As I walked through the dark streets of my old neighborhood, a soft breeze kissed my cheeks in the cold night air, sending a chill through me and making me realize that I was bare foot. The sudden sensations of the soles I stood on freezing and being scratched a bit with every step, created the sudden awareness that I was dreaming...so I could control what was going on instead of simply watching some subconscious story progress.

I turned around to head back toward the home I had grown up in when I saw I had, in fact, been on my my way out of the small town...a place I often took respite in visiting or thinking about as it had meant much simpler times for my young brain. The place we had moved to, Springwood, wasn't much bigger than it, but the energy of it was so different that it felt as if I was in another country...not just another town or state. Even little as it was, Springwood seemed to have a more city-like atmosphere which varied quite a bit from the poor country town where I had been born.

On my trek back to my original house, I sensed that things had become even more still in the empty darkness. Something was off for certain... I remembered that there would be locusts chirping at this time of day and year so loud it could be overwhelming. Not to mention the crickets and the frogs that the place was always flooded with and the seasonal fireflies. There was no sound whatsoever...no chirping, no croaking... the wind had stopped as well and I couldn't even pick up the sound of my own treading footsteps.

I stopped in the middle of the street with sudden paranoia that someone was watching me...or something. My heart skipped a beat and then began pounding in my chest as I turned around, peering into the dark. I knew it was all a dream...all in my head, but I was somehow still frightened. I normally had pretty good control over my dreams. I had practiced and even studied techniques yet for some reason, I felt less powerful than was usual... I hadn't had an actual nightmare in quite some time- as in a dream that bothered me. I used to have them all the time hence my reasoning behind learning to take conscious control of my own dreamworld... Something was different about this one... It felt like the old days...

That small voice in my head kept assuring me that I could handle this and that they were just mental pictures. However scary- they weren't real. Instinct though, I suppose, took over and silenced her, leaving me with only this intense need to find safety and prepare to run... to get out of harm's way when it finally presented itself. So I started jogging until I had traveled that last half-block that left me in front of the home where I had spent my years prior to being a high school student. I ran up to the door and jiggled jiggled the handle, glancing around and still seeing nothing around me but the quiet neighborhood. From what I could tell, I was still alone, but that sense of impending doom had only worsened. As I shook the handle and pushed on the door again, my mind took in the number posted beside the large red-painted door...

1428...that wasn't the number of the house I grew up in...

Just as this new information settled into my mind, the entrance swung open to expose a small foyer just before a staircase. I jumped inside and slammed the door behind me. There was a den to the left of me and a family dining room to the right. Off to the side of staircase and behind the den, I saw a kitchen with a breakfast nook... Everything inside appeared crisp and new...This wasn't my old home's interior either...

At that moment, the first sound I had heard in some time came. It was a young child laughing. Cautiously, and probably stupidly, I followed the voice into the den. Stepping around the couch revealed to me a small girl in a white dress sitting on the floor. She wasn't facing me, but she was moving...playing with something. I crept closer and looked over her. Finger paints. She was painting a picture on the floor there.

"Hello?" I called softly, not removing my eyes from her.

"Hello," the girl answered flatly in a tiny voice.

When I came to stand directly over the girl, I could see what she was painting...It was a picture I knew well yet still the sight shocked me. I had drawn it multiple times when I was younger after my parents divorced...up until my mom reprimanded me for continuing to do so. She told me I needed to grow up. On the floor, the girl had painted a house and a car with a large crack separating the two... Inside the house was a woman crying...my mom...and with the car was an angry man holding a dead cat...my dad.

"He did it on purpose, you know," the girl spoke, her face still hidden from my view.

"What?" my voice remained hushed as I started walking again... This time so that I was in front of the child.

"You were the cause of all their fights. So he ran over your cat to punish you and left mom to get away from you," the girl's voice had stayed flat and I became increasingly eager to see her face...

Finally in front of her, I leaned down at my waist, reaching a hand out to brush her long brunette hair to the side. Just as my hand grazed the tip of her hair, her head shot upward at an unnatural speed and cocked to the side. But instead of a young child's face, there was a rotting skull with bits of flesh falling off...covered in tiny wounds that looked like rat bites. There was still one eye within the stinking sockets there...and it, too had been chewed down.

I jumped backward in surprise, unable to keep from staring at the corpse. Once the image had properly imprinted itself into me, the girl disappeared with a sudden gust of wind as if she had been nothing except a ghost the entire time...but I had touched her...felt her... Once everything was still again and I was able to blink away from the scene... I heard a low chuckle come from the kitchen behind me.

"Who's there?" I yelled, spinning on my heels.

"Hello, Francine."

The raspy voice of a man greeted me as the form it belonged to produced itself from the shadows there. As he came into full view, I saw that it was none other than the strangely deformed and clawed man that I had been hearing so much about lately. I swallowed hard, taking in every aspect of his person. He wore dingy khaki pants and what would have been a nice striped Christmas sweater if the colors hadn't been so dimmed and the fabric itself torn and dirty. Atop his head was a brown fedora type hat with a large brim, equally as worn down as the rest of his attire.

"Freddy?" my voice was a whisper and I felt my hands start to sweat.

The man chuckled again and grinned, throwing his bladed hand- no it was a glove- into the air, "Ah! So somebody did get my message."

He took a step closer to me with his weapon still raised, allowing me to make out the details of it being an old gardening glove with metal shields around the fingers that had long knives attached to the tops of them. The blades reached past the length of each finger and seemed to be thick and strong...and sharp... At sight of the device, I felt a twinge between my legs...

I didn't move as he approached me, instead clenching my fists as he neared, trying to remain strong. It apparently worked because the more I studied him, the less afraid I was and the more I waited with...anticipation at what he planned to do. I trained my attention away from his hand and to his face. He was badly burned...even more so than I had at first pictured by the stories...but...he wasn't ugly. His cheek bones reflected a strong smile although he only wore a sly smirk. His brow was small and smooth, the most evolved look of humans as it exposed the eyes. And those eyes... They were blue...soft...and still somehow full of chaos...

My thoughts were pulled back to the present actions and I realized that my palms were no longer wet with sweat..and my heart had calmed from being fearful...no, I was still afraid...but also expectant. Blinking furiously a few times so that I could reassess the situation I was in, it seemed that Freddy had also changed...although I couldn't tell in what way it was... Either way, I felt I should speak though I wasn't sure what to say.

"Do you want to kill me?" I managed, thinking the words would come out quietly. However, my voice had a surprisingly normal tone.

Freddy cocked his head to the side as if he, too, was reassessing our situation. He pulled his claws back to his face, raising only one of the blades and using it to scratch his chin thoughtfully. Something within me wanted to get closer to him. I wanted to feel him...to see if he'd let me or if not, how he would stop me. Even so, I couldn't find the strength to move...not yet. I twiddled my fingers at my side, keeping my arms still. A stupid fear swept across my mind at that instant that if I did something, I would be the one to scare him off. So I just held still and waited.

"You're not afraid of me, huh?" Freddy inquired in that damaged voice.

I wasn't able to find my words...not that I would know which ones to say anyway. I was still confused at his existence, my sanity, and mostly, what I was feeling. So instead, I just kept staring at him and rubbing my fingertips together nervously. He lifted all of his blades again, before throwing them in my direction, once more retracted all of them but one, which he pointed straight at me. I could see feel it hovering just between my eyes.

"Do you want me to kill you, little girl?" a devilish grin crossed his face.

My hands finally found themselves just in front of my lap and wrung each other as they had started sweating again. Without moving my head, I glanced down at the painting the little girl had drawn that still showed at my feet. Do you want me to kill you? His words echoed inside my head as I thought back to my short, pitiful life. My mom hated who I really was... I always had to pretend to be this image of me she had constructed in her mind... Otherwise she'd show her disdain through dirty looks, insults, and other punishments. My dad probably hated me even more than she did. He abandoned me...left me behind with her. Even what few friends I had didn't understand me. They couldn't because I couldn't ever let them know who I was...or else... And the others? They would act nice to my face...most of the time, but still they made fun of me...some even acted scared of me...like I was some dangerous freak. I hated how I had to pretend. Despised what I was made to be... I just wanted someone to not care that I was different...yet nothing in life was that simple...everyone cared in the wrong way...

"Yes," I muttered. I wondered if I sounded as sad as I felt. I stopped looking at the dream man in front of me and hung my head, suddenly finding the will to grab an arm with my other hand and rubbing it absentmindedly.

"Hmm..." I could picture the man rubbing his chin again although from my new stance, I didn't actually have him in my sights.

After a moment without anymore noise, I felt I had been ghosted so I looked up once more. I had. I stood in the cold home, now dingy and worn...all alone. I sighed loudly and shrugged as I pondered what to do next. I didn't feel like anything anymore. Nonetheless, I turned back around, immediately emitting a tiny shriek as I found myself face to face with Freddy. This time we were so close that I could smell his burning flesh...feel the heat radiating from his body. With a growl, he raised his claw, softly resting all four blades against my face as his other arm stretched around my back and pulled me so tightly next to him that a sudden anxiety swept over me and gave me trouble with taking each breath.

"Perhaps we can help each other, then," he smirked, staring me down with crazed determination.

Before I mustered the courage to respond, he rapidly removed his blades from my face and instantly, I saw them fall to my chest. I let out a surprised cry as he not only tore through my nightgown, but into my young flesh beneath. My eyes could somehow see the long slash he made down my front, stopping just above my belly button. Blood burst out and then flowed down my pale skin and suddenly, the touch of his hand on my back and the claws against my stomach was gone.

I fell backward and onto the ground as soon as his support was gone and, unable to break my fall, hit my head hard against the ground, the images around me fading...

AUTHOR'S NOTE:: Chapter originally written 10/21/15
Chapter rewritten 10/27/2017

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