Eventide-Chapter 1

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CHAPTER ONE
NIGHTMARES

         I felt his heart beat slower and slower as the fangs popped through his skin.
         Blood—red, rich blood trickled down the side of his neck. The pain was excruciating, like two sharp knives cutting deep into his neck. The pain pulsed into me, slowly suffocating me, killing me. I tried to scream as the creature began to drain the life from his helpless body, but there was no sound.
         I shot up to a sitting position, shaking in terror, drenched in sweat—my short, dark hair sticking to my face. I lifted my hand immediately up to my neck. I sighed, relieved. “No blood.”
         I quickly jumped out of bed, and grabbed my shorts and shirt off the wooden chair sitting against the wall. Even though it was still dark outside, the full moon was shining brightly in the night sky, causing my room to be filled with its silver light that traveled through my bedroom window. I found them easily. I slipped them on and ran the few feet that separated me and my older brother’s bedroom across the hall.
         “Hunter!” I shouted, switching the light on as I stepped inside. I shut my eyes for a moment, shielding them from the brightness that invaded my vision. “Hunter!”
         He bolted upright, startled. The bed sheets slowly slid down his body exposing his bare muscular chest. I could see every ripple of muscle that were sculpted nicely in certain parts of his body I never knew existed. All that hard work my brother had put in over the years playing sports, going to the gym, and working out had really paid off. “Dante,” he moaned sleepily, running his fingers through his short, curly hair, and combing it back. Relief passed through my body. Glad that he was still alive. He rubbed at his eyes. “What are you doing in here?”
         “Thank God you’re all right!” I felt tears in my eyes as I ran over to my brother and hugged him tightly. I didn’t want to let go. Tears started seeping out my eyelids and roll down my cheeks. “I thought I’d lost you.”
         “Of course I’m alright, Dante,” he said a little confused but hugging me back nonetheless. His brown eyes searched my face. “Why wouldn’t I be?”
         I said nothing for a long moment. Then slowly and quietly, I said, “I had that dream again.”
         “What dream?” he asked, wiping some tears from my water-filled eyes. He knew very well which one I meant. The same dream I’d been having for the past few months. “The one where I...“ he broke off, and stared down at his light-blue sheets wrapped around his waist.
         I've had so many dreams (more like nightmares) of my brother for the past five months. They were always the same. Like re-runs playing over and over in my mind almost every night. The dreams consisted of different scenarios I didn’t understand that always ended the same—with blood.
         “Yeah.” I swallowed hard. My throat felt so dry like it always did every time I had a nightmare. Like a real choke sandwich, all peanut butter and no jelly. I shook my head. “It was horrible this time.”
         When the dreams had first started, the pictures hadn’t been so clear. All they showed me were the dark silhouettes of the figures standing in the distance like wax dummies you saw in Hollywood movies or Historical Museums. They just stared back at us as if planning something amongst one another in silence, waiting for the right moment to act on whatever they had decided. It was almost like they were playing a game of cat and mouse—sizing up their prey before the kill. I had thought it was just a dream like any other I’d ever had in my life.
         But after a month, they started getting worse. They had showed me more and more, little by little. I saw the same shadows as before, but this time one of the figures grabbed and threw what resembled a person. It was about an inch of a human body (the rest cut out of the picture) against something solid as if the person had weighed nothing more than a twig. After three months that’s when I saw it. The whole picture.
         A guy.
         But not just any guy.
         My brother.
         That was the first time Hunter had heard me screaming. My brother burst into my bedroom that night. He seemed terrified and told me later that he wondered what the hell was wrong with me. He had told me I was screaming and thrashing so hard underneath my covers that my bed was drenched in a puddle of sweat which covered my body from head to toe. My hands were so pale from having them shut tightly into two fists that Hunter thought I was going to lose them from all the pressure and blood loss. He admitted that he was afraid my screams would wake up our neighbors who already looked at us as if we were either crazy or ax murderers. It had taken my brother a few minutes to get me to stop and finally wake up. Hunter had said to me that he’d never heard me scream that loud since our parents’ incident ten years ago, when I was only six.
         That night I had told him everything. Everything about the nightmares I’d been having. How and when they started?  And why I was receiving them, I didn’t know. Hunter had told me it was going to be okay. That they were just dreams, nothing more. Of course, I hadn’t believed him then, and didn’t believe him now. There was something about these nightmares that kept me awake and terrified most nights, like they were some kind of vision—or worse—a warning.
         “It’s okay, kiddo,” Hunter said gently, using that fatherly tone he always used when I got scared or upset. The same way our parents’ had done when I was a child. The same voice I both loved and missed so much at the same time.
         Hunter placed his hands on top of my shoulders. “Nothing’s going to happen to me. I’m not going anywhere. I promise. We both know vampires don’t exist, Dante.”
         The image of the man floated at the front of my imagination, followed shortly by the fangs elongating, and sinking deep into my brother’s skin. I broke, and hot tears streamed down my face. “Oh God, Hunter! I could feel it as if it were really happening in front of me. And to my own body. I don’t know what I would do if I ever lost you. You’re the only family I have left.”
         “Look at me, kiddo,” he said, forcing a smile on his perfectly tanned face, trying to hide how he really felt about the whole thing like I wouldn’t see right through that facade of his. He was worried about me like any parent would be if one of their children was having nightmares. My brother didn’t know everything I went through. Or what I felt every time I experienced them. I had a feeling he wouldn’t want to find out either.
         I looked up at him, not meeting his eyes at first. Hunter continued. “I’m not going anywhere. Okay? You know I’d never leave you. It was just a dream, kiddo. It doesn’t mean anything.”
         I dried my eyes with the back of my hand. I knew he meant every word. I trusted him with everything I had. I took a deep, shuddering breath, and sighed. “I know, Hunter. That’s what you always say. But it feels so real. Every single time.”
         I ran a trembling hand through my hair. The smell of my own shampoo mixed with sweat and tears I had shed a moment ago filled my mouth with a salty, bitter taste. “I don’t know what to do, Hunter? Why is this happening to me? Why now?”
         “Dante I,” he quavered. My brother couldn’t think what else to say. Couldn’t think at all. My lips trembled in front of him. He sighed. “I don’t know.”
         We sat like that for a long time. Hunter started talking to me about how he would never leave my side no matter what. And how much he loved and cared about me. I should have known this, but I had never realized how much I really meant to him, until now. When we were finished talking he walked me back to my bedroom.
         “I’m sorry I woke you, Hunter,” I said once I got back into my bed. I pulled the black and white covers over my body, and up to my neck. I leaned over to the nightstand next to my bed and turned the black lamp on, giving the entire room a soft glow. I blinked. “The nightmares keep getting worse. Like they’re trying to warn me about something that’s going to happen. I can feel it, Hunter. I don’t know why. But I do. Something soon. Something evil. And I don’t understand what it’s all supposed to mean.”
         What if it was a warning? I wanted to tell him. What if my dreams (or nightmares) came true and my brother died like I had seen and witnessed myself? I didn’t want him to die. I couldn’t lose him too like I had my parents. Not when Hunter had everything he ever wanted. His life was on track. He was successful. A career he loved so much. And a little brother that meant the world to him. How could it all be over just like that?
         My brother pulled the wooden chair towards my bed and sat down next to me. He didn’t like to see me suffer like I had these past few months. He wanted to find the answers I was looking for. What we both were looking for. If we did, everything would have been okay. Hunter wasn’t a father. It wasn’t his responsibility to act as such. Our parents should have been the ones sitting next to my bed right now, comforting me and telling me everything would be okay. That it was only a dream. Nothing more. That they would eventually go away.
         Hunter and I both knew they wouldn’t. Everything wasn’t going to be okay. Our mother wasn’t here. And neither was our father. Not anymore. They were dead. And they were never coming back. It was Hunter’s responsibility now like it had been for the past ten years to take care of me and make sure I grew up strong and raised correctly.
         “Shh. It’s okay, kiddo,” Hunter regarded me with another smile. He shook his head. “You don’t have to apologize. Everything will be fine. Now go to sleep.”
         “What if—“ I started to say, still not convinced one bit.
         “It’s going to be fine,” Hunter interrupted me, running a hand through my hair which had dried off since I had bolted into his bedroom a while ago. He lowered his voice, almost to a whisper, “I can stay here until you fall asleep if you want me to.”
         “But—“
         “No, no ands, ifs, or buts about it, Dante.” He shook his head once again, and placed a kiss on my forehead. “Take a deep breath and close your eyes. It’ll be better tomorrow and the next day. You’ll see.”
         “I-I hope so,” I stuttered.
         “It will,” Hunter confirmed. What else could he say to me that I hadn’t heard already? I knew there was nothing else. All my brother could do was keep repeating himself. He went on. “Remember, I’m just across the hall. So if you need me again, I’ll leave my door open. Okay?”
         I nodded.
         After a few more minutes of talking and trying to stay awake, I bit my bottom lip thinking to myself. My brother’s words from earlier echoed in my mind. ‘Vampires don’t exist, Dante’. If that were the case, why did I have this strange feeling that I was onto something huge.
         I curled up onto my side and faced my brother defeated. I had so many unanswered questions, and was too terrified to admit my dreams would in fact come true.


Chapter 2 coming soon...