To Envy the Stars

Chapter 17

I hate nightmares. I get one about once a month. Can you blame me? I was fudging shot and nearly kidnapped.

This is roughly how this particular nightmare went:

I was in the clearing, staring peacefully at the stars. Everything was still and silent.

I was about to leave, when I heard a few leaves crunch behind me. I turned around to see the silhouette of a person. I couldn't make out the face, but the figure looked familiar.

"Boo!" Lukas' familiar voice yelled.

"Lukas, don't do that, you scared me." I said, laughing nervously.

"I know. That why did it. Let's go back to the apartment now, it's nearly 10 o'clock." He told me.

"Okay, follow me, I know the way back." I offered, heading into the forest.

We were halfway back to the apartment when Lukas screamed, followed by the sound of a few loud snaps.

I turned around, but instead of seeing the forest behind me, I was back in the alleyway. One shadowy figure, standing over another.

The one standing had a long rope in his hand. A whip. That's what the loud snaps were.

I reached for my bag to get my pepper spray, but my bag wasn't there.

I was in my prom dress again, my shoulder was shot.

I finally made out the face of the person on the floor. Lukas.

Blood was trickling out of his mouth and from sone wounds from the whip.

It felt like my blood froze and I became numb. All of my features seemed to be 10 times as heavy. My knees started to buckle.

I wanted to run, but I couldn't leave Lukas.

I reached down to grab a large branch off the ground and I charged forward.

I attempted to hit the man, but his whip reached me first.

It hit my arm, making me drop the stick. Another hit came down on my back. Hard.

I crippled to the ground next to Lukas, so close that some off his blood smeared on me.

The whip came down again. Again. A few more times. I screamed for help, but I knew no one could hear.

The whip came down again and it feels like thousands of tiny needles being hammered into my skin.

I could barely take steady breaths with how hard I was crying. My lip was quivering so much that when I sucked in a breath, it sounded like a dying pig and it provided me about as much oxygen as breathing through a straw.

Then he started whipping Lukas.

"Stop!" Someone yelled. It was James. He and Ash were standing behind the man with the whip.

The man turned around and whipped the living crap out of the both of them as I sobbed.

I couldn't move. I told myself to move, but my legs wouldn't even twitch.

The man came back over to me and whipped me 2 more times before he tied the whip around my hands like handcuffs.

He dragged my across the alleyway, slowly passing the bodies of my friends. I'm pretty sure he moved slowly by them on purpose.

I tried to look away, but it was too late. I stared at their scars and whippings and I blamed myself for coming to the forest.

I was thrown into the back of his car and the man said one thing. "You're life is mine."