Sweet Tears of Revenge

Chapter 7: Eli

I woke up in a pool of sweat.
So, after all, it was a dream. I'm very glad!
But then I suddenly heard some noises from downstairs, and some men voices I haven't heard before.
"Wait..." I mumbled, then jumped off my bed. I was still dressed with the same clothes I was dressed with yesterday.
I ran down the stairs. There I saw two police men speaking to my mom. She was deeply shocked and looked as if she cried in the past few hours.
I looked around as well: blood stains on the couch, on the counter and on the walls... and a body covered. My eyes suddenly noticed something quite disturbing, which I honestly thought wasn't real at first... but it really was it.
"The dog's head was stuck on that stick." One of the police men informed my mom. She was absolutely devastated. She didn't even notice me!
But I was shocked as well. You're telling me that I actually saw Buster's head on that stick without it being a dream? That the entity with the long neck was real, and the red parallel world was actually existing too?!
"Mom?" I spoke, interrupting the police man. "W-what is going on...?"
She came to me, sobbing. "Eli, my sweet little angel..." she said, then she hugged me while hiding her face on my shoulder. I could hear her weep as her tears were wetting my t-shirt.
"I'm so happy you didn't get killed too..." she said.
I tried to act dumb. "Killed? What do you mean, what happened?" While I knew damn well what happened.
She tried gaining back her ability to speak. "Buster got incredibly tortured by a murderer last night. N-neither of us know how it happened... we just found his head stuck on a stick."
I nodded. "Well... I'm sorry for him. Honestly, he didn't deserve that."
Mom looked quite freaked out at me. "That's all you're going to say?!" she shouted.
"Yeah, I'll just go to school." I mumbled since I didn't wish to piss her off even more. She was clearly very affectated by my dog's loss. So was I, but I knew more and from way more ago.
I went up and took a new t-shirt from my wardrobe as I changed. I thought about what happened a bit though. So if everything was real... would that mean...?
I sighed and went to school. Jasper wasn't going to be so happy to see me again. And I think it would've been better if I stayed at him for that night anyway. No dead dogs, no parallel worlds... just me, him, and a weird ass dead root hugging his balcony.

"Hold up, so you're telling me that your lucid nightmare was connected to the reality?" Jasper said.
I nodded. We both somehow ended up arriving sooner than usually, so we spoke. Jasper didn't seem affected by my sudden leave from yesterday.
His face changed. Now he was deeply thinking about something.
"And there was a man standing in front of you."
"Eh, bodily he seemed 16-17, but who knows..." I said.
Jasper sighed. "Are you on any sort of medicine?"
I looked confused at him. "No, why would I be?"
"Dunno, just trying to help you – if you cannot help me get rid of a darn dead root – " he said.
"I see. It's still bothering me the fact Buster died though. I don't think he deserved it." I spoke, sitting down on the road, near him.
Jasper shrugged. "Yes, but on the other hand the fact that you could manage to get out of the house and escape that... yokai or whatever in order to get teleported to a parallel world is still somewhat helpful."
"What do you mean? And what's a yokai?" I asked, confused. If he was going to say random Japanese stuff, at least he could translate it as well.
"A yokai is a sort of Japanese spirit. They either have long necks or heads who are detaching and flying around, but this species goes by the name of Rokurokubi. Whatever, imagine that parallel world wanted you to be there for certain, unknown reasons." Jasper said.
"And should I be happy that now I'm possibly haunted by a Rokurokubi and that I'm wanted in a parallel world?" I asked, dumbly.
He shrugged. "Well, depending on which fate they've chosen for you, it can be either Heaven or Hell."
"And knowing I'm usually very unlucky, my fate will be to die tormented by these creatures." I said, sighing. "Amazing."
"Want to go grab a coffee or anything? We have 30 minutes left till classes." Jasper asked, trying to change the subject.
"Sure." I said. "Do you know any coffee shops around?"
"Yeah, I know a few."
I shrugged and approved to go. We took out bags and left to get coffee.
"Sorry for not being able to stay with you yesterday." I said. I felt like I needed to apology to him over and over again
"It's okay, Eli, really. I could somehow take the plant away without you needing to be there anyway. It's all good now." He said, even though I could sense the disappointment in his voice.
"I promise I'll be a good friend, okay?" I said, but the only thing he did was to nod.
We entered a cozy coffee shop. "What do you want to order?" I asked him.
He shrugged. "Maybe a frappe, what about you?"
I examined the menu featured on the wall. "Yeah, I'll get a frappe too."
"I'll play for us." He said, taking his credit card from one of his pockets.
There was a nice atmosphere in the café. You could either just order your drink and go out or sit there and drink it.
Someone entered the café. We noticed that since the bell announcing customers rang but we weren't expecting that person to be anyone too important at all.
Suddenly we felt a hand on each of our shoulders. "Hello, boys!" they voice said. Jasper turned his head. "Oh, hello Mr. Ezra-"
"You can call me just... Ezra. I'm only 19 after all. I don't really mind what I'm being called."
"Hello!" I said to him. He waved to me.
"How are you, Mr.- I mean, Ezra?" Jasper said, sketching a smile. He was still a bit frightened.
"I'm alright, stopped for a coffee before classes. I suppose you too, guys?"
We nodded. "I think we, me and Jasper I mean, will stay inside the local to drink out coffees." I said. "Right, Jasper?"
He nodded.
"That's nice. Don't mind me asking but, can I sit with you guys?" Ezra said.
Not gonna lie, I wasn't very pleased by this idea. I wanted to discuss some personal stuff with Jasper but since neither of us wanted to seem rude, Jasper said:
"Yes, of course, it's alright!"
Ezra smiled. "Good. Oh, it's your turn to order now."
We placed our order then waited for Ezra, then chose a table and sat at it.
"Have you guys done your homework?" Ezra asked.
Me and Jasper looked at each other. "Well..." I spoke. "We both had some... problems."
"Oh, what problems?" Ezra said, quite tired.
Jasper sighed. "It's quite complicated... I've spent my whole afternoon plus evening trying to kill a... plant. Cause it was pretty much covering my whole balcony."
"And you, Eli?" Ezra asked.
I looked in the ground. I didn't really want to talk about it.
Jasper took me over by my shoulders. "His dog died."
"Awh." He said. "What a shame. I'm sorry for your loss, Eli."
"No, it's alright."
"Well anyway..." Jasper said, taking a sip out of his coffee.
I took out my phone while drinking my coffee. "We have ten minutes left. Students are already entering."
"We should go, right?" Jasper asked me, as if he wanted to leave faster. I will be honest, I didn't want to be bothered by Ezra's presence either.
I shrugged. "I mean, normally we should."
"It's okay boys. You have first class with me. If we're late for five-ten minutes it doesn't mean that we'll be entirely left out in front of the school." Ezra said.
So we stood there and drank out coffees. None of us was talking to each other.
"So what music do you guys like?" Ezra asked.
"I like alternative." I said.
"I like, uh... post hardcore." Jasper said.
"And I suppose the music is pretty much either about love or drug addictions." Ezra said, addressing to Jasper.
He laughed. "Yeah, some of them are..."
Ezra smiled. "What about you, Eli? You said you like alternative?"
"Yeah, such as Radiohead." I said.
"Radiohead is cool." Ezra said, looking at his watch. "But it's quite late... we should go to school."
We all got up and left there. Once we got in the physics cabinet me and Jasper sat in the last bench and waited for the day to pass by.