The Short Second Life of Mil Winchester - Book 2

Pac-Man Fever (reposted)

A/n: Hey Millers! May 2nd, Mil and Sam's birthday! Say happy birthday to them! So, in honour of that, I pushed to get this chapter finished to upload today. Cuz, if you're reading this - thanks again so much for giving me trickster!Isabel, who was awesome fun to write. And to Fahima, I love you, and I love your character. Stay strong, buddy!

We're getting so, so close to 500k reads - 475k at last count!! When we hit it, we will have a party! Suggestions for what I should do?

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PAC-MAN FEVER

Insomnia, though a bitch most of the time, was doing my world a favour right now. Of course, I was pushing it along a bit by doing the best I could to not sleep. Right now, I was at the wheel of Fahima's Impala, aimlessly driving through the streets of Lloydsville, Pennsylvania; doing little more than burning rubber, wasting petrol and trying not to...

Sleep. Ugh. I rubbed my drooping eyes, and pinched my cheek to waken myself. Fahima would kill me if I damaged her car - she didn't even know I'd taken it. I just had to get out of our motel room, away from the temptation of slumber. If I slept, Hell would slip through the cracks, and it was getting worse by the hour. Ever since my 22nd birthday a few days ago, my mind had spiralled downhill dramatically. Driving helped keep my mind occupied, it wasn't something I could do whilst distracted, and hence, it was the perfect distraction.

Oh my god the road is red.

"No, Mil," I told myself firmly. "That's just Hellfire."

I shook myself and kept driving, taking a turn onto another back street. About 50 meters ahead, a man exited a store, covered in blood. In shock, I felt the car's wheels jerk on the road. I blinked to clear the image, regaining control.

"No, Mil," I repeated, speaking aloud to drill it into my head. "Now you're hallucinating. Stop it."

I kept driving.

As the hallucinations began to fade, my exhaustion slowly began to return. I tapped my toe against the accelerator, causing the car to jerk forwards at the unexpected acceleration.

"Sorry baby," I muttered, channeling my inner Dean as I slowed back down, breaking just in time at the intersection. As I waited for the lights to change, I rubbed my eyes, the red light changing from blurred to clear, then blurred again. My head nodded, I couldn't help it. I was just so damn tired. A horn honked somewhere behind me, startling me back into awareness. I went to drive forward, before my eye caught on something surprising. A giant yellow mouthed ball on the street, stationary where a car should be parked. I reacted instinctively, my foot slamming onto the accelerator, the car swerving out of control.

The last thing I saw was a pair of yellow headlights obscuring my vision. I wasn't sure if the deafening noise came from a loud, blaring horn or somebody's screams.

** FOURTY EIGHT HOURS EARLIER**

I sat bolt upright in the darkness, breathing heavily and desperately trying to clear my head of the vile images invading my sleep. A red glow was seeping from beneath the toilet door, but I excused it on the basis that Fahima was in the can. I rubbed my eyes, and rolled over to fall asleep again. Despite being plagued with hellish memories, I was far too tired not to sleep, and I didn't really want to be the one to set the world record for the most hours awake without dying. Besides that, very soon it would start to impact on my work - it probably already had - I guess I'd have to wait for a case to test that theory. Through sleep blurred eyes I glanced at the clock, then forced myself back to sleep.