Page 66 of Praying for Rain

“That banner.”

Rain looks around the room. “Where?”

“Not here.” I point to the screen. “In the movie.”

“Really?”

I set her on her feet and stand up. “We should go.”

“Why? We just got here.”

“Because …” I gesture toward the screen as Jason Momoa snatches the bottle from the bartender and begins to chug. Then, I do a double take. The label on the bottle reads April 23. “Rain! Look!”

But, by the time she swings her head toward the screen, Jason has already smashed the bottle on the ground.

“Wes, I don’t see anything.”

“I think that’s the point.”

I grab her hand and sprint out of the auditorium and toward the main exit. The second we enter the lobby, four black-and-red banners unfurl from the ceiling, separating us from our escape. We’re running too fast to stop, so I sweep my arm out to push one aside … and watch the image of the horseman dissolve into tiny pixels of light around my hand. I turn around, but from behind, it looks just as real as the others.

“Wes, come on!”

Rain is tugging on my arm, but I barely feel it as I stare at the back of the floor-to-ceiling strip of fabric. Reaching out, I run my fingers along the surface again. I feel absolutely nothing as they pass through, leaving a digital trail of multicolored pixels in their wake.

“Look.” I do it again, this time sticking my whole arm through. “It’s not real.”

“Is that real?” The terror in her voice grabs my attention.

I swing my head around as the double doors burst open, and a smoke-spewing horse from hell charges through. The faceless, hooded motherfucker on his back swings his steel sword over his head in a flourish of swoops. I manage to push Rain out of the way before he strikes, closing my eyes and bracing for impalement, but when his blade slices through me, it feels like nothing more than a whoosh of air.

By the time I open my eyes, the horseman, the banners, all of it is gone.

It’s just me and Rain and a profound revelation.

None of this is real.

When I open my eyes, it takes me a minute to remember where I am. It’s dark outside, and I’m sore as fuck—both from digging graves all day and from sleeping on a plywood floor.

And probably from a few of the positions I twisted Rain into before I passed out.

I sit up and find her sitting with her back against the wall of the tree house and her legs straight out in front of her. She’s staring out the entrance, lost in thought. That is, until I stretch and five different joints all crack at once.

She jumps and turns toward me, her shoulders sagging in relief a moment later. “I was wondering when you were gonna wake up.”

“I didn’t even realize I’d fallen asleep,” I grumble, rubbing the back of my neck. “How long was I out?”

“I don’t know. An hour, maybe two?”

“And still no horsemen, huh?”

Rain shakes her head. “I’ve been hearing gunshots in the distance but no hooves. This shit is killing me, Wes. It wasn’t so bad when you were awake and …” She drops her eyes, and I can almost see her blush in the dark. “But, the whole time you were asleep, I’ve just been sitting here, waiting for the world to end. Why hasn’t it happened yet? What the fuck are they waiting for?” Her voice cracks at the end, and I know it won’t be long before she cracks, too.

I crawl over to her and kiss her worried brow. “I had a dream just now; it was like the nightmare, but … I think it was trying to tell me something. Come on.” I kiss her again before climbing down the ladder.

“No, Wes! Where are you going?” she shrieks, peering down at me. The whites of her wide eyes almost glow in the dark as they jerk left and right, looking for any sign of danger.

“I’m going to prove to you that there’s nothing to be afraid of. Come on.”

---