Blanket of Fear

“Eliza, baby, are you going to tell me what’s wrong?” Zacky asked her later that next day, pushing his hand back through her hair. “Are you still mad at me? Is that why you’re not talking?”

“No. I’m not mad at you, Zack,” she whispered, looking up at his face with a small smile. She felt tears forming in the corners of her eyes again when she remembered the nightmare, and Zacky brushed them out of her eyes before holding both sides of her face in his hands, his eyes looking down directly into hers.

“I can’t help you unless you let me in, El. Don’t shut me out. What’s wrong?” He asked her again, this time his voice softer; more compassionate. He was trying to help her, and he was being genuine. She knew that. She knew that all he wanted to do was help her, and it made her feel so damn guilty that she was hiding this from him. But she also knew that if she said anything to him, it was only going to worry him, and she didn’t want to do that. She sighed, and then shook her head.

“It’s nothing,” she murmured. “I love you, Zacky,” she added in a whisper, pressing her lips firmly against his before she pulled away from him. “I love you so much.”

“I know you do,” he told her, giving her a puzzled look. “What’s going on? There’s something you’re not telling me, Eliza. Just let it out.”

She was so damn tempted. She knew that he’d put her before everything else, and that he’d find a way to make her feel better about the nightmare. But she also knew that it would then bother him; that it would only add more to his plate, when he already had too much to deal with to begin with. She wasn’t going to do that to him.

“I can’t,” she murmured as she turned to walk away from him. She walked outside onto the deck, taking a chance to look out at the trees. She smiled when she saw the sun peeking through them, and heard the birds chirping in the air. Everything seemed so wonderful right now. Everything seemed so lovely, like nothing was wrong with the world she lived in. She heard the door slide open and turned around to see Leigh standing there, and she frowned, turning away again without saying another word.

She was starting to dislike the girl more and more as each day passed. There was something that Leigh knew that she wasn’t telling anyone. And she didn’t like it. The girl was already a threat since she’d had nameless experiments performed on her by Sean as it was; and now she was holding back secrets that could save everyone’s lives. Eliza couldn’t believe she had once saved the girl’s life. She wouldn’t do it now, and she wouldn’t feel guilty about it, either.

“You had the dream too, didn’t you?”

Eliza’s head shot up, and she turned to glare at Johnny’s girlfriend through narrowed eyes, her hands balling into fists at her sides. She wanted nothing more than to punch the girl in her face; to tell her to shut up and just stop hiding her secrets, but she knew that wouldn’t do anything to help anyone. Instead, she just glared back out at the trees, not saying a word. She had nothing to say to someone like Leigh right now; especially not when she’d just let on that she’d had some kind of dream.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Eliza quipped, not meeting Leigh’s eyes. Eliza felt the girl touch her shoulder, and she then brought her eyes down to look at Leigh’s. “Get your hands off of me, please.”

“You had the dream. Don’t lie to me, Eliza. I saw it too. I saw what you saw,” Leigh whispered to her, her eyes darting to the side quickly before she looked back up at Eliza. She wasn’t stupid. She knew that no one here liked her; that as each day came and went, Eliza herself was starting to dislike her more and more. But that didn’t mean she didn’t still want to help them all. Right now, this group was her only chance at a real life; at real survival. They were her only chance at finding a way to let her live a normal life in which she could die, if she so chose to do.

Eliza didn’t say a word, and then blinked. “It was just a nightmare. You don’t know anything about me, Leigh. Don’t pretend that you do.”

“You know it’s more than just that, Eliza. You’re smart. You know what you saw in that dream,” Leigh whispered again. “You know that she’s going to betray them all. You saw her point that gun at Zacky. She’s got to be stopped.”

“Just shut up,” Eliza snapped, unable to stop herself anymore. She was becoming more and angrier with Leigh as each moment passed, and she couldn’t hold in that frustration anymore. All she wanted was to forget about the nightmare she’d had, and now she had to find out that Leigh had had the same freak nightmare. It pissed her off, but on the same hand, it also worried her.

“Do you want Zack to die?”

The question was short and to the point, and Eliza turned her head so that she was facing Leigh once more. She narrowed her eyes, and then grabbed the front of the smaller girl’s shirt tightly before shoving her up against the fence, not bothering to hide the vehemence she felt for Leigh right now.

“Don’t you ever fucking say that again, Leigh,” she warned the girl before letting her go, backing away two steps. “You know damn well that I don’t want him to die.”

“Then she has to be stopped!” Leigh said in a little bit louder of a voice. “Look, I know that none of you trust me. Even Johnny is starting to become skeptical of me. I just want you to win this fight. I want you to help me live a real life,” she murmured before tears filled her eyes. “I can’t do that if Zack dies. I need your help, Eliza. None of them will believe me on my own, but if you…If you tell them about the dream, maybe they’ll take it seriously. Maybe they’ll believe me then.”

“It was just a nightmare!” Eliza retorted once again, throwing her hands in the air. “Nothing about it was real, Leigh. I’m sorry about what you went through, and I’m sorry that you can’t just end your pain and kill yourself like anyone else could. But you’re right. We don’t trust you, and we won’t believe you.”

“He’s going to die if you don’t tell someone, Leigh. Everyone is going to die, and then…then, he’s going to go after you. And he’s going to do the same shit to you that he did to me, only…You won’t be able to get away. He never makes the same mistake twice, Eliza. He let me get away, but if he gets you…you’ll never get away.”

Leigh’s words were creepy, there was no doubt about that. Eliza wanted nothing more than to just turn and leave, and not think another minute about what Leigh had told her. But she knew that wouldn’t happen. She knew that now that Leigh had spoken, everything she’d said would be engrained in her mind.

“What can I do, Leigh? I’m just his girlfriend. They won’t believe anything I have to say, either. Especially if it’s not about her being a traitor,” Eliza muttered, looking down at the ground. Leigh smiled when she saw that Eliza was starting to take her a little bit more seriously, and she sighed as she pushed her hand back through her hair.

“Follow the cookie crumbs. She’s got a trail, Eliza. Find it. Find it, and show them. Then they’ll have no choice but to believe you,” Leigh muttered before turning and walking away from Eliza without saying another word. She wanted to ask what she was talking about; to know what was going through her mind, but she knew that she couldn’t do that.

It was then that Eliza decided that she might as well try to find the trail that Leigh had told her existed. If it was the only way she could save Zacky’s life, and all of their lives, then she was damn well going to do it. Even if she had to do it alone.