110 Requiem for A Dream (2/2)

I wracked my brain and thought about it. Seconds later, I enumerated, \”Mostly in school. Half an hour in English Literature before Mrs. Garcia notices me drooling, an hour during Free Period, an hour during lunch, and another half hour in Physics because Ms. Ramirez is nice enough to let me—\”

\”—that woman dotes on you,\” Arah rolled her eyes again.

\”That she does,\” I answered happily. \”But that's because I ace all her exams even without needing to study too hard.\”

\”Show off,\” Arah smirked.

\”Don't hate the player, hate the game.\” I laughed.

\”You only get three hours of sleep a day?\” Ty asked uncomfortably.

I nodded. \”But enough about my poor sleep routine. Why were you asking me about dreams and the Fayne?\”

Ty lowered his head and didn't speak, prompting me to throw one of my paper-mâché Batterangs at him.

\”Speak, Superman!\” I ordered in a low, growling voice that emulated how I thought Batman spoke.

Ty scratched his head. He scratched his head some more. And after seconds of the obvious back and forth going on inside his mind, he finally said, \”I've been having these nightmares… I think they're about the Fayne because a lot of the stuff you talk about… well, it's like I can see them in my dreams.\”

Both Arah and I looked at each other. Then our eyes darted back to Ty.

\”What do you mean, Tiberius?\” Arah asked in a serious tone.

\”Um, maybe it's because Dean describes them really well, but sometimes, in my dreams, well… my nightmares, really…\” Ty looked sheepishly back at us. \”I can actually see fairies vividly in my dreams. I think. I think I've seen that dwarf Varda and your pixie friend, Qwipps… and they're exactly how you describe them… except…\”

\”Except?\” I asked, my anxiety slowly building in my gut.

\”Th-they were covered in blood…\” he finished. \”Like they'd lost a fight and were dying… or close to it.\”

But Ty wasn't done. He told us more of the things he'd seen in his nightmares like he couldn't stop now that he'd begun.

\”I saw Aura too.\” And after saying this, Ty sent me a wan smile. \”But not like when she's here. More war-like.\” Ty frowned.

Then he went on to describe Aura's mask in perfect detail as if he'd actually seen her wearing it, something I'd never discussed with either of them.

\”Ty's eyes looked hard into mine. \”Dean… there was blood on her robes, and she was holding onto someone and crying. Tears streamed down her face and onto a shock of red hair. I couldn't see his face, but I think it was you…\”

There was an awfully long silence while Arah and I absorbed Ty's words which were only broken after Arah finally snapped.

\”Geez, Tiberius,\” Arah said. \”Morbid, much?\”

\”Um, Ty,\” I added. \”Maybe I should stop talking about my time in the Fayne. Seems like that stuff really gets to you, dude.\”

For some reason, Ty's dream worried me, which made no sense to me at all. Dreams meant nothing. Especially dreams from someone whose only connection to the Fayne was me.

\”I saw a white tower behind Aura… It was half-carved out of white rock and designed like those Christian temples that were co-opted by the Muslims after Constantinople was sacked,\” Ty explained. He was a history buff. \”It was set against a stormy sky. Its battlements were torn apart like something had ripped half of it up into the air…\”

Ty sighed.

\”I think I'm going crazy,\” he finished, glancing between me and Arah afterward.

My heart was pounding like a jackhammer. How the hell did Ty know what my new tower looked like when I hadn't told him anything about its design apart from the fact that it was a tower.

My mind reeled, and I was in no condition to tell my friend he was just having bad dreams. Thankfully, Arah managed to save the afternoon by informing Ty that he was wuss and that his dreams were just that, dreams. In fact, she was so confident about this that I started to believe her words too. It couldn't be possible, after all, Ty dreaming about the Fayne when he'd never been there. And yet…

Hours later, just before sunset, I waved goodbye to Ty and Arah as they drove as in his car, wondering just what the hell Ty was on about. Maybe he'd started smoking pot and this hallucination was the end result. I'd have to ask Arah just to be sure. Still, it didn't make sense that he knew and described things he'd never seen before.

That thought gave me goosebumps, and I shivered uncontrollably while I stared up at the Fall sunset. It was almost time to return to the Fayne.

\”Maybe I'll ask Aura about humans dreaming of the Fayne,\” I whispered to myself.

I was about to head back into the house when I noticed something odd in the neighbor's yard on the opposite side of the street.

A man stood there. He was dressed all in black with a deep hood covering his face, but it was his ears that caught my attention. Even from where I stood, I could tell they were long and pointy.

At first, I thought he was looking right at me, but based on the way his hood was turned, he might have been looking at Ty's Camaro instead.

A gust of wind sent dust floating up to my glasses and into my eye, causing me to take the glasses off and rub furiously at my eyes. And by the time my vision cleared and I'd put my glasses back on, the strange hooded figure was gone.