Dear Tressi [✓]

11

Tressi's senses returned one after the other.

First, she could sense both her arms pinned down to the mattress. Then, she could smell the sweat that drenched her skin and pooled at her lower back. She could taste the blood from where she'd bitten her tongue.

She could hear Des's frantic voice with his lips close to her ear, but she had to concentrate to understand what he was saying, "Tress. Tressi! It's just a dream. Please open your eyes," he begged.

At his request, her eyes snapped open to see Des's face, inches from her own, wild with worry. The pressure from her arms released, and she realised it'd been Des holding her down. She sat up quickly, vertigo hitting her from the sudden motion. Des moved away to give her room.

"Edda. Edda. Edda," she panted, and before she realised what was happening, her body shook with convulsive sobs. Des wrapped his arm around her, wiping the moisture from her cheeks with the other hand. Her hand fisted the sheets as she tried to control the tears.

"Tress, what happened? Did you have a nightmare? It wasn't real" he spoke quickly trying to get through to her while her momentary silence lasted. "It wasn't real," he repeated firmly, wrapping both his arms around her, gently rocking her back and forth. "It's okay, Tress."

Tressi tried to take comfort from his words as she regained control over herself. Soon, the sobs turned to silent tears and she breathed deeply, feeling herself calm down.

"I'm fine."

She sounded so hoarse. The words left a burning trail up her throat on their way out; her mouth was parched.

"You've been screaming, Tress." Des frowned, worry saturating his voice.

"I have?" she asked, surprised; her nightmares had never caused her to scream out loud before. If Des knew how often she dreamed of Edda, he'd lose his mind.

"Yes. For what felt like half an hour. What happened? Did you dream about your sister's murder?"

Tressi's eyes flashed to his to see frantic concern reflected there. There was no point lying. "Yes," she said simply.

"What exactly did you dream about?"

"I can't talk about it, Des. You know I can't."

At her words, his arms disappeared from her sides. He got up from the bed in irritation and paced back and forth across their small bedroom.

"I'm so tired of this, Tressi. You're so closed off when it comes to this. It'll make sense if you've moved on and don't want to talk about it, but you're clearly still not over it. I've been real patient with you. I've not wanted to push you, to force you to tell me something that makes you uncomfortable. But I'm reaching my limit here. You drop these hints and throw away sentences that suggest that there's a big problem here, but you don't go farther. It drives me insane. I've tried to be understanding, but you make it so hard." He stopped pacing to kneel down in front of her. He took her face in between his hands, and concern replaced fury in his eyes. "Just tell me," he breathed.

Tressi blinked rapidly to dispel the liquid blurring her vision and looked down at her hands folded across her lap.

"Okay..." she whispered. "I just don't know how to start."

Des got up off the floor and sat beside her on the bed. He waited patiently for her to gather her thoughts, and gently squeezed her arm to reassure.

Tressi's hands twisted and untwisted themselves on her lap. "You probably aren't gonna think much of me when I'm done," she said, with remorse heavily lacing her voice.

Des blinked in surprise—he hadn't expected that. What would she have to feel guilty about?

"You know that'd never happen, Tress. Just tell me," he repeated, trying to make his voice soothing.

So she told him. About her childhood, about her mother and the kind of relationship she shared with the woman, about how important Edda was to her. She told him everything about her past.

But she couldn't bring herself to tell him about going back to Lapec that weekend. It seemed like a betrayal, almost. She'd never lied to him before, but now she'd done exactly that. The prospect of Des finding out later was unimaginable, but she felt she couldn't take his reaction if she told him then.

Not now, she decided. Not when she was baring her soul, showing him the darkest stretches of her past; these were events that plagued her mind with a guilt that wrung her soul. The shame was too much. Adding something more to it, when she was so vulnerable—she couldn't face it.

Des listened patiently, trying not to interrupt and saying as little as possible. He just gave her small words of encouragement and nudges when she couldn't go on. She had to stop for a whole ten minutes while recounting discovering her sister's body as sobs racked through her. He held her tightly as she tried to get the trembling under control.

"I c-can still h-hear her Des. Why couldn't I have heard her that night? If I had, then maybe I could've stopped it. I should've stopped it. But now, that's all I can hear; her screams, pleading her killer to let her go—" She stopped, unable to go on as her muscles spasmed from the guilt coursing through her veins. Des's eyes were wide and horrified hearing the pain in her voice.

Swallowing loudly, Tressi tried to continue, "She'd even scrawled it on the floor with her blood. But she died before she could even finish it. I can see it now if I close my eyes—her body sprawled on the floor, with the word 'let' written in blood beside her. Why didn't I stop it?"

Tressi grabbed her head with both her hands, fisting her hair, pulling it by the roots. The pain in her chest ripped her apart as her throat closed up and black spots appeared in her vision. Her eyes rolled back.

And then, everything went black.