A Broken Fate by Cat Mann
Chapter 1
Pattern
My toes were cold. I pulled at the covers, my hand frantically searching the other side of the bed for comfort of some sort and my fingers dancing rapidly along the edge of the mattress. I found myself to be alone and the disappointment in this discovery was quickly replaced by absolute fear. My heart pounded rapidly in my chest and my pulse thumped deafeningly behind my ears. Screaming out, I jumped awake from a night terror, causing my ear buds to rip forcefully from my ears. My cell phone made its daily, overly dramatic plunge from my tossed blankets onto my bedroom floor where it landed with a ceremonial thunk. I had a most terrifying dream, one that ended with the death of my mother in a car crash. Running from my bedroom, I searched for her with hot tears streaming down my cheeks, panting breaths and sweaty palms. My feet pounded to a halt in the living room where I found her sitting, reading a book.
“Mom,” I shrieked, startling her.
“Ava, what’s the matter?” She looked up over her tattered copy of Tolstoy’s The Devil, her forehead creased in a deep v with alarm and concern.
In a panic, I yelled, “Mom, please! Tell me you won’t go to the fundraiser with Dr. Spruce tonight! You can’t go! I had a dream and it was so real. Please, you cannot get in that car tonight or you will die. Promise me you won’t go!”
She pulled my shaking body onto her lap. Shushing me, quieting me down with soothing words.
“Ok, Ava, I promise I won’t go.”
An unsteady breath of air streamed from my pursed lips, collapsing my puffed cheeks. She held me tight in her Mom-warm arms. Breathing in her sweet scent, I ran my fingers through her soft hair.
“Mom, I love you so much. Please don’t ever leave me,” I begged.
“I won’t leave you today,” she promised, then brushed the wayward wisps of hair off my face. “Tell me more about your dream.”
“Ok,” I explained to her in detail what I saw in my sleep.
“In your dream, did Spruce die, too?”
“Yes!”
For a moment, the corners of her mouth turned up in a smile. Her eyes were triumphant, then she blinked and the blink swept her emotions away.
“What other dreams do you have?”
“Umm...” I felt unsure; never had I been encouraged to talk of my nightmares.
“It’s okay, Ava. Tell me. I want to know.” Her voice was sweet, convincing.
“I walk in strange halls. People cry for me to come into their rooms. They ask me to let them die.”
“Do you?”
“No … I don’t know. My head hurts, Mom. I can’t think.”
We spent the day together at home and time passed in a haze. I had a pounding headache and I was very tired. Every time I closed my eyes, I was blinded by white light. In my sleep, I could feel hands touching me, caressing my hands, arms and face but when I tried to focus, no one was there. Unfamiliar voices filled my ears; people were begging me to wake up, to open my eyes. I tried to scream but each time I opened my mouth, I woke up again and I felt woozy and confused.
Each time I awoke, I searched frantically for my mom to be sure she had kept her promise. Each time I found her in the same place, in the living room with her book in her lap.
“Promise me,” I begged of her over and over. “Promise you’ll stay with me.” She promised and then questioned me again. She asked me questions about my life that I could not answer. Questions about love.
“What is it like?”
“What’s what like?”
“Love, Baby. What’s it like for you to be in love?”
“I wouldn’t know.”
I could feel heat on my face from my blush. Looking down, I stared at my knotted fingers in my lap.
My mom tapped gently on my temple.
“You may not know in here, but you know in here,” and she moved her finger from my temple to my chest, over my heart.
I looked back up at my mom. Tears stung the back of my eyes my throat was tight with emotion.
“My heart feels heavy. I am longing for something, but I don’t know what or who it is.”
“Oh, honey.” My mother rocked me back and forth, hushing my sobs away.
“Adrian told me this would happen. I am so sorry. I tried to hide us, keep us safe. I failed us both.”
I wanted to ask my mom who Adrian was, and what he told her, but I drifted back asleep before the words could form. My nightmare and the blinding headaches lasted for three days and would not leave me. Each morning, I searched the bed for something, some kind of solace or warmth. And when I found nothing there, my heart crumbled and I would wake in a panic.
I stayed at my mother’s side every waking moment, unwilling to let her out of my sight. She asked me more questions that I did not have the answers to and I asked her questions that she would not answer. We reminisced about happy times we had spent together. Often I found myself in her arms just weeping, begging her to stay with me. On the fourth day of my nightmare, she made me no promises. She repeated the odd notion that I was in love and was needed elsewhere.
“Ava, I have been selfish keeping you here with me.” Tears filled her warm brown eyes. “You are not mine to keep anymore and it is time I give you back.” Holding me tight, she rocked me like a small child.
“What are you talking about?” I demanded, sitting up in panic. “I’m not leaving you; stop talking like this!” My confusion caused my head to throb and pound in my ears.
She stroked my hair and then held my face in her hands. She stared into my eyes and turned very serious. Dropping her hands away from my face, my mother took my left hand in hers, turned my hand over and was overcome with emotion. Resting the back of my hand in her palm, she pointed to my wrist with fervor. I looked down at my bare skin; nothing was there. Tapping the inside of my wrist, she said softly but with determination, “You aren’t safe. You aren’t done. Be careful who you trust, Ava.”
“What?”
“It’s coming … it is time for you to wake up.”
“I am awake. Stop it! You are scaring me!” I screamed and choked on my sobs.
“Ava, Baby, I love you so much, but you have to listen to me. Ari is waiting for you, Ava. You have to wake up.”
“Who?”
Kissing me one last time my mom whispered a goodbye and then she was gone.