"Mom?" Peter called into the hall, his voice shaking slightly. Each breath was harder than the last. He closed his eyes, hoping she would hurry. He had spent his entire life knowing that soon he would die. He had spent hours fanaticizing what it would feel like and had scores of dreams and nightmares alike on the topic. He couldn't remember a single instant in his life that he hadn't known that this moment would come. He had always thought it was better to be prepared. Dying felt just like he imagined.
"Mom?" he called out again, this time more abruptly as he heard footsteps enter the room. But they seemed heavier than his mother's dainty, yet exhausted, shuffle. "Mom, is that you?"
A cold arm brushed against his balmy flesh and he heard the suck of a syringe being filled, sending a tingling feeling up his arm. He gasped, forcing his large blue eyes open. At first he couldn't see much, someone had turned the light on, and he had to blink away the glare that clouded his vision. When he could see, he wanted to close them again. He wanted to run away. Yet he couldn't move. He couldn't take his eyes off the man that stared down at him.
The feeling that gripped his gut felt worse than death.
"D-Dad?" His voice trembled in his throat, faint and no more than a mere whisper.
This man wasn't his father.
Large, freezing hands wrapped around his shoulders, yanking him out of bed. He let out a single terrified shriek. He screamed for his mom, he screamed for someone, because, as he stared up into his father's eyes, all that he could see was a monster.
This man wasn't his father.
This man was a monster.
Peter awoke with a horrible jolt, warm hands wrapped around his shoulders, shaking him awake. "Peter, wake up! Peter!" His father's voice pulling him out of the dark pools of his dreams. Peter let out a low moan, his eyes squinting as they adjusted to the light. "Was it the dream again? I heard you screaming!"
Peter nodded, his heart still pounding in his chest as he tried to avoid his father's gaze. Afraid that he might see an unfamiliar face within them. That his dream could be real.
"Are you sure it was the same son, you didn't see any more—"
"Yes I'm sure! It's the same every night!" Peter yelled, unjustified anger surging through him, his small hands forming tight fists in his sheets, fearful tears creeping into his eyes. Every night it was the same questions from Walter. Do you remember any more? What happened? Who was there? Who did you think I was, Son? It was almost like Walter wanted him to keep dreaming. Like he wanted him to see something. But what it was, the boy had no idea.
"It was the same as last night, as every night. I was about to…" he took a deep breath, he always hated telling this part. It always felt so real. And that's what scared him the most. "…to die. And I was calling for Mom. We were at the lake house…and instead you came. But you weren't you. It was like there was some sort of monster in your skin. And you injected me with something. And you yanked me from my bed."
"And then you woke up?"
"And then I woke up. What is happening to me, Dad?" Peter cried, he tried to fight the tears in his eyes and failed, his voice shaking as he spoke.
Walter let out a sad sigh, but didn't say anything. He sat on the edge of his eight year old son's bed. His father, whom normally had all the answers, from how to make the perfect root beer float to science that Peter did not understand, did not seem to have an answer.
"Dad?" Peter squeaked, the images of his father yanking him from his bed still fresh in his mind. But when he finally picked up the courage to look into his father's eyes, he found nothing but exhaustion and fear. None of the darkness that had possessed them before. Even at two in the morning they were familiar. "Dad…what is happening to me? Can you make it stop?"
His father let out an exhausted sigh, thinking for a moment before the familiar, playful spark that Peter was accustomed to appeared in his father's eyes. He hid a smile as he spoke, "Now you must listen to me very carefully Peter. You must do exactly as I say, do you understand?"
Peter nodded eagerly, the dream slowly being pushed out of his mind in anticipation of what his father would say next. He leaned forward in his bed , eyes wide, childish excitement taking over.
"Every night before you go to bed you must think 'I will not dream tonight. I will not dream to night. I will not dream tonight!' Do you understand?"
He nodded hesitantly.
"That's a good boy. I'm going to go back to my room now, will you be ok if I leave you alone or do you want me to wait for you to go back to sleep?"
"Can you stay?" The boy asked sheepishly.
His father sat down in the far corner, clicking off his rocket ship light so that the room was bathed in darkness. Even though Peter couldn't see him, he knew his father was there. Watching him. Keeping him safe from the monsters in his own mind, even if those monsters were himself.
I will not dream tonight. I will not dream tonight. I will not dream tonight. I will no—"
And Peter drifted off into an ominously dreamless sleep.