2:07 AM
The old farmhouse was mostly quiet, aside from a few occasional squeaks or scuttles from its smaller inhabitants. All the lights were turned off, and darkness shone from all the dirty or broken windows. All the lights except for a small, barely detectable yellowy glow from the topmost right window.
Inside the room, a tall, somewhat scrawny red-haired boy sat crouched over his latest whittling project, which was SUPPOSED to be a squirrel if the stupid thing just turned out right. Sighing, he rubbed his freckled face with one of his hands, trying to reclaim his focus.
"Stupid, dumb, freaking dull-ass kniFE," He muttered angrily through clenched teeth, glancing over at the clock beside his lit lamp just as it clicked to 2:08 AM. He sighed aggressively, unhappily admitting to himself that he probably wasn't going to finish this dumb thing tonight. But before he could ponder it more angrily, his old, battered cell phone began to ring loudly, startling him and causing him to almost drop his knife on his leg.
Swearing under his breath and trying to control his breathing before picking up the phone, he grouchily wondered who in the hell was calling him this late at night and whether or not it'd be worth it to just throw the phone out of the window and pretend it never existed.
Squinting at it, he made an angry resigned noise at the caller ID: Dawn.
Flipping it open and bringing it to his ear, he wasted no time with pleasantries.
"Its 2:00 AM, Dawn."
"It is actually 2:09 AM, Scott."
More resigned sounds.
"I don't care about the EXACT TIME."
"I know that you don't, otherwise you would've originally said it."
"It's really late."
"Technically, it could be very early."
Scott took a moment to rub his hand over his face.
"Dawn."
"I know you weren't sleeping anyway. You wanted to finish that whittling sculpture. Even though you were clearly having a hard time with it."
"How do you know I was having a hard time with it?"
"You're very easy to read, Scott, no matter how built up you assume your defenses are."
Scott sighed again, setting his knife and his sculpture on the nightside table.
"You didn't call me to talk about my failed whittling."
"There's not much you could've told me that I wouldn't already know."
"Dawn, it's 2:10 AM."
"Yes, it is."
There was a prolonged moment of silence between them.
"Why did you call me so late at night?"
Another stretch of silence. He could hear her breathing.
"Dawn."
He could almost see her hesitate.
"Dawn, c'mon. Just tell me."
He heard her sigh lightly into the phone.
"I… I had a bad dream."
Scott fell quiet for a moment, partially out of confusion and partially out of exasperation.
"You what?"
"I had a bad dream."
The clock ticked to 2:11 AM.
"I thought you could control your dreams."
"I can."
"Well, why did you have a bad dream then?"
More silence.
"I don't know."
"There must be a reason. Unless you just lost your dream control powers over night somehow, which I kinda doubt."
"I doubt that as well. It seems highly unlikely that there was even a momentary lapse in my powers."
"Well, it seems like that's what happened."
"That doesn't make any sense."
"Oh yeah, but you talking to animals and reading auras and tea leaves and feathers sure does."
"I don't read feathers. I collect them."
"Whatever, the point is that you do a lot of weird stuff that people shouldn't be able to do. How's it so weird that for one night your power things didn't work right?"
Dawn fell silent once again.
"I'm scared."
Her voice was even quieter than usual.
"…Oh."
Another lapse of silence. The clock inched to 2:13 AM. Scott spoke up again, this time trying to sound less like a grumpy teenager who just wanted to go to bed.
"What was your dream about?"
Dawn took a small, shallow breath.
"You were there."
"I was?"
"Yes. You and my parents."
"What were we doing?"
"I'm not really sure. You and they were just standing there at first. I tried to approach you, but as I did you started whispering something."
"I did? What was I whispering?"
"I couldn't hear. It was almost like static. Perhaps another language I'm unfamiliar with."
Scott shifted a bit, trying to get more comfortable.
"What happened next?"
"I was confused, and I tried to reach out to ask what was wrong, but when I did, you seemed to be repelled by my hand. I tried reaching out again, but this time you fell over backwards. There wasn't any noise when you landed."
Scott stayed quiet, letting her tell her story. Her voice was becoming more high-pitched.
"I crouched over you to see what was wrong, but your eyes were blank white and you weren't moving, so I tried to see if you had a pulse, but when I touched you, it burned away at your skin and you started screaming and I jumped back and my parents were right behind me and they had the same awful blank white eyes and they just stood there and stared and didn't move and then you just laid there with part of your skin burnt away and it was smoking and I tried to change the dream I tried so hard but nothing worked and I just-"
"Dawn, are you crying?"
There was another brief lapse of not talking, in which Dawn tried to stop herself from crying and wiped at her eyes. Sniffling, she went back to the phone.
"N-no."
"Yes, you were."
"…Perhaps a little bit."
He almost smiled at her characteristic reluctance to show her emotions and thought of her pale, elfish face, probably dirty with tears and contorted in a way to make it look as though it wasn't.
"I'm gonna come over, okay?"
"…If you want to."
"'Course I do. Hang tight, I'll be right over."
He heard her sniffle.
"Alright. See you then, I suppose."
"See you then, Dawnie."
He hung up and placed his phone down on the table. Sighing and running his hands through his hair, he noticed the time was 2:15 AM. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood up, careful not to cause the old, stained house to creak loudly. Slowly opening his door, he continued just as cautiously down the hallway, down the stairs, and making sure to grab his keys from the kitchen counter, out the back door.
—
At approximately 2:37 AM, Scott pulled up to the entrance of Dawn's neighbourhood. Hers was one of the nicer ones, with neatly trimmed hedges and impeccable lawns and bushes after bushes of colourful flowers sprouting up along the sidewalks. He always thought it was too fancy, that the figurines of flamingos and gnomes and deers were unnecessary and kinda just stupid overall. And no matter how often she tried to defend her living space, he could tell that she secretly agreed with him and simply refused to admit it.
At 2:38 AM, he parked his rusty old truck by the corner and walked down the street to the house he knew to be labeled with a 1119. The streets were dark, aside from the occasional streetlamp, and Scott had little to no trouble finding the house he'd already been to before. Of course, he didn't really go INSIDE the house very often, but what did that matter?
He quietly crept to the side of the house, climbed over the gate, and landed with a slight thump into Dawn's backyard. Still staying quiet, he walked across the expanse of it to a group of several trees, one of which contained a small treehouse. Lights flickered from the open area, a sure sign that Dawn was up there and had lit candles. Smiling faintly, he strode to the side of the tree he knew a ladder would be, and started to climb it, completely aware that Dawn would know he was there before he even reached the top.
At 2:42 AM, Scott peeked up over the side of the treehouse and saw Dawn in a meditative position, her back turned to him. Smiling a little more, he climbed all the way up, walked over to her, and sat down beside her, waiting for her to say something to him. He wasn't disappointed.
"You didn't waste any time."
"Nope."
"Where is your car?"
"On the corner."
"By the house with the three green gnome ornaments?"
"That's the one."
"Good."
Scott barely had time to chuckle before she had practically jumped into his lap and clung to him like a small animal, burying her face in his chest. He grinned at her, and wrapped one arm around her waist and the other around her shoulders, lightly rubbing her back.
"Aww, you're alright Pixie, it was just a bad dream. Everyone gets 'em."
No response aside from a faint noise and her hand gripping his old tank top more tightly.
"Everyone but ME."
"Heheheh, aw c'mon, don't beat yourself up over this."
He kissed the top of her head, feeling her squirm in his lap.
"But I'm supposed to be able to CONTROL them, not just let horrifying nightmares come to me instead."
"Oh, shh, you're fine. Nightmares are just a regular thing. Just means you're human."
She went a little limp at his words, as though she disliked the connotation, but squiggled into a more comfortable position, her face still buried in his chest. He snickered a bit at her reaction, and laid back on her surprisingly plush rug, bringing her down with him. Still rubbing her back, he took one of her hands and placed it against the pulse point of his neck.
"See? Nothin's burning away, I'm fiiine." He smiled a bit at her as she peeked out from his chest, eyeing his throat warily, although seemingly more relaxed than she had been a few seconds ago.
"Let me see your eyes."
"Heheh, oh alright, just for you, Moonie."
Sitting up a little, he looked at her face, letting her drink in the fact that his pupils and irises were in fact still there. He noted that the usual dark bags under her eyes were even worse now, probably from lack of proper sleep. Gently pushing her head back into his chest, he snickered again.
"Go to bed, Dawnie, ya gotta get some sleep y'know."
She peeked at him again, her face defiant, but merely stuck her tongue out at him as a means of voicing her disdain for the situation.
"Fine. But only because your chest is warm."
"Mhm, okay, whatever you say."
This earned him a small whap on the chest, which tickled more than hurt, and she curled up on top of him and closed her eyes. Rolling his, he patted her back and chuckled.
"'Night, Fairy Princess."
Her response was muffled into his shirt.
"Goodnight, Scott."
She fell asleep on top of him at 2:58 AM.