Notes: If you're looking for a happy ending, this definitely isn't the right story. My musae are sometimes evil like that, I can't help it.
N Is For Nightmare
by Jules
It is a Monday in June in the early afternoon hours when he boards a plane to Denver, bound for Colorado Springs to attend a conference. He usually likes flying, but this time everything is different. He usually likes conferences too, but he couldn't get into the right mindset for this one, felt distracted during his preparations, always drifted away in his thoughts. He can't explain why.
Neither can he explain the uneasy feeling that held him captive for the last couple of days. A little voice in his head, far in the back, telling him that he shouldn't go. But the voice offers no explanations why and not to go would be silly, so he tells it to stop.
He plane ascends steeply and he swallows against the rising pressure in his ears, watches as the world below becomes smaller and smaller. He likes Colorado Springs. He looked forward to the conference ever since he knew the date. He was going to enjoy himself.
The flight takes forever and the flight attendant smiles at him and he smiles back as he makes his way down the aisle to deplane. Even if he doesn't feel like smiling, but he was brought up to be polite.
He has a layover of 45 minutes and wanders along the red-carpeted concourse, passing gates and people traveling to Memphis and St. Louis. He fishes out his cell phone, types a quick message to his father in a sudden need to communicate. Boarding for his flight is announced and he shuts the device off before knowing if he would get an answer.
Colorado Springs is invigorating. Higher altitude and lesser traffic, he breathes in deeply, imagining how the oxygen atoms dance on his tongue and he smiles at that. He never liked the big city, always preferred nature. The morose mood lifts a little and he flags down a cab to get to his hotel.
Other conference attendants are already there, he knows some of them and it doesn't take long to get into excited conversations, exchanging stories and experiences, sharing results. Time flies and it's after midnight when he's finally back in his room, his ears ringing from too much noise over too many hours. He crawls into bed and remembers to check his phone. Reads the answering message his father had typed to him and falls asleep with a tired smile on his face, the fan of the air conditioning serenading him with soft whirring.
Tuesday flies by and he likes it, Tuesday is good. He's in his element, standing before a large group of interested listeners, lecturing about what he likes best. More interesting points arise and are discussed over lunch. He ignores the soft vibration of his cell phone, too caught up in the schemes they're developing. Plunges right back into his element for the rest of the day, more lecturing and discussing and when he's heading upstairs for a quick refreshing, he remembers his phone and checks his voice mail. Listens with a chuckle to the message his brother has left him, making a mental note to call back later at night.
And dinner stretches out, pleasantly colored by the good company of fellow specialists and when he finally makes it upstairs again, he's overstimulated and more than just a bit tipsy from the glasses of wine he had too many. He slides into bed and listens to the whirring from above him while his thoughts slow down and tumble into a stop.
And he starts dreaming.
He's back in Los Angeles and it is night. He's sitting beside his brother in his car while they slowly drive down a brightly lit boulevard and his brother accuses him with mock hurt that he never calls, that he's always busy with something, always too focused. I know, he says, that's how I am. And his brother stops the car and gets out and he watches him as he crosses the street, jogging the last few feet to get clear of a passing car. He follows him with his eyes as he enters the convenience store, watches him as he suddenly stops in his tracks and raises his hands in a protective gesture.
He sees the dark clad figures moving into his field of vision, sees the guns in their hands with painful clarity and he wants to move, so desperately. But he can't. He is condemned to sit here and watch and listen, hears the soft plopping of automatic fire, sees his brother crumble where he stands. Watches with paralyzing horror as the dark pool of blood widens and three dark figures rush out and away.
He startles up jerkily, a cry dying on his lips before it can find its way out, his clothes and the sheets clinging to him, glued to his body by cold sweat. It takes a moment until proprioception sets in, until the vestiges of terror fall away and the surroundings become familiar again. A hotel room in Colorado Springs. Not the interior of a black SUV parked on a busy street.
He scrubs his palms over his face, feeling a bit silly. Chuckles at what his mind conjured up. Blames the wine. Struggles against the unpleasant feel of foreboding that doesn't want to leave his chest cavity, clawing at his heart with razor-sharp blades.
The air-conditioning whirs on as if nothing happened and he tries to persuade himself of the same. Lies back down, the blanket pulled up halfway. Reminds himself that if he's wrong, his father will be very angry about being awakened in the middle of the night. He cannot call. He's being overly superstitious, he knows that.
Sleep comes after what feels like an eternity, crawling along his body and dragging him under again. No more dreams accompany him, only silence. Darkness and oppressive silence. And the sneaking sensation of déja vu; he'd had a dream like that before.
He wakes up feeling jaded and has to swallow to ward off unwelcome tears that threaten. His chest feels empty, there's an inexplicable hole torn into his core that wasn't there before. In the bathroom, he chides his reflection for being inane, but the shower he takes doesn't wash the sadness away. He never was homesick before, not even when he was younger and almost a continent away from home.
He leaves his room uninspired, takes the stairs instead of the elevator in a vain attempt to get going. The breakfast room is empty, he's early, none of last night's companions are there yet. Coffee, toast and the morning paper and just as he sits down at the table he'd chosen, the receptionist approaches him, carrying a message.
His father had called, asking him to call back as soon as possible.
He knows before he straightens from his chair, before he can make the first step towards the public phones. He doesn't want to, but he knows. He recognizes the difference, the last time he was right there, stood only a few feet away, so close he could smell the cordite and could almost taste the blood on his lips. He wasn't three states away, not answering his phone because his mind was occupied with other things.
His father sounds broken as he croaks out the words, but they aren't news to him. He knew it, he just didn't want to know it. Tried to hide from reality.
His brother was shot in a store hold-up last night.
-the end-