The Days

I held the cold knife high with my innocent hand clenched tightly. This was it. I drove the knife right through the middle of the boy’s chest. Despite all the cheering, screams and chanting I could hear the blade pierce the skin, rip through the muscles and shatter its way through the bone where it found itself embedded in his heart. To be sure I pulled it out and plunged in again and again and again. This 14 year olds blood ran hot and red across my hands. But its ok, I thought, because I woke up, it happened in my dream…it happened in the other Sydney. But I couldn’t have been more wrong.

It started with minor dizzy spells and blackouts, both of which I blamed stress and fatigue. I had nightmares, which I’ve had since my parents’ divorce, but these where different… more like hallucinations in my sleep. I would wake up in what seemed to be an alternate Sydney, Tall grey buildings, towering above the low thick fog that lingers in the air. It’s painfully quiet with the sickly feel of someone watching you. I caught the glisten on a silver knife in the corner of my eye, a boy, darting between buildings; my eyes followed him but were brought to a halt when the boy was stopped by a gang of teenagers. Two held his arms back and one plunged his knife into the boy, with every stab I screamed but nothing came out, I tried to move but I couldn’t. The gang of boys looked at me and a shock of fear surged through my body. The ground started to shift beneath me and everything went blurry, I let the darkness swallow me. I open my eyes to morning sunshine, lying in a cold sweat. I prayed the nightmares would go away but instead they got a thousand times worse.