Care For Me Not, I'll Hurt You Too Much

The knocking brings you out of your dream, harshly.

You stagger in your spot and kneel over, grabbing your head from the sudden rush of reality swarming down around you. You could feel a small throb in your temples that made you think a massive migraine was going to be coming, but don’t pay too much attention to it. Really, you had bigger things to worry about. Like just trying to figure out where the hell you had ended up.

The slight pressure on your eyes causes you to keep them closed as you still sway lightly in your spot, feeling all the rushes of reality slowly seeping out of your head as you try to make yourself more alert. You could still feel the way your face was puffy and your eyes were swollen from crying so hard. The small tingles running through your entire face made everything feel numb and alerted you to the fact that your eyes were probably red as hell.

You bring your hands up and poke and prod at your cheeks. One of them stung horribly as soon as you touched it, so you decided to leave it alone and just deal with the other. You were just trying to bring the feeling back into them while you wipe away the wetness that had accumulated there. You keep your eyes shut tight as they sting behind your sockets and burn the corners of your eyes slightly. You were still able to hear the wind whistling through the trees, but now with the added sound of thunder booming away in the distance, it all sounded even more menacing then before. You tried not to concentrate on that so much as you shake your head, hearing your hair whip around your face and against your ears. Small water droplets splash your face, making your jerk slightly in shock.

This brought to your attention that your hair was wet. You had no idea how that happened, and a small mental image of your face falling in the toilet or in the sink makes you wince. You knew that didn’t happen, but you didn’t know any other reason why your hair would be wet. There was a slight sound of a tap, tap, tap nearby that caught your attention, making you realize that it was probably raining. It sounded like the rain was beating against the glass of your window, but you suddenly weren’t even sure if it was your window you were hearing it tap against.

You feel a pounding in the back of your skull that suddenly makes you dizzy as you reach out and clutch onto the wall just to steady yourself properly. The pounding beats through your ears and makes everything sound muffled and the world a bit hazier. You knew that being out here alone and having no idea where “here” was is dangerous, so you tried to just block it all out and gain your bearings again.

You tried to concentrate, but it was hard with all the sudden injuries now presenting themselves to you. Then, there was something else that was bugging you. Something didn’t feel right. Something about the wall didn’t feel right.

Sure, it was like a usual wall. It was hard and flat and stood upright while you didn’t, but there was something else about it that wasn’t like it should be. It wasn’t the softer, smoother texture of the walls in your room. It was rougher, and grainier as you slightly stroked your finger across it. Plus, it was…cold…extremely cold. In fact, everything around you felt cold.

Where were you?

At this, you snap your eyes open and are revealed to a painfully familiar doorway and front porch. You didn’t even have to look around the darker streets or even turn on a light to be able to know where this doorway was. You knew, and it hurt.

You could feel your eyes grow wide as you stare shocked at the door, wondering how and why you were even standing here in the first place. You could feel the panic rising in you as you think of what it was that you were doing. What the hell were you doing here?

Faint memories of your bathroom greet you, but they only help in making you feel even more confused. Sudden flickers of light in the window next to the door catch your eye and you’re able to see the television on through the curtains, along with a much brighter golden glow drowning it out.

They’re home. The thought jumps into your mind and brings with it an unexpected and automatic feeling of relief.

But why should you care? You think. They don’t know you’re out here, and you’re not going to go in. Why should it matter to you if someone is here or not?

A bright beam of yellow light suddenly shines brightly on your face, making you squint and turn your face away. You step back, surprised, but have a suddenly strong urge to just bolt away from this place.

“Holy shit, Ken?” It was at the sound of his voice that you barely realized that the suddenly bright light was caused by Gerard opening the door to greet you.

Greet you? you wonder, feeling suddenly nervous and extremely confused. But how did he know you were there?

A sudden memory of you knocking floats in hazily as if it were from a dream. Then you remembered that the sound was the entire reason why you had “woke up”.

You panic and groan a little bit in frustration. You had really thought that you were dreaming at first. You thought that you probably passed out in your bathroom and your mind wandered off dreaming, pretending to bring you here where the dream began to fade. You figured that’s what happened, and you had later gotten up in still a haze and wandered about town until you regained reality. You didn’t know that your entire dream was what really happened.

The last thing you could vividly remember was lying down on the tiles in your bathroom. That was where you figured you fell asleep and began your dream. You could only remember faint images of you getting ready, and then walking downstairs. After that, your dream faded into another one. You were looking down the darkened hallway leading into your father’s room. A faint image of him charging at you, eyes blazing came after that. But you figured it was all just apart of your nightmare. You didn’t know that that’s what really happened.

Wait, it all really happened. You think to yourself, and remember seeing the hallway that lead to your father’s room. You remember seeing his charging form, and earlier when you touched your face it had hurt.

Holy shit! you start to panic, thinking that you were bloody and covered in bruises, and…standing in Gerard’s doorway!

You could feel yourself panicking, but before you could bolt and run away like you were planning to, an arm wrapped tightly around your elbow and pulled you in towards the bright golden light.