Apocalypse, Steve Harrington

Chapter Forty-Eight. Haunted

FORTY-EIGHT
— haunted

    SHE DREAMT SHE was small.

    Rosy-red cheeks, splotches of freckles starting to find themselves on the sides of her face. She wore Mary Jane shoes, the blue ones, with a buckle and an uncomfortable amount velcro. Silk-like brown curls, spiraling from her scalp, and a heap of bangs on her forehead. When she smiled, it was gummy, the two front teeth missing from her top row. Golden sun peaked from the cream-white curtains, and beamed onto her face, sensitive eyes squinting through the harsh rays. Large hands tangled in her thin-hair, fingers pulling at strands to tie them into perfectly sculpted piggy-tails. She couldn't feel any of it, she just saw it— like she were herself, seventeen-year-old Lucy, watching a memory from when she were young.

   Little hers knees were bruised and scraped with youth. Lucy knitted her brows, so they were scrunched in the center, and the tip of her freckled nose twitched. Hazel-eyes scanned down the young girl, every glimpse putting a pit deeper and deeper in her aching stomach. She raised her hand, and pushed a strand of hair from her face, and the smaller version of her did the same.

    A voice, small and boyish, echoed. It was distant, hazy, and painfully familiar. He called her name, Lucy, Lucy, Lucy, three times, six syllables that made her want to sink into the floorboards. The young version of herself hummed, in a short response, and she found herself parting her lips in sadness. She wanted to speak, tell herself hello, but instead, she stood still.

    She awoke with an immediate headache. Her hair was pulled tightly into a ponytail, one that she didn't remember tying, and her scalp throbbed hot and red. Her pajama shorts twisted at the waist, and she had a stream of dry saliva down her cheek. The open curtain beamed a stream of white-gold light onto her bed, and onto her body, heavy with sleep. "Fuck," she groaned, the word deep from her chest. One hand moved to pull the hair-tie from her matted locks, and the other to cover her watering eyes.

    Floorboards creaked. Heavy steps, in a one-two pattern, that moved across the living room. She knew it was Daniel, by the weight of his stride, and the rapidness in which he crossed the cabin. Her door opened— he didn't knock— and he stood tall the entrance of her room. Tangled, mop-like brown hair fell past his ears, and his sunburnt face was turned down with a frown. She peaked at him, through puffy eyelids, and grimaced at his alarmingly large frame. "When did you get so much taller than me," she huffed, and turned over into her pillow, "get out, dude."

    "It's past eight," he widened his eyes, even though she couldn't see. She heard him scoff, "we have work."

    She lifted herself, lips departed with a gasp. He stood there, in red swim-trunks, a whistle hanging from his neck. Lucy swung her legs off the bed, the palm of her hand connecting with her forehead. "Shit," she mumbled, "why didn't you wake me up?!"

    "I did," he lifted his brows, "twice. You rolled back over both times."

    A heavy groan pushed past her lips, and she scrambled towards her dresser, opposite of the bed. "Go, get out," she snatched the bathing-suit from a drawer, and made a shoo motion with her left hand.

He shut the door, partially, and poked his head in, "you have seven minutes."

"Plenty of time!" she called, extending her left-leg to slam it closed with her foot.