Page 11 of Victorious Vice

Reality slowly sinks into me.

I am not in a hospital. I am home, safe and warm under piles of blankets in my own bed. The rhythmic ticking of the clock on my bedside table lulls me back, bringing with it a sort of comfort.

“The dream…” I murmur to myself as I rub my hand over my fuzzy head.

I shake off the remnants of fear that gripped me so tightly just moments ago.

That voice.

That haunting whisper telling me to remember.

To remember what?

I reach out blindly in the dark for a glass of water sitting on the bedside table. The condensation makes it slippery. I bring it to my lips, the water cool and refreshing as it trickles down my parched throat.

It’s not the first time I’ve had this dream. I had versions of it a lot during my cancer treatment. I always assumed it was a side-effect of the chemo.

The dream is always so vivid.

Too vivid.

The sterile walls of a hospital room, the relentless ringing of a phone, the lack of color at the end…

And Vinnie.

Vinnie’s face that disappeared in front of me and sent me hurtling back into that hospital bed.

That’s new. Of course, I didn’t know him when I had the dream during my treatment.

And that familiar feminine voice… The voice that told me to remember. That’s new, too.

I close my eyes tightly to dispel the images, but they refuse to be erased. The ticking of my clock grows louder in my ears, each tick-tock a reminder of the dream’s dreadful heart monitor.

I draw in a shaky breath. Echoes of that soft whisper still linger in my mind, circling around like a mournful ghost.

“Remember…”

Frustration wells up inside me. I yearn for clarity, for closure, but all I am left with is an unquenchable thirst for answers.

With a sigh, I settle back against the pillows and stare at the ceiling. The pale moonlight streaming through the window paints eerie shadows on it, turning its smoothness into a canvas of my nightmare. The silhouette of my own face is reflected across the room, and for a moment, I am transported back to that hospital bed and surrounded by sterile walls, deafening silence, and suffocating loneliness.

Remember…

What the hell am I supposed to remember? What could those fragmented and horrific images mean?

“It’s just a dream,” I say out loud to myself. “Go back to sleep. You’re safe here. Jared is in the next room.”

It was just a fucking dream.

4

VINNIE

I’ve lost track of time. How long have we been in the air? Beside me, Elmo snoozes.

And I continue to read.

Nothing particularly interesting. Just that nameless old woman whose eyes pierce me through the old photograph.

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