Page 204 of In Somnis

“Yeah, that’s what people call your comfort zone in dreams. Your own spot.”

“Is the forest yours?” she asks, and there’s genuine curiosity in her voice.

“Fuck no.”

She waits, like she’s expecting me to elaborate, to tell her what my actual comfort zone is, but I’m done with fucking talking.

I need my outlet before I crawl out of my own skin.

“You remember our deal?”

“Of course I do.” She starts to ramble immediately. “I think maybe it would be good to try talking to Tessa while she’s awake, you know? So when⁠—”

“Yeah, yeah.” I cut her off, summoning a lollipop out of the air between us. It appears in my palm, wrapped in yellow cellophane, and fuck yes. I unwrap it with my teeth, blow the cellophane away, and shove it between my lips, letting the sour burn hit my tongue. “First, I get my part of the deal. I fucking need it.”

I step closer, close enough that she has to tilt her head back to look at me. “Do you trust me?”

She shivers, her breath catching, but her voice is steady when she answers. “Yes.”

A dark chuckle escapes me. “Rookie mistake.”

I let the lollipop roll to the other side of my mouth, and her eyes track the movement before coming back to mine.

“Close your eyes if it gets too much,” I murmur, already reaching for the shadows pooling in the corners. “But don’t let go of my hand.”

They peel off the walls like living things, dripping down onto the white tiles. I build a creature in the corner and give it too many joints and eyes that blink out of sync, its jaw unhinging to reveal rows of needle-like teeth that click-click-click as it crawls forward.

“Ridge…” Lennon’s voice wavers, and I can taste her fear starting to curl through the air.

But I don’t stop.

Can’t stop.

The release feels too good after months of blockage, after being trapped in that forest.

This is mine, and I’ve been starving for it.

I summon more figures, emerging from the shadows with their faces peeling away in strips, their mouths opening to scream in frequencies that shouldn’t exist.

“Ridge,” Lennon pleads again, louder, stepping back from the blood that starts seeping from the ceiling, dripping onto the white counters awfully close to her feet.

Her fear spikes when the kitchen island cracks down the middle, fingers pressing up from underneath, dozens of them clawing their way into existence.

Lennon tries to pull her hand from mine, but I yank her back to me, my free hand coming up to cover her eyes.

“Shh, don’t look,” I murmur around the lollipop, and there’s a laugh bubbling up from somewhere dark in my chest. “You’re fine. I’ve got you.”

I feel her pressing her eyes shut beneath my palm as I make the walls breathe, bulging inward with each inhale. The shadows form faces, dozens of them, hundreds, all shrieking in harmony.

Make it worse.

Make it real.

Make it exactly what’s been clawing at the inside of my skull for a hundred fucking days.

When there’s another long scream from a creature, Blondie turns and presses her face into me, her free hand coming up to cover her ear, trusting me to keep her safe even while I’m the one terrifying her.

Later. Think about that later. Not now.