore. It's closed, why is it closed? I see her. Black, raven hair, arms pulling her from branch to branch, elegantly until she perches on the windowsill. But the window is shut. I see her turn back around and I let out a shout "Tammy! I'm here! I've over here! I'm not dead, I'm not dead!" But she doesn't hear me, or she doesn't want to hear me. And then, there's a sharp bang, something that sounds like an arrow but it's ten times louder. There's a lot of blood and she collapses, sagging like a sack of potato. There's blood everywhere. I scream, it seems never ending. It is never ending.

----

I can't breathe. I'm being suffocated, someone's trying to kill me. So I struggle, I kick and squirm, my eyes open but as of yet, unseeing. I have long since kicked off the raggedy blanket that had been covering my frame and I am freezing. But I hear her voice but it can't be. She's dead. I just saw her die. "You're dead, you're not real," I whisper, my voice strained and hoarse. But if she's dead, then why is she hugging me. I push my elbow backwards with as much force as I can muster in the situation, as I struggle to escape her embrace.

"You're d-dead." It's incredibly dark, I realize that it's not even dawning yet. But my eyes adjust, slowly, to the dark and her shape and forme begins to make sense. The walls of the house are familiar now. Of course. I am still trembling. The nightmare had been so real. But then I remember. Oh, God. She's got a fever, she's ill and I just elbowed her. It takes only a split second for those thoughts to register before I am by her side.

She wasn't on the ground when I fell asleep. So I figure that she has climbed down. "I'm sorry," I whisper, kneeling back down amongst the other scruffy blankets. "Are you okay?" I disregard that thought. "No, of course you're not. Is there... anything I can d-" but my question dies away as a cold gust of air tells me that we're not alone.

I turn, slowly, staying protectively in front of Tammy as the dark figure looms into focus. It's just like the nightmare all over again. Only this time I can be sure that it's real. It's my father. "I wanted to apolo - " He steps forward and he sees me, because his expression changes in a flash. I think about how we must look. Sweat beaded on both of our foreheads, my arm still half-way around her shoulders as we are hunched on the floor.