Chapter Eighteen

"Victoria,"

Victoria and Reid both stopped and turned back to see Richard Parry standing in the doorway of the old colony house, calling her back. The meeting had just finished in which everything about Pogue and Victoria's new doublegangers status had been disclosed to the rest of the members of the Covenant. He ambled down the stairs towards them.

Victoria looked at Reid, "I'll meet you back at the truck?"

Reid nodded and continued walking. She watched him walk away, still unsettled by their fight earlier. Sure she and Reid got into it over tons of stuff. But not like this, it had never been like that before. His immediate thought she would just leave him. It made her feel ill.

Victoria took a deep breath, and turned to face Richard, "Yeah, Dr. Parry?"

"Please, Victoria, call me Richard. I think you have earned the right."

Victoria smiled, "Thanks, uh, Richard." It felt unbelievably weird to call him that. Victoria shifted on her heel.

"Victoria, I don't mean to keep you. I just wanted to say that I know you…" Richard shifted trying to find the right words, Victoria watched him confused as to where he was going, "Don't have a lot of people to lean on." He looked at her closely, "I just wanted to say, that I am here for you if you need to talk."

Victoria watched him, and felt flattered, that he would think to say anything to her in the first place, "Thank you,"

He nodded and stepped closer to her, "You and my son are on a very difficult path. You need as many people in your corner as you can handle. I am here for you, Victoria. Take care tonight," He turned and walked back into the colony house where James and Michael were waiting for him.

Victoria walked back over to the vehicles. Reid was leaning on the hood of his truck and Victoria tried her best not to watch Pogue pull away from the house on his motorcycle. It was the strangest feeling but she was almost hyper of aware of Pogue now. Always aware of where he was or what he was doing.

How did everything change so completely in the matter of one day? Victoria walked over to the passenger side of the truck, "Victoria?" She hesitated and looked over the hood of the truck at Reid when he said her name.

"Yeah," She felt exhausted and all she wanted to do was get back to the dorms and curl up in a ball. Even though the thought of sleep was proving very intimidating.

Reid stood up from the from the hood of the truck and turned to look at Victoria, but he had been staring at where Pogue's bike had disappeared around the corner. "Did Pogue break up with Kate because of the dreams?" His eyes turned and settled on Victoria. They were cold and slightly vacant like he was prepared for any answer.

Without blinking Victoria answered, "No," She shook her head, "That wasn't the reason." With that Victoria turned and got in the truck without hesitation. She swallowed as she sat in the plush leather interior, trying very hard to not think about the first lie she had ever told Reid.

Pogue took a deep breath pulling his shirt over his head still listening to his friends voice.

"I just don't understand how you couldn't tell me this." Caleb said shaking his head sitting tensely on the end of his own bed. Pogue looked at him. Caleb had arrived shortly after Pogue had walked back into the dorm from the meeting.

Pogue felt numb the whole way through the meeting. His dad's voice calmly explaining what Pogue and Victoria had told him about their dreams, to the rest of the covenant. He could feel all the eyes on them, darting between him and Victoria. Tyler's shocked gaze, Caleb's pensive one. But all Pogue could think about was the fact that Victoria was sitting beside Reid, holding Reid's hand. And he hated himself for being so aware, and so irritated by it. He felt like he was loosing his grip on everything. When it had been just him, he could compartmentalize. He was able to simply shove Sabine and Lady Anne and Victoria into a small box in his mind and deal. But now she knew... And everything was changing.

Pogue looked at his friend, "Oh come on dude, what was I supposed to say? I am having these wild dreams about your little sister?" Caleb opened his mouth to argue but closed it when he didn't seem to have anything real to say. "Besides, I didn't know it was gonna be so...involved,"

Caleb nodded and rubbed his hands over his face, "Yeah, I know man." He stood up and walked over to the door and patted Pogue's shoulder, "You think things will calm down once we graduate?" He asked chuckling at his best friend.

Pogue scoffed, "You can only hope."

Caleb nodded, "Kay, I am gonna go see Sarah. Promised I would check in when we got back."

Pogue nodded, wondering how exactly Caleb planned on explaining all of this to Sarah. After Caleb left he changed into sweat pants from his jeans and flopped down on his bed. He stared at the ceiling. He had tried everything, sleep aids, gravol, melatonin, he had even tried smoking some weed before going to sleep. Nothing made the dreams less intense or vivid. He stared at the roof.

It was odd to think that whatever he dreamed Victoria would be dreaming as well. It seemed so intimate and he hoped tonight wouldn't be as… intense as last night. He took a deep breath. He checked his alarm, 5:00 am, ready for swim practise. State was two weeks away. He felt ill about that. How was he gonna focus on his swims when he could barely focus on... anything.

He laid looking at the ceiling trying to clear his mind. When his phone vibrated on his side table. Pogue picked it up and looked at the screen. It was a text from Victoria, 'Night…. see you soon….'.

He couldn't help but chuckle, maybe it would be better now. Now that he wasn't alone. It certainly didn't feel any better with everyone knowing. It felt uncomfortable, like sharing this deep intimate secret. Reid glaring at him across the meeting all night didn't help.

The worst thing was Pogue did understand how Reid felt, he could understand why he would be pissed, and Reid had never exactly been level headed. But at the same time Pogue wanted to pummel the jack ass, just because he was with Victoria when Pogue couldn't be.

Pogue shook his head. He reminded himself he wasn't dreaming about Victoria, he was dreaming about the women she had been in previous lives. None of them were Victoria….

They just looked exactly like her…

And had some of her habits...

But that was it.

Yup, he was screwed.

Pogue slammed his phone down on his side table and rolled over to face the wall, trying to ignore where his life had ended up.