The darkness was a viscous expanse that resisted all attempts at passing through it. He could feel it clinging to the skin that he couldn't see, begging him not to venture further. But he was compelled to move. He wandered through the vast emptiness for what seemed like eternity. Time had no power here. He felt calm. The inevitability of nothingness dulling any panic, fear or impatience that reared its head briefly, reminding him that he was still human.
In the endless dark, he walked. But never alone.
Something was in the darkness with him. A presence that never approached, but made itself known as the only other thing in this bizarre realm. A passing traveller. A threat. A friend. He didn't know, but the fact he was not alone in the darkness was eerily reassuring.
One day, he felt it approach closer than it had ever been before. It didn't have a physical form or a voice. But he felt it surround him in an embrace.
He welcomed it.
And felt the sting of cold water rushing into his lungs. He was clutching at his throat, ice slicing through his vocal cords, not letting him scream. The viscous darkness retreated, leaving his bare skin unprotected from the elements.
Dylan was coughing up water by the bank of a creek, shivering in the dawn chill, his pyjamas completely sodden. After he managed to force his convulsing lungs to behave, he flopped onto his back, staring at the early morning sky only slightly brightening, the sun still well over the horizon.
"Damn it! Not again!"
He winced with pain as his bare feet were bruised badly from the forest floor. He had to make it home before anyone saw him, or he would have to explain to his mother why he was sleepwalking again. It took him a while to get his bearings this time, the dark forest around him being no help at all. He wondered how he managed to walk all this way without anyone seeing him.
He saw the treeline recede, and a few minutes of walking had him stepping onto the side of a small country road. Thankfully, it was empty. He reluctantly glanced down at himself in the dim streetlamp light. He looked like some sort of B-movie zombie, freshly crawled out of a grave. His wet clothes were perfect for absorbing all the dry earth around the creek, and his bare feet were caked in mud. He definitely had to be stealthy to avoid unnecessary questions.
After figuring out that he was only a few minutes away from his house, he began making his way through the sleeping suburbs, keeping to unlit paths. He still couldn't figure out how he got out of the house. The sleepwalking wasn't anything new. He had episodes since he was a kid, his mother catching him mindlessly browsing the fridge at night, looking out the living room window, sitting on the sofa as if he was watching TV. They did what the doctors recommended and locked the doors and windows at night, removed tripping hazards, and even installed a baby gate on the top of the stairs. The last one worked for a fortnight before he figured out how to undo the child lock in his sleep. He was a bright boy.
He shivered as he saw his house in the distance. It's been five years since he and his mom moved here, following his parents' divorce. It was surprisingly amicable, with no typical drama and shouting around the house, and he saw his father regularly. It seemed like there was something broken all along, and his parents were too tired to fix it. They kept telling him that it wasn't his fault, but a tiny little voice inside sometimes would whisper that it was. If only he were normal, like all the other kids. If his dad didn't have to constantly apologise to the neighbours about him making noise at night, if his mom didn't have to work the early morning shift so that she could stay awake for some of his nightly activities, in case something bad would happen. Maybe they still would be together.
Too late to cry over spilt milk. He had an illness. He was getting better. Emphasis on was.
Dylan reached the back door and tentatively tried to see if it was open. To his surprise, it was not. In a moment of panic, not sure how he was going to get in quietly, he felt a solid weight in his pyjama pocket and produced his house keys. He sighed in resignation. If the sleepwalking was bad enough that he had the mental capacity to get his keys, open the door and put them in his pocket after, then he needed to restart his medication again. He really did not want to do that. Partially because they made him feel like a zombie the next morning, and partially because he was getting better, damn it!
The turning point was five years ago, a few months after they moved in. His mom hadn't installed the window locks yet, and due to all the furniture, he slept in the upstairs bedroom for the first week. It just so happened to be the time when he decided that walking out of the second-story window was a good idea. Luckily, the rose bush broke his fall, and because he was relaxed upon impact, as the doctors said, he only broke his leg.
He was creeping slowly through the house, back to his aforementioned bedroom, stopping at every break in his mother's snoring. She was beside herself with worry, gripping his hand in the hospital as the doctors told her that he should probably be medicated so that it never happens again. For the first few weeks, even his dad came to stay with them to help sort everything out, and now that Dylan was an adult, he recognised that it couldn't have been easy for him. At the time, eleven-year-old Dylan was ecstatic. He not only got both of his parents back, albeit temporarily, but also met Adam.
Adam Penhalyn became, quite literally, the centre of Dylan's universe. From the first glimpse of his crumpled form, crying quietly on the steps of the oncology ward, Dylan found himself moving before he understood why. He was cranky from the discomfort of his cast and the stupid crutches he couldn't figure out how to manoeuvre, but one look into those sorrowful sky-blue eyes and he was acting the fool, doing anything to cheer the boy up. And when Adam smiled… all was right with the world again.
After cleaning himself up the best he could in the upstairs bathroom, watching for noises from the master bedroom, he bandaged his feet the best he could and collapsed on the bed, too mentally exhausted to sleep. He was going to pick Adam up for school in a few hours, and any more damage to his feet was going to make driving pure agony. But that was the price he had to pay for being a coward.
***
Dylan rushed to the cafeteria to buy something greasy to shovel down before heading out to lead the lunch break orientation. He flew down the stairs, skipping three or four at a time, dangerously close to twisting an ankle. His feet still hurt like hell from his night escapade, but the pain was grounding him somewhat, so he relished it. Otherwise, he might have been in his head again, and no one wants to see a sullen, dull guide showing them around.
He winked at the lunch lady and flashed his pearly whites. Predictably, it didn't get him a larger portion of cheesy fries, but a man's gotta try. As the others with initiative and valuable plans for the break, that did not involve standing in a queue for most of it, started filing in, he saw her. Monica Warren. Adam's new girlfriend.
He was impressed with himself this morning. Dylan was stunned for at most fifteen seconds before the mask of teasing mischievousness was firmly on his face. He was pretty sure Adam didn't notice. Adam didn't notice most things, which honestly was to Dylan's advantage.
Monica was Adam's third official girlfriend. First was in kindergarten, an innocent playdate who moved away to Canada before he started school. Second was Clara Tomlin in middle school, apparently sweet, pretty and kind but ultimately too eager to get rid of Jesse to stay for long. There were a few attempts from then on, but nothing as major as Monica Warren. And she knew it.
The way she simply placed her hands on his shoulders, fixed his collar as if she owned it, and leaned in to kiss him. The casual possessiveness in that small gesture made Dylan's dried-up heart crumple. He didn't know it could still do that. After years of watching Adam Penhalyn, Brunswick poster boy, walk proudly through life with fawning hordes of admirers, he thought his heart had no more pain to give. Apparently, falling in love with your best friend was a lifetime sentence.
It was doomed; he knew that. Adam was kind, understanding, and surprisingly accepting for a guy in his school social circle. But ultimately, he was deeply devoted to the church. A church that would see Dylan banished to hell for something he couldn't change. The worst part was that it wasn't either of their faults. Adam was heartfelt to everyone, especially to his friends. He never prioritised Dylan or Jesse, and both of them felt his friendship equally. And Dylan… he had no choice but to love him. Romance novels heralded love at first sight as a bolt of lightning striking through you. Utter bullshit. It was more like having one's world completely rearrange itself, firmly positioning that person in the core of every decision, every waking thought, the very centre of one's being.
Dylan was doomed to eternal torture the moment he laid eyes on Adam. Worst of all, he couldn't even hate the man. Until the age of thirteen, Dylan simply thought he really liked hanging out with his new friend. Someone who wasn't annoyed by his constant jabbering about musicals and theatre, even though he didn't share his passion. When the realisation that it was the romantic kind of love hit him, watching BBC's Merlin of all things, he cried for a week. Afterwards, he vowed to break off the friendship cleanly, lest he end up devoting his entire life to a man who could never love him back completely. Merlin to Adam's Arthur. But the next morning, when he saw Adam's smile light up the bleary winter morning, he couldn't go through with it.
It's been three years since. He had made his peace with his fate by now. It still hurt like a bitch to see Adam with her. Monica. Who was walking intently towards him now.
"Hi, there! Dylan, right?" She asked, all perk and innocence, as he tried not to choke on his meal.
"Yeah, hi." He replied stupidly, extending his hand by reflex to shake hers.
She giggled and shook it, the sound of it making Dylan's skin crawl. "I just heard that you are the orientation leader for today. What a coincidence!"
Please, please, PLEASE, no.
"I came over to convey my regrets." She said bashfully, perfect eyelashes drooping oh so sadly over a face without imperfections. "I was going to sign up earlier today, but the wonderful ladies on the cheerleading team volunteered to show me around instead. I couldn't refuse. If only I had known that you were doing the orientation, I would have definitely come with!"
He glanced at the gaggle of girls by the largest table, some staring in their direction with amusement. Some with sneers. He turned to Monica.
"No problem at all. I'm sure I can show you around the school whenever you like. Just give me a shout."
"Amazing! Thank you so much!" Monica beamed and glided away.
Dylan exited the cafeteria with a sinking feeling that he wasn't simply unlucky. He actively enjoyed digging his own grave.