I'm baaaaaaaaaaaaaack! Just back from a much-needed hiatus (my God, I sound like Mariah Carey releasing her new album). Enjoy!

Disclaimer: These characters are not mine, but this story is, etc, etc…

Chapter 11- Walk

In a hotel across town, just before dawn, Luka, too, dreamed. He moaned in his sleep and threw a protective arm over his face. Perspiration beaded his forehead.

In his dream, it was raining. He stood in the middle of a cemetery, alone.

Lightning flashed, illuminating the deep open grave that lay a few paces in front of him. His feet moved beneath him and he tried to look down at them, or even at his hands.

Rain dripped down his face, clinging to his eyelashes and rolling down the tip of his nose.

Lightning flashed again, and Luka looked down into the hole in the ground, and he saw them there. Lying perfectly straight and still, just touching one another. The three of them. Danielja, Marko and Jasna.

They were dead, their hands folded neatly atop their chests. But their eyes stared blankly, almost accusing him of some complicity in their deaths.

Oprostite.

The illumination of the lightning seeped away, eaten by the dark, and still Luka stared in sorrow and guilt at the dark pit beneath him and the bodies that lay there in the shadows.

In his mind's eye, he reached out a hand. Icy fingers gripped his. Tears like brittle, frigid diamonds began to pelt his cheeks.

Suddenly, Sam appeared before him. She, too, was weeping, and he saw that it was her small hand that gripped his so tightly.

She looked deep into his eyes, her own glittering with tears. She leaned forward and brushed his cheek with the softness of her lips, whispering a single word into his ear.

Forever.

Then, just as soon as she had appeared, Sam was gone.

Luka turned and looked once more into the grave. He stared at his Danielja and whispered her name aloud, though she could not hear his voice.

Dreams could be like that.

Luka was chilled to the bone, weighed down, and smothered in unending gray oblivion. Cries of the dying echoed through his head.

Ljubim te.

Before he could reply, the night was suddenly torn asunder, and his eyes were blinded by a flash of bright, white light.

Luka's eyes fluttered open. For a moment, he couldn't breathe. He stared into the distance, feeling disconnected from himself, from the waking world.

Then, suddenly, his breath returned, and he inhaled rapidly, as though he had been suffocating. His heart was pounding in his chest, and Luka sat up, staring around his hotel room with wide eyes.

A dream is a wish your heart breaks…

Luka looked down and saw that his bare chest was sweat-slicked, his shorts rumpled and the sheets tangled violently around his legs. He angrily extricated himself, rolling out of bed and glancing around his darkened room. The clock on his bedside table read 5:02AM, the numbers garishly bright in the otherwise black room.

After he had crawled into the shower, then tumbled out and dried himself off, Luka began to dress for work. He felt as though he was sleep-walking. The horrible images of his nightmare did not fragment and dissipate as such things have a tendency to do. Instead, they lingered, and as hard as he tried to turn his mind to something else, his thoughts went back there time and again, as though the dream was a horrible melody repeating itself over and over in his head.

It's been so long since I dreamed of… of Danielja and the kids. Why now?

And I know I miss Sam. In spite of everything that's happened.

He winced as he thought of her tears in his dream, shed for Alex, no doubt.

His breath quickened as he mentally tried to calculate what Alex's condition would be now, wherever he was. If he didn't start to become weaker – even hypoglycaemic – today, he would tomorrow.

Oh, God. Luka tried not to let his thoughts drift towards the worst-case scenario.

Coma.

Surely Sam would have called me if something had happened, if Alex had been found last night, he thought as he noiselessly left his room. Or does she think I don't care?

His musings were guilty as he took the stairs down to the hotel's exit. I can't believe I left her like that last night, he reflected. An image of Sam as she had been then, vulnerable and sad, flashed across his mind. He saw himself kissing her and the happiness that had filled him at that moment.

But how can we have said all those things to each other? he pondered, thinking back to their huge fight. Maybe she was right. Maybe we weren't happy.

He pulled open the door and stepped into the small lobby, where a young receptionist sat behind a long desk. She was impatiently tapping keys on the computer before her, her brows furrowed in concentration.

She looked up, smiling, as Luka passed. "Good morning," she greeted him pleasantly. "The early breakfast starts at six o'clock, if you're interested." She gestured to the wall clock behind her which read 5:50AM.

Luka contemplated this. He sure wasn't that hungry. The only thing he was desperate for was coffee and going on his experiences from when he had arrived, this hotel's coffee appeared to be brewed from the finest Columbian lighter fluid.

"I'll pass," he told the girl, throwing her a small grin to show that there were no hard feelings. "Thanks anyway." He walked over to the exit and pushed open the heavy door.

Upon stepping outside, Luka was met with a blast of frigid air that made his desire for a cup of steaming coffee even stronger. He shoved his hands into his pockets and proceeded to walk down the street in search of caffeine. After all, he still had two hours to kill before his shift started.

When he had woken, it had been practically still pitch black outside, with slight tinges of colour burning like fire on the distant horizon. Now, however, the dark sky had become bands of ever-brightening blue, and the colourful sunrise had made shades of gold and apricot scar the morning. The air was crisp, with a slight mist hovering in the atmosphere. Luka watched as men and women emerged from nearby convenience stores, clutching bags or briefcases in one hand and eating hurried breakfasts with the other. Luka smiled slightly to himself as he watched a young man attempting to answer his trilling phone as he sucked back his coffee. The poor guy looked lost.

Now there's a feeling I can relate to, Luka realized as he trudged along. I just don't know what to do anymore.

I will always miss my family… but does that mean I can't be with Sam? Dammit, she barely knows the half of it, he railed against himself. Because you won't Because you won't talk to her. Sure, they might have discussed it briefly. But before long, he would close up, his hopes and fears as lost to her as Alex now seemed to the both of them.

But she should know that's hard for me to talk about – for anyone to talk about, the other part of him argued. My whole family – everything I loved – died. And that day, a part of me died with them.

The rational part of his mind knew that he was being selfish. In truth, something in him always had been.

Luka spotted a coffee shop and stopped in his tracks, his thoughts still a jumble.

Am I ever going to get through this? he wondered as he stepped inside. It was crowded, but customers were being served relatively quickly. He watched as the young men and women raced around, desperately trying to fill orders.

It sure doesn't look like it.

Oh, Danielja. My Marko. My Jasna.

He could not bear another second of agonizing regret. He was drowning in sadness, and he knew of no way to find relief.

But Sam… he loved her. He knew he did. But what did that mean now?

There was no easy way. In all the fairy tales, loving someone was enough to tame the beat, awaken the princess, live happily ever after. But in the real world, loving someone was often the shortest route to misery.

"Next." A staccato voice broke into his thoughts, causing him to look up.

A stressed-looking girl was looking at him expectantly from behind the counter, pen poised over a pad of paper to take his order.

"Just a large double latte, thanks," he mumbled, fishing in his pockets for some change.

"Is that all?" She looked supremely relieved.

"Uh, yeah," he told her, passing her the money.

"Thank God," she muttered, taking it from him. "If I get one more person telling me they want something that takes more than two minutes to say, I'm going to snap."

He smiled, not envying her in the slightest. "What time do you finish?"

"Finish? Are you kidding? I only just started." She managed a small grin as she gave him his change. "Have a nice day."

"I'll try," he told her, cheered, albeit very slightly. He thought of the day ahead.

Well, at least Morris isn't on.