Chapter Text
Everything was burning. One giant landscape of embers and smoke. Ari coughed as she pushed her way through the charred, wooden boards, dodging the embers that were still glowing that eerie gold-red, lighting up the night sky.
“Ari..” Ari heard someone whisper, barely audible over the cracking of the wood still alight. It almost sounded like Natalie, but, no, it couldn’t be.. Ari hadn’t heard from her in years...
“Ari..” The voice sounded again, seemingly wispier, but also somehow seemed louder. It seemed to be just through the next gap. Almost...
“Ari! Are you paying attention?” a voice said, jolting Ari from the burning scene, making her vision fade back to the depressingly familiar classroom of her Calculus class. At this point in the year, the class had become a formality due to the class having finished their AP exams the day before. Now, the teacher wasn’t sure what to do until their graduation that night.
“Yes Mr. Fleming,” Ari said, looking up at the whiteboard where the teacher had already started writing more equations on it.
“I know this is not the most enjoyable, but you may see this next year.” Mr. Fleming prattled on, repeating the same speech he had probably been saying to himself all day. None of the seniors wanted to be here, but her school had decided that this year, instead of letting them stay home and get ready for graduation, the best way to send them off was to give them one last day of classes.
Ring! The school bell sounded throughout the classroom, signaling their freedom from the school. As she packed her things, Ari noticed her best friend, Philip, already packed and walking over to her.
“Hey. You looked to be in your head for most of class.. Still getting those dream things?” he asked, stopping in front of Ari’s desk as she finished packing up.
“Yeah. But this one seemed different...” she had been getting these almost dream-like visions for the better half of that school year. They had first started off as wisps of feelings or pictures which had eventually evolved into full on unavoidable day-dreams. However, she had never gotten something as vivid as she had just then.
“Different? How?” Philip asked as they headed out of the classroom and towards one of the exits from the building.
“I am not really sure.. It just seemed to be more.. Real? Like it was actually happening? And I thought I heard someone I knew this time. Usually it’s either indiscernible or a voice I don’t recognize, but, this time, I could swear I knew it..” Ari replied as she faced the ground, trying to recall the voice from the dream. “But I haven’t heard from her in a long time..” she mumbled, slightly stuck in her own thoughts as she and Philip exited out of the building and headed towards the parking lot.
“Hmm.. I wonder what else you will see, them.” Philip said thoughtfully, crossing the road and heading towards his car. “Hey! Maybe you could help me find my tie before tonight!” he said jokingly.
“You still can’t find it? I bet your mom’s freaking out,” Ari laughed, unlocking her truck and throwing her backpack into the passenger side before closing her door again.
“Yeah, she said that I have to find it before I can be on my phone...” he said sheepishly. “And,” he added,” it would at least be better than the one two months ago.”
“Yeah..” she said, trailing off as she remembered that day-dream. It wasn’t the visuals that were bad, just some blobs of color and vague shapes. But the noises. The screams and the metal on bone would stay with her on nights she couldn’t sleep, keeping her wide awake.
“You may want to get your parents to drive you, just in-case. Wouldn’t want you to be driving and it to suddenly trigger again.” Philip said, throwing his stuff into his car and hopping in.
“Yeah, I’ll try, though you know that's probably going to be a dead end.” Ari said.
“I guess, but it might be worth a shot.” he replied, starting his engine. “Anyway, I better head off before my mom wonders where I am.
“Alright, I’ll see you.” Ari said, finally hopping into her own truck and turning it on.
“Bye.” Philip said before driving off. Ari sat there for a little longer, thinking about that night. What if it triggered as she was walking to her seat or to get her diploma? What would she do? Most of her class wasn’t aware of these. What would she say?
Then again, she still had to worry about getting there in the first place. Asking her parents was a whole other task that she wasn’t sure was even worth it. At first, they had been fine. Of what she could remember from her childhood, it had been a happy one, but something had seemingly changed in the recent years, making them more short-tempered and annoyed with her being around them.
She finally pulled her parking brake and drove down the crowded streets to her house, hoping that it would go better than she hoped. She had a bad feeling about tonight, but something told her it may start to explain everything.
You know what they say about false hope and instinct...