Chris had no idea what had just happened and he felt strange, like the world was suddenly revolving strictly around him. This was quite possibly the strangest dream that he had ever had in his entire life. It felt so much more real than a dream, but people didn't just appear and disappear at will without this being some sort of hallucination. He didn't know how to wake himself up though, so he stood there, doing nothing, feeling nothing, just standing there.
"Hey there sailor," came a new voice and he turned around.
"Trish, what are you doing here?" Chris asked, suddenly feeling guilty for the confession that he had given Stephanie earlier…if that was earlier, he had no real sense of time at the moment.
"Well, I'm what you're thinking about right this moment," she said, punctuating her words with a finger as she stepped closer to him. "You thought of me and suddenly, here I am."
"Yes, here you are."
"So why'd you want me here, I mean, I know that Stephanie was here earlier, but now I'm here and so I must have more precedent in your life right? Since I came last, and they always say that you save the best for last."
"You know that Stephanie was here?"
"Yes, and I know your dirty, little secret. So when did it happen, huh Chris? When did you fall in love with her?" Trish asked, her voice void of any malice or contempt, but simply one filled with a child-like curiosity.
"I don't know, I just…"
"Tell me, I'm not real, I'm just your imagination, confess what you need to confess."
"I fell in love with her after I had these dreams about our life. And then I just…I can't stay away from her, I don't know what it is, I don't know how she got in my head in the first place. I don't want to hurt you Chris."
"You're not hurting me Chris," Trish said, running her hands down his broad chest. "Because you're not leaving me. I'm not going anywhere. I can't go anywhere, I'm your girlfriend, or have you forgotten?"
"But I'm in love with Stephanie," he protested.
"Does Trish know that? The real Trish, the one you actually know, does she know that you're in love with Stephanie?"
"No, not really…"
"Then she's still your girlfriend?"
"Yeah, but as soon as I wake up, I'll break up with her. I mean, we had a good run, but it wasn't going to work out anyways. So we just go our separate ways and that's that. I mean, simple, right?"
"Wrong," Trish giggled. "You don't want to hurt Trish's feelings. You don't want to break her heart like you did when you had the bet going. So, do you know what you're going to do Chris?"
"What?"
"You're going to stay with her, because that's the kind of guy that you are. You're the kind of guy that doesn't break someone's heart. That's who you ARE. Don't you get it Chris? You're one of the good ones. Too good probably."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means that you don't have what it takes to break it off with Trish. You're just going to keep staying with her because you won't work up the nerve to dump her. Think about the situation Chris, you're with Trish, and then you fall for Stephanie while you're with her. How do you think that's going to make her feel?"
"Well, I can't help that."
"And that means you're going to stay with her. Don't you love Trish, Chris? She's stuck by you through a lot of things, has Stephanie?"
"It doesn't matter."
"Doesn't it?" she said cryptically. "Doesn't it matter that Trish has always been there for you? Doesn't it matter that she took you back even after you were in on a bet to sleep with her? Does any of that matter?"
"No, it shouldn't."
"You're just a good guy Chris, that's it, nothing to be ashamed of, you're just a good guy and you aren't going to change. I mean, you've already cheated on Trish, kissing Stephanie like you did. Do you really think that after that guilt, you're going to just turn around and dump her?"
Chris hadn't thought about that kiss and the fact that he was still with Trish. "I don't know."
"Of course you don't," Trish said with a smile. "You don't know because now the seeds of doubt are planted in your brain. You hate hurting people Chris, you don't like to do it. Isn't that why you ran to Stephanie after you heard about her nervous breakdown?"
"I felt like she might've needed someone."
"Maybe she did, maybe she didn't, but you thought that it could've been your fault. Deep down, you were worried that it was your fault. How are you going to feel if you dump Trish and she has a nervous breakdown? Are you going to feel so guilty that you run back to her?"
"You're just trying to confuse me."
She shrugged. "But it's in your mind now."
"Go away."
"Your wish is my command…but make the right decision Chris."
1He was seeped into the inky darkness that surrounded him. He felt like he was suspended in time and space, not even a person anymore, but more like an entity, a spirit surrounded by the dark sky with no stars in sight. It was an odd feeling and yet strangely peaceful. He saw Trish again, up ahead, where it seemed to be light, saw many of the times he had spent with her, and she had made him happy, and he tried to reach out for it, but he couldn't reach it.
He was being pulled back by something, but he couldn't turn his head to look at what it was. His eyes remained focused on Trish and he could see the time he apologized to her and she took him back. But then the scenes started to change, started to fade and he saw Trish fading.
"What's going on?" he muttered as the images shifted.
This time they were dreams he had been having of Stephanie. The dreams that haunted him night in and night out. He saw that life that his mind had built and was confused to see so many of those images pass in front of him. But perhaps he was dreaming now, maybe this was just a dream.
"Chris, come back to me," a voice said softly, but the sound reverberated through this empty space and echoed until it was the only thing he heard.
He wanted to call out, but when he tried to it was drowned out by the voice. Was it Trish, trying to call out for him? Maybe she was trying to wake him up from this dream state. He tried to break free, but he was still being held by something, and he tried to call her name again, but before he could, all sound stopped.
"Chris, baby, please come back to me, we need you…"
He didn't understand what was going on, but whatever it was, he desperately wanted to find out what it was. He stopped trying to think and concentrated on opening his eyes. But that was hard too, because he felt like lead suddenly, unable to move. And again, the visions came, but this one starred Trish again, the same scene as before.
"Trish, what I did, I know that was inexcusable."
"You're damn right it was," she said, "I trusted you Chris, I thought you had feelings for me, but obviously you don't. I was a bet to you. I know that in the past I was seen as nothing but a slut, with the T&A and everything, but I've changed and to be treated as a simple whore in your schemes, that hurt beyond anything, even everything Vince put me through."
Those words stung and he looked down, "I'm sorry, I know those words aren't the best, but they're sincere. I'm sorry, I…it did start as a bet, but somewhere down the road of that, I fell so hard and so fast for you."
"How can I even trust what you're telling me? This could still be a part of the bet and you could be lying to me right now."
"Trish, I swear on everything that I am, that I am NOT lying to you right now, with my heart, I'm telling you this."
"It's going to take a while for me to trust you," she said, giving in to his words, his charm, everything about him, she was just giving in.
"I know," he whispered, leaning in closer and closer to her, his eyes targeting her lips.
"As long as you know," she whispered back as she closed the distance between their lips.
Chris watched as the scene faded before him. Well, yeah, that's how it had gone, but why was he reliving that scene and why did it seem so surreal now? It didn't seem real, but maybe that was due to his surroundings, nothing seemed real around him, how could it when there was nothing.
"I need you Chris, I need you so badly…"
The voice again. Where was it coming from? He couldn't look behind him, but everywhere else, he tried to look and still…nothing. This voice was starting to haunt him, like those dreams with Stephanie. Had he been injured? That had to be it. This was too…real to be a dream, and yet too dream-like to be reality.
Another scene flashed before his eyes and suddenly he went right back to thinking that he was dreaming, because there was Stephanie and she was smiling at him. It was like the scene out of a dream. She was standing in the middle of a rainstorm and her bangs were sticking to her forehead, her dress clinging to her curves and she was smiling and looking at him through narrowed eyes as she tried to keep the rain away from her face.
"Chris, get out of the rain, you're going to catch a cold."
"We will," he said as two little boys chased him around the grassy expanse of their backyard.
"You're all going to be sick in bed!"
"Well, at least we'll have you to take care of us," Chris laughed as Brennan tackled his leg. Chris fell to the ground in laughter.
"Yeah, I wouldn't be too sure about that," Stephanie said as she started to walk away towards the house. The three boys got up and Chris jogged over to Stephanie, putting his arms around her and kissing her neck, the rain making her taste so sweet.
"I love you."
"I love you too, even if you are as stubborn as a mule."
"But you still love us right?"
"There will never be a day that I won't love you. There will never be a moment where I don't love you anymore."
The scene faded out again and he was in the darkness once again. This was all becoming way too confusing. It was like he was being shown two different paths, but he couldn't go down either of them. All he knew was that Trish was his reality, and Stephanie was his dream reality, if such a thing existed.
"Chris, don't leave me…"
Leave who? Now he was just getting irritated, wanting to know what was going on and who was speaking to him, or rather pleading to him rather desperately. He wanted to find out who it was, but it didn't seem that that was going to happen. Now he was just sick of it.
"I want out!" he yelled at nothing and nowhere in particular.
And just like that, everything turned white and he was standing, instead of floating like he was before. There was a door and he found that he could walk and went straight for it. Looking around for a moment he grabbed the gold knob and turned it.
Chris opened his eyes to look up at the ceiling. The room was unnaturally dark, the curtains drawn and the door partially closed so that little to no light traveled through to the room. His eyes adjusted to the dark a little and why he was in the hospital, his mind was hazy at best, and it was pounding so he had trouble concentrating.
He noticed a figure stir on the seat next to him, but couldn't see who it was because of the darkness of the room and what appeared to be a blanket covering the person. He looked around, expecting the lights to turn on, both figuratively and literally. The person mumbled and shifted again and he found his voice enough to say.
"Hey."
The lump jerked up and looked at him, though he couldn't quite make them out, "Chris!"
He recognized the voice immediately and smiled, "Yeah, it's me."
"Oh Chris!" The woman (he had figured that out by now) threw her arms around him and hugged him tightly, despite him wincing in pain from the hug.
"Hey you."
"Do you have any idea how worried I've been over you!"
"A lot," he ventured to say.
"God, I thought you were going to die," she said, her tears apparent in her voice, "They said you it was bad Chris…really bad. I…I can't live without you Chris."
"Babe, I'm not going anywhere."
"When you fell, they…it was so bad Chris, I had to turn away, I didn't know what to do, I ran out there to be with you and left--"
He hugged her tighter, "Hey, hey, now don't cry, I'm here and I can feel all my extremities and I know who you are and everything."
"If you know who I am, tell me my name right now…"
