Chapter 8: Inside My Mind

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I woke up to laughter, confused and disoriented, my face stuck to whatever I was lying on. As I peeled my skin from the leather, the laughter turned into undecipherable whispers. Where was I?

I rolled over, looking around the room, trying to remember how I'd ended up here, and then it all came back to me. I was on Nick's couch, too scared to sleep in his room. I'd rather be confused and disoriented than remember what had happened, the clown's face in the forefront of my mind again. I quickly glanced around the room, fear trying to consume me, but I saw no clown or anything else out of the ordinary.

"I don't know," I heard Nick say from the kitchen. He said something else, but was talking so low I couldn't hear. I turned my head slightly, hoping I could hear who he was talking to.

"We may have to go back." It was Erik's voice.

"I doubt she'll go back." Nick said something else, but I didn't hear him. "She's really scared."

"We need to catch some kind of proof, though," Erik said. "I mean, how do we know...?" He lowered his voice, so I didn't hear the last part, but I could only guess what he was saying.

Not wanting to listen to them talk about me anymore, I got up and walked into the kitchen, purposely stepping heavily so they'd know I was coming. I didn't want to walk in on them mid-Amber convo and it be all awkward.

They both looked at me as I walked in. "Whoa," Nick said, making a face. "What happened to your face?"

I sat down at the table across from him, next to Erik. "What's wrong with my face?"

He laughed. "Is that a rhetorical question?"

I rolled my eyes at him, thinking back to when I peeled my cheek from his couch. "Your couch just happened to love my face and didn't want to let go." I reached up and rubbed it, feeling a crease from the stitching. "Just one more thing to add to the freak show that is my life," I added, nodding down at the sling that was still keeping my arm immobilized.

"How's your shoulder doing?" Erik asked.

"Sore. My collarbone, on the other hand, hurts like a mother."

"You're lucky that's all that happened, taking a fall like that," Erik said. I nodded, and then an awkward silence filled the kitchen.

"So, are you up for going back to bed... in my bed?" Nick asked.

"Are you serious?"

"Well, now that Erik's here, he can stay in there with you, that way if you see or hear anything, he'll be there to witness it. And make sure you don't take out any more of our cameras."

He should've just said Erik would be there to see if I was crazy or actually seeing things. "Yeah, I can do that. I just can't be in there alone." I didn't think I could be anywhere alone, at this point.

"Okay, I'll be watching from in here, too; no smoke breaks," Nick said with a wink.

"You don't need to be smoking, anyway. It's a bad habit."

"My life is one big bad habit," he retorted.

Erik pushed me out of the kitchen before I could say anything else, causing me to wince in pain. "Sorry," he said.

"It's okay. I guess tackling Nick like I did wasn't such a good thing with a broken collarbone."

"I don't know. I think it sounds pretty awesome. Too bad that wasn't caught on the DVR."

As we got to Nick's bedroom, I let Erik walk in first, making sure it was all clear before I went in. I still found myself looking toward the chair, but it was empty this time. Hopefully it'd stay that way.

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