insomnia [✔]

scene. i

"Where am I ?" muttered Madeleine and her voice rang out because of an echo.

She was in a room with white walls. Impossible to know where it started and where it ended. The young woman felt enclosed, as if the walls were getting closer.

Madeleine's heart began to beat faster, her breathing became irregular, it was like a panic attack. Everything around darkens, leaving only the light of a spotlight trained on her. Then her mother appeared, under the light of another spotlight. Madeleine wanted to run towards her, but suddenly a silhouette stood up behind her. She recognized the young man in white rags she had seen from her bus stop. Anger bubbled up inside her. What was he going to do?

"Don't you even dare touch her! If you were to do anything to her, I would make you regret it!"

But despite all her will, Madeleine could not move. She was like paralyzed, unable to unstick herself from the bed where she was lying.

"I won't let you hurt her!"

There was a silence, the intruder gave a mocking smile to the dark-haired young woman. Madeleine was then about to reply when her mother suddenly collapsed. Madeleine exclaimed "Mom!" under the influence of panic. She was helpless in this situation, still bedridden and unable to move even a toe.

"Things ain't gonna happen like that!" shouted out Madeleine to the strange young man in white clothes.

But he wasn't listening to her. On the contrary, he was content to ignore it. He squats near the inert body of Madeleine's mother and seizes her wrist as if to take her pulse. Then he shook his head saying : "She's dead." His voice was soft as a whisper, but it weighed heavily on Madelein's heart. It's as if he was trying to trick her, she couldn't bring herself to believe what he had just said.

"What the hell did you do to her! You better tell me before things get bad" exclaimed Madeleine, ravaged by pain.

"You were there, weren't you? You saw that I didn't do anything to your mother. But you, you did something wrong... Maybe it was just an accident ?" said the mysterious young man, and as he spoke, Madeleine's mother's body turned into a pile of purple sand.

"Bullshit!" replied Madeleine racily, and yet doubt was already creeping into her.

"Ain't you the one who's been lying to yourself for the past few years?" declared the young man dressed in white.

Madeleine found nothing to answer. She clenched her fists in frustration and incomprehension, and when she opened them again, purple sand escaped from them. Everything disappeared at the same time as the mysterious young man. He walked away until the dark-haired young woman could only make out a somewhat vague and distant shape. So she stood staring at her now empty hands wondering if there really was a logical explanation for all of this.

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The young woman almost jumped out of bed. She thought she heard someone shouted out her name. Then she noticed the boy green-haired boy who wasn't a stranger to her. Her eyebrows furrowed when she recognized Gar. The boy seemed to hesitate for a moment, then cautiously approached. He had called Madeleine because she was fidgeting while asleep. He had worried. With a concerned face he approached the screens that displayed  the vital parameters.

"How do you feel? Any nausea or headaches?" Gar questioned in a very calm way.

"It's like I wake up having drunk too much the night before..." complained Madeleine, trying to sit up.

"It must be a normal symptom. Your last vision lasted a long time. It looked intense. And you fainted..." told Gar.

"No, that's not me. I don't pass out so easily. You must be kidding me" laughed the young woman in a incredulous way.

"Yet that is what happened! You were in an alley. I came to talk to you, but it's like you can't see or hear me. So I thought you must be in the grip of another vision" replied Gar.

"Yes! I got it! Everything can be explained: this was all just an hallucination. Maybe it's just me who's freaking out?" exclaimed Madeleine.

Madeleine was sincere. She was looking for a rational explanation for all these incidents. A thought regretfully, that perhaps she needed to see a psychologist. Someone who would be able to help her and maybe even find an antidote to what was wrong with her.

"Can I ask you... What did you see?"

In response to Gar, Madeleine sighed and mumbled that it didn't matter since it was insane. The young man assured her that there was surely a meaning, but that perhaps she first had to accept her visions to better understand them.

"Can you describe it? How it feels..."

Madeleine started to think. It wasn't that simple. She realized that she didn't remember much when this happened. When she woke up and the vision had therefore ended, all the sensations evaporated. She didn't understand it, and had to admit that she didn't really know how it worked. Gar then replied that it was no big deal, and promised that they would find out together. He seemed convinced and Madeleine thought back to the way she had left the restaurant where they had had lunch. For the first time, she seriously wondered who was this boy who came at the right time several times.

"Who are you... Gar?"