A/N- Hi! You know, I think this might be one of my favorite stories… So here's Chapter 4! (Confession time: I'm still working out the kinks of Lief's past…but it'll turn out pretty well, I think)
Guess the State contest: iamtheblueskittle won! Right away! First guess! I'm amazed. (btw, the answer was Minnesota.)
Disclaimer- Whatever. I really don't need this because you all know…but the rules say I have to, so I disclaim.
Chapter 4: Night 1- Nightmares and Sketches
Erin's POV
The rest of the day went…fairly smoothly. I read the book I had brought, which turned out to be a murder mystery belonging to one of my brothers. It was pretty good. Lief didn't blow up at me and instead went for a walk. After sunset, he came back, with a couple leaves in his hair and a scratch across his face. "Hungry?" I asked.
"Not really." He's never hungry. I made a mental note to make sure he ate the next day.
"You're never hungry."
"Don't' bug me about it, Erin. I'm too tired to be bugged." He sat down against the wall and grabbed his sketch pad. I had been going to flip through it while Lief was walking, but decided against it on the grounds that he could came back in and I'd never know it. He makes about as much noise as a cat. Personally, I think the boots he wears have something to do with it. He always wears these leather boots that apparently have no rubber soles and allow him to move absolutely silently.
"Are you sure you're not hungry?" I pressed.
"Erin, I'm really not. I'd rather not have to yell at you again. You can eat if you want."
"I ate."
"Then go to sleep. It's late."
"How do you know?"
"I have a watch."
"Oh."
"You can use the blankets. I'll be fine."
"You'll get stiff sleeping on stone, you know." I said.
"Whoever said I'd be sleeping on the floor?" Lief asked before laying down on the table and closing his eyes.
"You're sleeping on the table?" I asked, disbelieving.
"Yeah. Your point being…what?"
"Nobody sleeps on tables."
"I do. Now shut up and turn off the light." I turned off the light and lay down on the blankets. They were old and smelled funny, but they were thick. As I was about to drift off to sleep, I realized something.
"Lief?"
"What?"
"You sleep with your boots on?"
"Yeah. What about it?"
"Most people don't sleep with their shoes on."
"I do. And they aren't shoes, they're boots. Now go to sleep."
"'kay. G'night, Lief."
"Good night, Bomber Girl. Now shut up and go to sleep." That defeats the purpose of saying good night, I thought as I drifted off to sleep.
A piercing scream woke me up a while later. I jumped up and flicked on the light. Lief was still on the table, and still sleeping, but was shaking and covered in a cold sweat. I went over to make sure nothing was wrong. "Lief? What's wrong?" I murmured. Hey, I can be serious when I have to.
"No…NO! STOP! Just make it stop, make it stop…" Lief trailed off. His dark brown hair was messy and so sweat-soaked it looked black. I started shaking him, not knowing what else to do.
"Lief! LIEF!" I was starting to panic a little. What could be so horrible that it would make Lief, cold, hard, stoic Lief, scream like that?
Lief opened his eyes and looked up at me. The usually hard blue-grey eyes were large and dilated in fear. "Erin?"
"I'm right here."
"Why are you looking at me like that?"
"You were screaming. And saying things."
"What did I say?" Lief said, sitting up and suddenly looking panicked.
"Just something about making it stop." Lief looked a bit more relieved.
"Good."
"What was all that about? Did you have a nightmare?" I asked.
"You have no idea what it was all about. Nor do you want to know. Nor am I going to tell you."
"Why not?"
"Just shut up, would you, Parman?"
"You know, I just woke you up from a nightmare, I'm not sure you should be snapping at me."
"Nightmare? NIGHTMARE? Erin, when you've seen what I've seen in those dreams, you wouldn't call it a nightmare. You wouldn't know what to call it. And neither do I. Your worst nightmare is like a fluffy little dream compared with that- that- dream."
"Lief, it's okay. Nothing's happened. It's okay."
Lief turned away from me and lay back down. "No," he choked out. "It's not okay. Nothing will ever be okay. And it's all my fault. Nothing happened, you say? Maybe to you, no. But me? I've seen too much, so much has happened. Be glad you're not me, Erin Parman. Be glad you're not me."
I wasn't sure what to do. Or what to say. So I just did what seemed right. I sat down on the edge of the table, grabbed Lief's shoulders, and pulled him into a hug. Hey, he looked like he needed it. He tensed for a moment before relaxing. After about thirty seconds he pulled away and turned the other way. I grabbed his shoulders and turned him back toward me. I nearly gasped. Lief's eyes were closed and tears were leaking out of the corners. He looked a lot younger then 15. "Lief, what's wrong?" I asked. He shook his head, obviously not trusting his voice. "Lief, you need to tell me."
"No," Lief said.
"Lief-"
"-Listen to me for a moment, would you? Erin, you really don't want to know what I would have to tell you. Trust me for once when I say that you don't want to know. Now please, let me sleep. It's three in the morning and unlike the other Apollo children, I do not appreciate being woken up early." Lief's eyes bored into mine. They had gone back to their normal cold look, but pain still lingered there, along with a touch of fear.
"Alright, Lief. But if you ever want to tell me-"
"I don't."
"-you can." I turned off the light, and within a couple minutes, Lief's breathing was slow and steady again. I waited a while longer to make sure he was asleep before I quietly got up, taking a penlight out of my pocket. I snuck over to the table and pulled Lief's sketch pad out from under the chair. Then I sat back down on the blankets to take a look. I felt a little guilty, but I was really curious.
I flipped open the cover and started to look through the pages. The first few were of objects, and a couple looked like a little kid had drawn them. Once I got to the people, I started to go more slowly. There were a couple drawings of people around camp. There was a sketch of Chiron in a hoop skirt that nearly made me laugh. Curse Lief's imagination. There was a picture of Theo and Noah. Frankly, I could only tell them apart because Noah's knife was always peeking out of his pocket.
Matt and I jumping off the roof of the Hephaestus cabin, alight with flames…Connor, Travis, Matt, and I planning and pulling off a big prank on the Aphrodite cabin when the Stolls had come back for a visit…Percy and his little sister Autumn. Autumn was 13 and Percy was about 25, but the way they were grinning, you would have thought they were best friends. I started flipping again, through so many people that Lief had drawn. Finally, I stopped. Lief had drawn a self-portrait. He stood stiffly, hands jammed deep inside his pockets. His head was down and his hair fell in his eyes, but you couldn't mistake the pain, anger, and pure hate in his eyes. He looked like the picture of revenge.
I tore out a piece of paper and grabbed a pencil. Placing my blank piece of paper over Lief's drawing, I made a reasonably good copy. Then taking my pencil, I started sketching a little. When I finished five minutes later, two large, black wings stretched from Lief's shoulders. Oh, wow. He looks like the angel of death, I thought. He really did. I flipped to the next page and stopped again. Lief- at least I think it was Lief- was standing with an older woman and two little girls. Lief looked a lot younger. He was smiling. Smiling. Lief. And not just any smile. A full, genuine grin. Ear to ear. I looked at the next few pages. Darkness, street corners, and alleyways reigned. There was a close-up of a rat that looked like the beast might come out of the page and attack me.
I turned back to the drawing of Lief and the girls. Noticing something, I took a closer look at the page. Crinkled splotches turned out to be dried tears. Lief had been crying when he drew this. A voice, rough with sleep, startled me.
"What are you doing with my sketchbook?" Lief growled, jumping down from the table and grabbing it.
"Nothing."
"You were looking at it," Lief said, his voice cold and dangerous. "After I'd told you not to. Isn't that so?"
I gulped. "Yes."
"What did you see?" He looked down at the page and his expression hardened. I backed up against the wall. Lief was scaring me. Like, really scaring me.
"Nothing?"
"Don't lie to me, Parman." Lief strode toward me. I shrank back into the wall. Lief put his hands on my shoulders and pushed them back, pinning me. I looked up and into his eyes. Big mistake. They looked like the eyes in Lief's self-portrait, cold, hard, and deadly.
"Lief-"
"Don't try to explain. There's no need to. There is no possible good reason why you would be looking in MY SKETCHBOOK!" Lief roared. I was scared. Really scared. Lief looked mad. Worse then mad. Lief looked like he was full of enough hate and anger to stop a train in its tracks. The worst part? It seemed to be directed at me.
"Lief?"
"Shut up. Now." A knife was placed in the hollow of my throat. I glanced down and realized it was my knife. Lief's hand was shaking, although whether it was because of anger or nervousness I couldn't tell. I guessed it was anger. Trying to escape, I kicked Lief in the shin. He winced and I slid away, out the door, down the hall, and into the woods.
Lief's POV
I'll admit it. I was angry. Erin had been looking in my sketchbook. And not just at any picture. She had found The Picture. When she slipped out of the room, I felt like chasing her with the knife. I didn't, and instead sat down at the table. I looked at my sketchbook, flipping randomly through the pages. I paused a moment at a sketch of Autumn. The daughter of Poseidon was like a mix between Erin and I, funny, sarcastic, violent, and yet managing to be nice at least half the time. I smiled in spite of myself. She always managed to make me laugh.
I drew a couple pictures, calming me down considerably. One almost made me laugh. It was the time that Noah and Theo had caught Matt and Erin trying to prank them. The twins had cornered the pranking duo. Noah had whipped out his knife and Theo was smirking. Matt looked like he was trying to talk his way out of it, while Erin looked scared. She never had liked Noah. Especially his knife.
I heard a little scuffling and looked up. Erin was peeking into the room from the door. "You can come in," I said.
"Okay." She sat down on the blankets.
"Sorry if I scared you."
"'s okay." Erin didn't press any further, which I was glad about. I couldn't shake my dream from my head, no matter what I did.
"Erin?"
"Yeah?" She still looked nervous.
"What do you do to get rid of nightmares?"
"Um…I prank somebody with Matt."
"Well, that won't help. It's not like there's anybody for me to prank here."
"Your nightmare from earlier?" Erin asked.
"Yeah." I remembered Erin's hug. Her hair smelled like smoke and machines. I suppose that's what comes from hanging out with Matthew the Bomber.
"It'll go away." Erin said.
We sat in silence for a moment. "Thanks," I said.
"For what?" Erin looked genuinely confused.
"For being there."
"Oh. You're welcome, I guess." Erin's seeming nicer then I'd have thought. Still, I should be careful. You can never be too careful.
A/N- There you go. Autumn was submitted by the amazing winner, iamtheblueskittle. Submitting a character was the prize for the correct guess. Thank you, iamtheblueskittle! Review?
-smartone101
