The Reality Of Dreaming

Chantel woke up from her nightmare dazed and confused, she never used to remember her dreams, but lately, they had been so vivid that they almost seemed real, and it scared the living shit out of her. She glanced over at her clock to find it was just past 6 am, good enough time to get up, shower, and get ready for the day; she had volunteered the previous day to go with the search party to Winchester and see if the same thing was happening there.

Once showered, dressed, and ready for the day, Chantel heads out of her house, where she stayed alone ever since the disappearance of the adults, and heads on over to the football field where everyone who volunteered for a group, was to gather at 9 am. Since it was still early, Chantel decided to stop at Richard’s first, for breakfast, he was usually up around this time, reading or doing some other thing to help exercise his brain; plus, it was a ritual they started when they first met all those years ago, and just because their town was turned upside down, does not mean they were going to start breaking traditions.

When she got to his place, he was indeed, already up and making breakfast, he had two plates of bacon, eggs, and toast ready with a glass of orange juice, Chantel smiles and heads to the table where the food has been set.

“This looks delicious as always.” She says through a mouthful of food. “Were you going to come to the field today to help organize everything? Or were you just going to stay here and do whatever it is you do when I’m not around.”

“Of course, it is, I am a master chef!” Richard jokes while taking a sip of his juice and continuing. “Hahaha, very funny, but yeah, I’ll come with you, I know they are wanting to set a date for the council election, as well as help with all the finer details.”

“Yeah, I thought as much. Well, probably best to get there early, what do you say? Wanna head out now?” She asks while finishing the last of the food on her plate and chugging what was left of her orange juice.

“Yup” he replied while popping the p sound with his lips to exaggerate the word. He then gets up, grabs his and Chantel’s dishes, and brings them to the sink, Chantel follows and they both quickly clean the kitchen of their breakfast mess before heading out of Richard’s house and to the football field.

Chantel and Richard arrive at the field around eight, and there are already a group of people waiting to get instructions, most of the teens stop to look at them as they enter the field, recognizing them from Josh’s speech last night since they were both at the front with him and the rest of their friends; and they expected them to have some answers as to how they were going to go about everything, luckily, Josh, Jocelyn, Christopher, and a few others came walking up just then to help with the organization of the groups.

Since Josh was the one who made the speech and was ultimately the one everyone knew, he was chosen to announce the groups and give them instructions on what they were to do, he started with the search party, since that was one of their main focuses.

“Okay, so for the search party, we have Me, Chantel Grey, Elliott Till, Peyton Joseph, and Bastion Wright, we five will head to Winchester to speak with the other residents and determine if they are experiencing the same thing as us, or if everything is normal.”

“Now, for the scavenging party we have, Christopher Nelson, Han Cannon, Sasha Smith, Stephanie Patel, Nathan Carey, and Brooklyn Ashanti, if you six can go around the town farms and see how the crops are, we may very well need them in the future, only if our parents don’t come back, so this is just a contingency plan, just in case.”

“Before the search and scavenging parties leave, I want you to stop at the grocery store, Bernard Wolfe and Chloe Jenkins have packs with food and water in them for us, that way we don’t go hungry or thirsty while we are out, so please, do not forget those!”

“We have three people including myself who volunteered for childcare, those are Anita Willow, and Storm Lee, we will be finding a place to house the children under ten and any others who don’t want to be alone, preferably in the same building so it will be less chaotic and easier to keep track of everyone. If you two can do that today while I’m out with the search party, it would be much appreciated, I’ll come and help with the details once we’re back from our mission.”

“And finally, for the council, because we are using today to explore our surroundings and get our town in order, I think it would be best to name the candidates and have the election tomorrow; once we have an elected council we can then start thinking of some rules and regulations to implement to keep everyone safe and alive until our parents return. Are there any questions, comments, concerns, queries, etc.?” He finishes, looking around at all of the individuals, when no one says anything, he takes it as a means to begin.

“Okay, well, with all that being said, there’s no better time to start; Chantel, Elliott, Payton, and Bastion, with me, Winchester is about an hour’s walk away, so we had best get started or else we will be caught outside after dark.” The four in his group nod as they all walk to the grocery store to grab their packs and start toward the town of Winchester.

Chantel looks around her group as they are heading from the grocery store to the main road that led to Winchester, she didn’t know Elliott, Payton, or Bastion but if they were willing to volunteer to walk an hour to find out if the other town was experiencing the same thing, then they must be decent people, she thought to herself.

Elliott is a tall, lean young man, with short brown hair that is shaved at the sides and longer on the top, and brown eyes to match, he looked the part of a linebacker, which was exactly what he is but he didn’t give off that ‘jock’ vibe, it was more of a ‘protector’ vibe, like he wasn’t afraid to stand up for other people, kind of just like Josh, which is probably a big reason why they are friends.

Bastion is shorter than the rest of us, has white, blonde hair that goes to his shoulders, mossy green eyes, and scrawnier physic, he looked a bit like a nerd, who wouldn’t be caught dead out in the wilderness, and yet, here he was, walking with us to another town, where we did not know what we would find.

Payton is the type of girl that looks like a stuck-up bitch that doesn’t lift a finger, I hope that that’s not the case… She’s conventionally pretty and has beautiful long brown hair that reaches the middle of her back, green eyes, and a long, fit, physic that most girls would kill for. Chantel wasn’t too sure why she had come and was intent on finding out.

The group walked most of the way in silence, everyone thinking their thoughts of what may meet them when they reach Winchester. As they continue, they notice that the road they are on seems to have an odd feeling to it like the entire road has been forgotten, they start looking at one another, wondering if they were the only ones feeling it or if the others were as well, Bastion is the first to speak up.

“Uhm, is anyone else having this weird feeling of desolation? Kind of like we’re not supposed to be doing what we’re doing? I’m not sure how to describe it, all I know is that I want to turn back to town and hide in my room where I’m safe and the feeling can’t follow me.” Bastion asks the group while looking around uneasily at the thick forest on either side of the road.

“Yeah, I’ve been feeling that since we left the perimeters of town… I think it’s still wise to go to Winchester. We need to know if the same thing is happening there as it is in Deloraine, it won’t take too long, we’ll just pop in, talk to a few of the locals, find out if anything strange has happened in the past few days, and then dip.” Josh replies as a matter of fact and everyone nods their head in agreement.

“I agree 100%, I have a few friends in Winchester, so getting information won’t be so difficult, it’s the main reason I wanted to come, to help with finding information quicker, I’m not sure why, but I’ve had this weird feeling in my gut that I had to go with the search party, not just because of my friends, but for some other reason that I can’t quite explain… Ugh, I know I sound crazy.” Payton says waving her hand as if to dismiss her feelings.

“That doesn’t sound crazy, it sounds, familiar… Not sure why I think that, but yea, I felt weirdly compelled to join as well…” Chantel confesses, looking down at her shoes as they rhythmically hit the pavement as she walks. It was then that she noticed that the pavement was becoming overgrown and filled with vegetation as if the forest was starting to retake it and claim it as its own. She points this out and the group stares in amazement at the pavement.

“Uhh, it wasn’t like this last week, I know, I biked to Winchester for my mom to grab some of their famous beef jerky and call me crazy, but I’m fairly positive that overgrowth doesn’t happen in just under a week…” Elliott explains looking from one person to another.

“Yeah, no shit, and it seems to be getting worse the closer we get to Winchester, on another note, I haven’t seen any deer, birds, or any wildlife… There are not even crickets or frogs singing, which there should be… Where are all the animals?” Asks Peyton, while everyone shrugs not knowing the answer, but Chantel speaks up.

“Maybe something scared them away, like the feeling we were getting? Perhaps they were feeling it too? And instead of continuing to the source, which seems to be Winchester, they decided to go the opposite direction, like any rational being who values their life and wellbeing.” She tries to joke but it comes off more as pessimism.

“Perhaps,” Josh replied but didn’t seem convinced as they walked the rest of the way to Winchester in silence.

Upon reaching the Winchester town limits the teens realized that as the road became more overgrown with vegetation the town, they were entering was also experiencing the same thing. All the buildings, like the streets, had moss and flowers growing out of them, and the cars that sat empty and forgotten on the sides of the street were rusting, vegetation covered, and falling apart, completely unusable. The entire town is quiet and isolated, with not a single soul in sight the town looked like it had been untouched for years or even centuries… Even though the kids were just mingling with the citizens of this town, not even five days ago.

“Uh, maybe we should split up, cover more ground, just to ensure that there is no one left here…” Josh suggests, and everyone agrees except Chantel.

“I’m not sure if that’s a good idea, I have a really bad feeling about this place. There’s something ‘off’ about it.” She protests but no one takes her seriously and they all go their separate ways.

“Meet back here in twenty minutes!” Josh instructs as the group acknowledges his words while moving to their respective areas, not knowing that there was something following their every move.

As Elliott made his way through his part of town, he couldn’t help but feel paranoid, he comes here all the time and not once had he ever experienced the town like this, it was usually bustling with people, so, seeing it with only his group in it, made him a little on edge. It also didn’t help that he felt like there was something just out of his line of sight that was watching him, waiting for him to let his guard down, so it can pounce; ever since splitting from the group the feelings were getting so strong that he was looking over his shoulder expecting to see something… anything, to explain the odd feelings he was experiencing at that very moment, it made him wondered if the others were also experiencing something similar.

Bastion was currently regretting his decision to join the search party, he was in no way a coward and was able to deal with shit as it came but the second, he left his group, he started getting suspicious, wondering why the others had come to Winchester, he doubted it was because they were interested in the wellbeing of the town. ‘I bet they just came to keep tabs on me, they know that my parents work at HCSR, and they want to get information from me’ he thinks, and just as quickly as the feeling came on, he was able to push it out of his mind. “Well, that was fucking melodramatic and irrational…” he says out loud to himself while peeping into shop windows looking for any sign of life, which he didn’t find.

Angry, was an understatement for how fucking pissed Peyton was feeling while walking down the rows of residential houses, she couldn’t quite place her finger on it, but she had a feeling that the others in the group didn’t like her, which royally pissed her off. ‘They didn’t even know me, how could they just dislike someone they don’t know?’ she thought to herself, kicking the gravel as she walked. She went around checking the houses to see if anyone was in them, but so far nothing, she eventually made it to her friend’s house and decided to go in to investigate a little further. The first thing she notices is that everything is still in place, all her friend’s clothes, game systems, and everything was exactly where it was the last time Peyton was over, weird. After she had searched her area of town, she went back to the spot they were told to meet back up, the feelings of anger completely forgotten.

Josh was confused while walking through town, not only was it completely desolate but he found that the town itself was coming off as dark and foreboding like it was alive and not pleased that our group had been walking around as if we owned the place, it also gave him a sense of dread, like no matter what their intentions were, there weren’t good enough, it made him want to leave screaming. Instead, he continued walking down his street, glancing in house windows and cars, wondering what on earth happened to the town that was once so full of life.

Chantel absentmindedly roamed the streets of Winchester, not paying attention to the town that seemed to have been abandoned overnight, she had other things on her mind, like the Barge, she didn’t know why, but she had a feeling that it was important and that they should be going to check it out, sooner rather than later. Coming out of her trance, she realized that the entire twenty minutes had passed, and she needed to get to the town square to meet the rest of the group and head back to Deloraine.

As the group comes back together they don’t say much aside from what they all found, which was all the same, nothing, so, they stop to eat and drink a little before they start to make their way back to their hometown. As they are walking back, their feelings of paranoia, suspicion, anger, and dread all came creeping back in, and almost, simultaneously, they all start speaking.

“Something is watching us from the shadows, I can feel it, don’t you guys?” Elliott says.

“Why did you all even come, you know my parents don’t tell me shit, so whatever information you think I have, know that your wrong,” Bastion explains.

“You pricks don’t even know me! I don’t understand why you would dislike me without even getting to know me!” Cries Peyton.

“We’re all going to die,” Josh states as a matter of fact.

Jocelyn was the only one who seemed to not be affected by the preternatural feelings and for this reason, she was able to keep a clear head and listen to the things that her group mates were saying, once again, she had an outlandish feeling that the things being said held some type of importance, so she listened, the entire way back, keeping a mental note of all the things said that may seem random to the average person, but tickled her brain too much for her to leave it alone.

As the group approached Deloraine, the bickering between the four slowly started to die down and the second they entered the town’s radius, it all stopped, the four who were just at each other’s necks, seemed to have completely forgotten that they were at odds with one another. They each said their goodbyes and went their separate ways, Josh would be the one to inform everyone of what they found, so there was no need to stick together anymore. As Chantel walked away from the group and back to her own house to rest, she couldn’t help but feel a sense of Deja Vu, there was something in her mind trying to tell her that she had experienced the entire trip before, just from a different perspective, but once again, just as quickly as the thoughts came, they vanished and she continued with the rest of her evening, knowing something wasn’t quite right but not caring enough to look into it.