~O~

Waking up today I feel as though I've shattered a protective shell around me. That it's burst open and wounded me in the process. I still feel it in my eyes.

I'm trying to stay awake now, but it's hard driving.

I'm seeing things as if in a dream. Little moments snap back, waking me from my trance. And it hurts. It pains me because I feel like I'm supposed to be entering another place, somewhere I belong in sleep.

But I can't. I won't let myself.

One of the Sheriff's deputies is behind me.

Trying to drive normally, but I keep panicking as I see the car in the mirror. All I need is for him to see the state I'm in. I think he would be able to tell right away that something's up.

I rub my eyes, and when I am able to see again the deputy's car is passing me. It's Hawk, the guy who pulled me over before for speeding. He waves as he passes, apparently not noticing a thing.

O

I miss Donna. I'm starting to dream of her because I miss her so badly.

I know, with the way things are now, the only way I can see Donna, be with her the way I used to, is in dreams.

Even though we're in the same classes, it's like I see through her at school.

Something prevents me from caring about the little things. The facts from her nights with Mike and at home. They're so foreign to me and unreal, and that makes her every bit as unreal.

Yet, though I sometimes despise her ignorance, I don't want to open her eyes the way mine have been opened. To make scars outside not matching those within.

I don't think I can ever feel for Donna the way I did before. Before remembering BOB, before being ruined.

O

Bobby was a no-show tonight. He might have forgotten our little play-date (or should I say snow-date?) but I doubt it. I imagine he's with Leo's girl now, laughing it up behind the unknowing husband's back.

That's fine. It's not like I need him to have a good time. I have plenty of friends who can help me in that department. There's a few with me now; round and promising a night without dreams...

I shouldn't let myself miss certain aspects of Bobby's personality anyway. That's a mistake I need to avoid. A strength I have to build in myself.

I wish I couldn't smell him, though. The cigarettes, the sweat. Even when he's not been near me, it just breezes by, a phantom memory...

James gave me one of his poems after school today. It was sweet of him, but when I first read it I had to cover my mouth to keep from laughing. It was so childish! He's shy about letting other people read his work and seemed so proud of his verse... If it had been Bobby, I probably would have said something, something that would have hurt, but it's different with James. He's sensitive and already so sad. And he doesn't really know the Laura that Bobby does.

I'll keep the poem. Save it back with other little things people have given me over the years. Nothing really important, just pieces of paper kept to preserve the memories that will die with me.

Dad's just put a record on. It's trailing up the stairs. Benny Goodman. I can hear Dad calling me now, wanting me to dance. Come on, Laura! I'll humor him and Mom too, if she's in the living room. She always laughs like she's never seen it all before. Maybe I'll make them dance for me this time.

O

There is a man I do not know asleep at my feet. I am leaving him in the night. Another from the Roadhouse.

As I slip outside and into the cool air I am confused by the fear quickly placed inside me, slipped into my heart like a note on paper.

I'm on the road, and something is making me want to run, but to where and why? I feel as if eyes are on me, those not of BOB but another who sends chills down my spine. In these sparks I want to disappear, to hide.

If only a door to a haven in the woods would open. A cellar under roots made all of wood. Out of sight and mind. Unknown by the darkness, by BOB.

But there is no escape. No room in which I can hide to evade the world.

O

My own screams wake me in the middle of the night. Donna's close, up in my face, wanting to take in all that I can translate from my nightmare. But it was a nightmare she cannot know. Even repeating it to myself feels foolish, let alone saying it aloud to Donna, who has no idea that such nightmares are often a reality for her friend.

I lie, make up some cliche, a movie dream, and she wraps her arms around me. Her voice is soft and calm and leaves in a whisper.

"They can't get us. Nothing can while we're together," she assures me. "Think of good things."

I try. I try to think of good things, but there are so few that make themselves known in moments like that.

Her heart is beating against my back, so I close my eyes and I concentrate on that instead. On the heart I feel inside this girl. Pretend the flesh between us yields so that ours are pulses that meet. In that one pulse she understands and knows my pain. The reasons behind my actions, and she forgives.

But thinking of this dream as reality only hurts me more because, like everything else in my life, I know it is a lie.

~O~