All Four Of Me

Chapter 19

KENZIE

Fear.

That is the main emotion I feel as I lay in bed, breathless and disorientated from the events that occurred in my latest nightmare. Beads of sweat tickle my skin as they roll off my body towards the centre of gravity, but I am too petrified to move in case the monsters in my dreams come back to torment me again.

It is times like these that I need Rosemary. Her fuzzy white fur, flattened into small round tufts over the passage of time and stained the slightest shade of grey from being carried everywhere, could always calm me down no matter how horrible my nightmares had been.

She may not have looked like it with her lilac coloured bow and golden-brown eyes, but Rosemary was the fiercest of protectors, never once abandoning her post as she watched over my sleeping form from the place where she had been tucked into the crook of my elbow. I have always known that she was special, possibly even gifted to me by the nameless man in my memories and I had never pictured myself living my life without her in it.

And then she had been destroyed. The last pure piece of my childhood that I had managed to keep when the state took custody and she had been torn to pieces right in front of me.

Stretching my arm out across the mattress, my fingers grasp wildly around the cool fabric of the sheets in search of my beloved stuffed lamb, but I know that it is pointless. Rosemary is gone and I will never get to hold her again.

My pajamas are still soaked with sweat and now that I have tossed the blanket off my body, the sticky moisture has now chilled in the spring air, leaving the thin material of the shirt to cling to my skin with an uncomfortable coldness. Goosebumps rise along my flesh despite the rest of my body feeling flushed from my nightmare and the strange mixture of the soggy cotton clinging to my burning skin sends shivers dancing through my body.

Images of cold, callused hands gliding across my bare skin like they had in my dream make the feeling intensify and within mere seconds I find myself tearing the shirt away from my body, uncaring that the sudden frantic action causes the shirt to rub harshly against my skin when it gets caught under my chin. The moment I am free of the disgusting garment, I toss it away onto the floor and wrap my arms protectively around my naked chest, shielding myself from the beady eyes of any monsters that could be lurking in the darkness of my room.

Instead of feeling relief at the absence of the item triggering my discomfort, I find myself physically cringing away as every inch of exposed flesh erupts into nauseating tingles, as if a million tiny spiders have crawled onto my body and burrowed themselves beneath my skin. Another dangerous shiver vibrates through my spine and a fresh layer of sweat beads across my forehead and upper lip as I drop my arms from their protective hold on my chest to frantically swipe at my tingling skin.

My efforts are fruitless and after only a couple of minutes of scratching and rubbing at the worst effected limbs, I climb off the bed and use the flashlight on my phone to navigate towards the door, snagging Nathan's hoodie off the door handle as I go. Creeping into the hallway, I am glad that the bathroom is only across the passage from me and within two long steps I am standing in the cool tiled room and closing the white painted door behind me.

Not wanting to draw any attention towards myself if one of the guys wakes up, I jamb a spare towel up against the crack at the bottom of the door and flick the light switch on, instantly filling the room with a warm yellow glow. I am vaguely aware of my reflection in the mirror, but I ignore the patches of bright red skin that litter my body and instead focus on digging my fluffy mesh loofah out from under the bathroom sink where I store the remainder of my shower supplies.

Dumping my phone and the hoodie onto the vanity, I step into the shower after discarding my pajama bottoms on the tiles and flip the taps until a steady stream of water is falling rom the shower head. The water is cold at first, but after a few seconds the warmth begins to bleed into the mixture until the cubicle is filled with billowing vapours of steam. I don't care how hot it is, I just need the repulsive tingles to disappear.