Author's Note:
Sorry this took so long to update, but I've had so many fanfic ideas floating around in my head that I didn't know what to write first, with the result of having at least three things in the works at once, which is never a good thing for me. Anyways, I haven't forgotten this one, and I will hopefully continue this as time moves on. Just bear with me (and review, please!).

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In 24 hours...

.:. insert picture of Adam, standing at the bathroom
sink at night in boxer shorts and a t-shirt .:.

Adam:

A golden ray of early morning sunlight shines through the window and illuminates a once soft and warm looking face, rimmed by brown, curling locks. The face of the middle-aged woman has now gone hard and sad and determined as she is sitting at the kitchen table. She takes the weathered and beaten leather-bound notebook in her hands and opens it on the first page that is not filled with drawings and sketches, most in pencil or simple black ink.

She puts the notebook down on the table in front of her, pensively placing the pencil's blunt top end to her pursed lips, twisting it round from side to side. She starts doodling a few nondescript shapes, meaningless at first, but with every new pencil stroke forming into an intricate pattern. A snake coiling round a tree's branch. As she starts shading the branch, she stops, forlorn. It's like a thought has suddenly appeared in her head that paralyzes her.

Slowly, she puts the pencil to paper again, writing words. I can just make them out in her curved handwriting—and it looks familiar, so familiar. She writes something that I see and read, word for word, as she writes it: In 24 hours they'll be laying flowers on my life. It's over tonight. I'm not messing, no, I need your blessing and your promise to live free. Please do it for me.

As the implication seeps through, I realize I should be shocked, alarmed at the very least. But I'm not, I'm as calm as the surface of a lake in a lull of the wind—and I don't know why.

Then, suddenly, the scene shifts and the light is not a golden yellow anymore. It has changed to an annoying, alternating red and blue, flashing and blinking. And in the middle of it, there's a gurney and a black plastic cover over it and paramedics and my dad with an expression on his face that haunts me to this day.

I stare at the gurney, and suddenly the black cover moves ever so slightly, sliding away from the body it is covering. A torso rises and I see her pale and lifeless face staring at me with empty, dead eyes, her mouth opening and wordlessly mouthing something I can't understand. I fight a sob working up my throat and cry out, "Mom? I can't understand you, Mom!"

But the paramedics push the gurney into the ambulance. I start towards it, but before I can reach it, they slam the doors shut from the inside. It is all I can do to throw my open palms on the cold metal of the ambulance doors and hammer on them, screaming, "Stop! Open up! She wanted to tell me something. Please, I gotta know! Please!"

With a sudden movement, I jerk to wakefulness, sitting up in my bed. I can feel my sweat-drenched t shirt clinging to my back. I pant, catching my breath, trying to wrap my head around the fact that it was just a dream. No, not just a dream, not just a nightmare that will go away in the morning when you wake up to the aromatic scent of freshly baked eggs and coffee. No, this one doesn't go away in the morning when I wake up, because no matter where and when I do, my mother is still dead.

I get up and tiptoe into the bathroom on bare feet as quietly as I can, I don't want to wake Dad in the middle of the night. I splash cold water on my face and try to wash away the last images of the dream still floating too freshly round my mind. I put my hands on the edge of the sink and lean forward. The face that stares back at me has red-rimmed eyes from too much crying and too little sleep and shadows under the eyes approaching the depth and darkness of the night sky in bad weather. I haven't dreamed about my mother in a long time—not since Jane and I kissed at the science fair.

Jane. She appears in my head like a sweet cherry that is red and juicy on the outside, but rotten at the core. A feeling of lifelessness sweeps over me, sucking away all of the little energy I still have left. It takes all my strength to towel off the water droplets on my face and go back to bed. I fold my arms behind my head and stare at the plain, white ceiling. There are no edges or smudges or holes in it that I could study, but the moonlight makes an undefined shadow appear on it. The tree outside my window that is swaying in the light breeze paints moving, colorless pictures on the ceiling and walls, and I take them in.

As hard as I try, everything I see in them makes me think of Jane and of the horrible past weekend that followed mock trial. Tomorrow, I will have to face her in school, and I dread it, knowing it won't be anything like the times when the simple sight of her would make my heart skip an ecstatic beat or put a smile upon my face. This will be completely different—and I don't want to picture it.

Scenarios run through my head like water through a sieve, never stopping. Jane walking past me, ignoring me completely. Jane facing me, telling something cold and heartless to my face. Jane coming at me, fiercely yelling accusations at me. Jane silently sitting down next to me in AP Chem, head bowed and tears just a hairbreadth away from forming in her incredible and soulful eyes. It's that last scenario that haunts me most, driving the pain ever deeper. I think I can stand defiance, disregard, anger or even flat-out aggression, but the one thing I won't be able to face is quiet pain and hurting, because I've had too much of that myself already.

I hardly notice as more tears are slowly rolling down my cheeks, permeating into the checkered cotton fabric of my pillow. I hastily turn to lie on my side, angry at myself for not being stronger, for not having been stronger, more resistant to temptation. It's only fair that I'm being punished for my own stupidity, but it still drives the bittersweet pain too deep, deeper than I think I can stand.

I close my eyes and try to ban any emotion from my mind, not succeeding because the tears are still coming. I had forgotten a person could cry this much—I never thought I would ever again have to after—No, I mentally chide myself, I will not indulge in any more self-pity, not tonight.

I sit up again and reach for my discman on my bedside table. I put the earphones in my ears and hit the PLAY button. Ian Holm's British voice welcomes me, telling the tale of Frodo, the Hobbit, going on a quest to destroy a ring of power and evil. I need something to distract me from my mother and Bonnie and Jane and this miserable life I have been stuck in. And this will do the trick, as it has so many insomnia-laden nights before. As I concentrate all my effort on letting J.R.R. Tolkien transport me into Middle Earth; I can already feel exhaustion doing its part. Sooner rather than later, the fatigue will catch up with me and let me slip away into a restless sleep.