I started writing this as death, but afterwards realized it would probably have fit much better under nightmare. However, I'm sticking to the original inspiration, and so…
18.
Death
Alicia Blade
259 words
He dreamt that he saw her lying in a coffin.
Her skin was ashen and dry and her face had become sallow where once it had been round and lively and smiling—always smiling. Her hair fell, matted, against the satin-lined box, no longer looking like spun gold. In her hands was a bouquet of bluebells. Brown and decaying, they, too, were once beautiful and now dead.
Mamoru awoke with a jolt, breathing hard and trembling, sweating and shivering as a night wind blew over his bedspread. Gasping for breath, he swung his feet over the edge of his bed and walked to the window, slamming it shut, hoping to keep out the chill. There he stood silent and alone, desperately trying to shake the horrific image from his mind. Desperately fighting back the tears that tried to escape. But he would not cry over a stupid dream, he continuously told himself. No, he would not cry.
She was alive. She was fine. And tomorrow, she would be smiling—always smiling.
When his heartbeat had returned to normal, he returned to his unwelcoming bed and, pulling the covers up to his chin, swore that tomorrow he would tell her he couldn't live without her. He would tell her that he would die if anything ever happened to her. He would tell her that he loved her.
But when morning came and she crashed into him on the sidewalk, giggling and smiling—always—he bit his tongue.
She was alive.
She was fine.
And he didn't need a broken heart.
