Rebecca looked down at her hands. The soft skin of her palm was smooth and empty. She felt just as they are. Empty and okay on the surface, but inside, deep down, they remember the guns, the fire, the blood, the destruction. She wanted to forget, but every night she lay awake and press those palms to her eye's. Trying to push the dreams away. But she couldn't. The dreams still came.

"Rebecca? Are you okay?" The woman's voiced asks.

Rebecca looked up to the therapist, her pen posed at the ready for something of value Rebecca could share.

"I keep… I keep having nightmares… Horrid nightmares of my death. Over and over again. Always in the same mansion,

the same room, by the same thing. And there is always a man, standing just by the door. It just ends differently. Every

time." Rebecca's voice slightly shook.

"Let's start there. Where are you, Rebecca?" The woman scribbled notes onto a pad of paper.

Rebecca swallowed, "I'm in a mansion. Its huge. The walls are decorated with horrid pictures of death and decay

everywhere. I'm walking down a hallway, a long hallway with disgusting green carpet. I can almost smell the mold and

rotten flesh. A sudden and slow, 'Click, click, click' begins and I turn. There at the end of the dark hallway, is a huge green

beast. It has huge claws for hands and feet. And it-" Rebecca breaks off.

"And it what? What happens next?" Her voice is gentle and coaxing.

"And it charges me. I start to feel my body run, and I'm terrified. I sprint to the end of the hall, busting through a door and

try and close it before it gets me. But it's already there. Pushing against the door. All I can do is scream."

The pen writing furiously across the page is the only sound heard. With a deep breath, Rebecca continues.

"Its slow and I back as far away from it as possible. I see a door, I can feel my gun pressing into my hip; but I ignore

them. In my head I'm screaming to grab my gun and fire, to bust open the door and run away. But I just back myself into

a corner, shaking, saying, 'No, no, no, no, please.' But it still comes forward, clicking its claws."

"Why don't you run away? Why don't you grab your gun, Rebecca?" Her voice is soothing.

"I don't know. I want to, but my body isn't in my control. Its like someone else has the reins on me and all I can do is be

helpless. I can't move it feels like, unless they move me. Whoever they are."

"And the man?"

"He always comes through the door, he always looks right at me. Me, backing into a ball in the corner. Me, someone who

is going to die right then and there. In front of him. And he stands there. The thing, this hunter, raises its claw and swings at

me. My throat either slits open, or my head rolls."

"That's horrible."

"The man kills the hunter, and walks over to me. Falling to his knees yelling, 'Rebecca!' or more recently, just muttering,

'No.' Sometimes he leaves the room, and I die. Every time I die. And I can't protect myself, I can't defend myself or even

run away. This man doesn't even try and help." A tear glides down Rebecca's face.

"Has he ever?" The question was hesitant.

"He sometimes fires his gun. Aim seems dead on." Rebecca wipes her hands on her jeans.

"And what happens when he does?"

"I don't know. I always wake up." Hot, angry tears pour from her blue eye's. "I never know if he kills the thing or if he

puts me out of my misery." Rebecca's chest feels broken and she starts to cry and gasp uncontrollably. Her body shakes

with the intense sobbing. The woman frowns and a tear falls through her lashes as well.

"Why don't you try and move away? Cry for help? Anything?"

Rebecca wipes her eye's, and taking a deep breath, speaks, "Because this wasn't in my control. My body didn't do what I

so desperately wanted. It was like a game. And I just lost."