Chapter 50.
It was a peaceful sleep, warm and comforting, nothing confusing or disorientating at first. She was walking through a garden, riotous colour surrounding her, flowers full bloom a feeling of utter contentment. As she moved further, a wall revealed itself, almost from nowhere, a door. Pale blue wood with a golden frame, a spiral knob in the middle of the door and a delicate hand as a knocker. Rebecca reached out and knocked, the door gave a crack and she pushed forward. Now, she stepped through and into the dark interior of what seemed to be a nightclub, the muffled throng of music in the background, loud and oppressive, dulling her senses. As she moved forward, body after body, hot and sweaty pressed against her, she pushed through noticing a sense of familiarity about the place. It had been the nightclub that she had dreamt of before. This time the faces were all masked, strange and contorted faces looming down at her, eliciting a sense of smallness in her. The crowd closed over her more as she fought her way through. To the side of what seemed to be the dance floor she saw a staircase that led up to the glass balcony she had seen before, glancing up, she saw him. The mysterious stranger from her previous dream. This powerful, elegant figure stood watching her, and like everyone else he was also masked. She felt strangely drawn towards him, she knew deep inside that she needed to get up there to him. She needed to find out what secret he held for her. Once again, she pushed her way through the crowd to get to the staircase. She looked down at her body, she was wearing the white dress that she had been sent, realising it must be Halloween, she felt her face and there it was, she too was masked. Was this the man that had sent her the invitation?
Fighting her way through the crowd, being pushed and shoved by those around her. When she eventually reached the large staircase that led to the balcony her dress had been torn, and her mask pushed off. She straightened herself up and put her foot on the first step, and then the second. And as in her previous dreams, time seemed to stand still. Every action she made was exaggerated, like she was seeing all of the frames individually, all at the same time. Each step felt harder and harder to achieve as she neared the top. The door was in front of her.
Reaching out once again, she turned the handle and it opened. Stepping inside the room, the masked man was waiting for her. He held out his hand in offering to her, she walked forward towards him. As she reached out to take his hand, she could hear someone behind her calling her name. Turning, she saw Stevens standing in the doorway with his gun in his hand. Everything stopped, silence, not a sound could be heard in the nightclub below, just her laboured breath as panic began. She felt a the fingertips of the masked man touch her hand, her head turned to look at him when she heard the loud bang of a gunshot. Once again, the searing pain erupted in her back and radiated outwards. Her body crumpled inside as she fell to her knees, and then collapsed. Lying on the floor she could hear the muffled voices above her and an alarm ringing, somewhere in the background was a constant ringing sound. She closed and opened her eyes again to find that she was safely in bed in her own room. A sickening sensation stirred in the pit of her stomach; this had been the second time she had dreamt that the man she was falling for romantically had killed her. But the comforting feeling of being in her own bed, and in her own room made her relax.
Somewhere in the distance she could still hear the persistent ringing sound, realising it was her mobile. She threw off the covers and swung her feet out of bed. But as she fumbled for her phone, the call ended, an unknown number. She shrugged, reconciling that if it was important, they’d leave a message, setting the phone back on her nightstand before collapsing back on the soft bed. She was awake now and this time she was going to stay that way. Perhaps a humanising shower would do the trick. She had a free day then to do whatever she liked. But as she had already been shopping the day before, the outside world held no attraction for her, no, there would be no point in going out today again. This was a day for kicking back and chilling out. Listening to some music and maybe rabbit hole online ‘research’, maybe even watch some half-baked slushy romantic movie. The possibilities of nothingness were endless.
She wandered into the bathroom and switched on the shower, once again the thought plagued her “why on earth would he want to kill ME?” She shoved the thought it to the back of her mind. Chalked it up to inner fear of committing to a relationship, her natural state trusted no one, and maybe that was tangled somewhere in her psyche. She walked through into the bedroom still a bit dazed from sleeping so late to leave out clean clothes. She fished around in her underwear drawer and pulled out her comfy but sexy smalls and laid them on the bed. Then riffled through another drawer and unearthed a pair of slouchy bottoms and casual t-shirt and set them out next to her underwear. This wasn’t a day for dressing up. In fact, it was exactly the opposite. But the sexy undies were just in case she had a visitor. In the event of her young and very handsome detective calling around unexpectedly, she would at least be halfway prepared. Not that she was expecting him. But she told herself that a girl can never be too careful.
She stepped into the shower and washed herself down. The refreshing scent of oranges wafted through the steamy air as she lathered up every inch of flesh she could get at. Then shampooed her neat and tidy bobbed hair before making sure it was silky smooth with conditioner. She looked after herself well and wasn’t afraid to admit to her little obsessions. She liked to have a shower when her day didn’t go the way she planned. She liked to think of it as washing all of the frustrations of the day down the plughole, removing them from her body and her mind. And it worked for her.
When she had finished cleansing her body, she emerged from the shower feeling all sparkly clean and renewed. She wrapped herself up in the warm and fluffy towels the were an instant comfort. Then brushed her teeth and finished cleansing her skin before sauntering into the bedroom to dry off, rubbing frantically with the towel all over her skin until it was glowing red and she could feel that there wasn’t so much as a trace of moisture left on her body. Now completely revived by it she got dressed. She wanted to see if Cyprus was about. And no doubt he would be looking to get fed. As she strolled into the kitchen, she noticed for the first time since she had woken what time of day it actually was, she could hardly believe her eyes as she read on the clock that it was three in the afternoon. The day had drifted past her without her realising.
She opened a tin of cat food and put it into Cyprus’ dish and left it for him, then made a cup of tea. Forcing herself to eat some lunch she moved into the living room to switch the laptop on. After logging in, she scanned her playlists for the appropriate choice of music, this was definitely a day for the bluesy sounds of Nina Simone and Billie Holiday. Blasting out the sultry tones through the speakers so that there were no empty spaces left in the apartment. She settled herself down mug in hand and opened her browser, sifting through marketing emails and checking out the latest ‘Halloween’ themed offers.
Somewhere in the back of her mind the word ‘Vampire’ kept chiming. Unable to shake it off she decided to amuse the deep-rooted thought. Opening a fresh search, she typed in V A M P I R E. And as with the previous attempt, it threw up the run of the mill websites that she had found before. Sites filled with merchandise, custom fang kits, blue tinted glasses, contact lenses, and of course the traditional velvet frilly shirts that all vampires were trademarked to wear. It was everything a person would need to try and play dress up. She found a guide to being ‘Living Vampire’ and how to spot impostors, the people out there that only pretended to be ‘Living Vampires’ and what things they might say to lure you into danger. It resembled the old-fashioned chat rooms where people could go into and live out their fantasies, and this was their helpful information on staying safe. She physically cringed at the idea and quickly went back to the search engine. Maybe she was searching for the wrong things.