Sleepwalker sleepwalker.., p.15
Sleepwalker: (Sleepwalker Trilogy Book One), page 15
“I remember you, actually,” the man nodded. His eyes were so close to each other that he almost looked cross eyed. “But I haven´t seen you around that much lately.”
“Um, well Daniel and I had a fight but now we´re on good terms again,” she lied.
“I see,” the man said and looked at her with pity, adding. “Such a shame about Daniel, such a deep shame and what a waste of a brilliant mind.”
Waste? Makenna thought panicky but the man continued as if he hadn´t noticed her distress.
“I´m so sorry about all of this. I tried my best to help Daniel but he is a rare example.” He frowned at her. “I can´t imagine how you all must feel. It´s so unfortunate what has happened and there´s nothing worse than failing at your job.”
Snow started falling, catching the light of the street lamps and Makenna could feel her heart clench. Was Daniel really that sick? The smell of the disinfectants from the specialist’s hands in the winter air made her nauseous. What if Daniel was alone and dying while she´d been stuffing her face and opening gifts she didn´t want? Makenna´s thoughts were racing and suddenly she didn´t feel the cold anymore. She felt numb.
“What do you mean?” she asked and her voice didn´t even sound like her own.
The specialist cleared his throat.
“I´m talking about the coma, of course.”
Chapter Twelve
It was far too bold for Makenna to do something like this, but she tried the doorknob of the Barlow home and luckily it wasn´t locked. This was breaking and entering but she had no choice. Mrs. Barlow wouldn´t let her in and Daniel didn´t want to see her, but she had to find out more about what the specialist had meant. She tried sneaking past the kitchen but failed.
“Makenna,” Mrs. Barlow yelped in surprise, almost dropping the glass of water she was holding in her hand. “How did you get in here?”
“I´m sorry, Mrs. Barlow but the door was unlocked. And…and I have to see him, please don´t make me go away.”
Mrs. Barlow pinched her thin lips and did a halfhearted try to tidy her hair. She wasn´t wearing her traditional coral lipstick and it was now that Makenna noticed that there were no decorations in the house and no festive dinner was cooking on the stove. Suddenly Daniel´s home felt the same way that Makenna´s had just after her dad got sick.
Sterile and depressing.
Mrs. Barlow leaned against the wall and Makenna worried that she would faint but when she spoke her voice was gentle.
“My son is quite infatuated with you and it´s the first time I´ve ever seen him like this. I suppose I can´t stop you,” she sighed. “He´s upstairs. In the room.”
Makenna nodded and thankful she ran up the stairs but stopped in the hallway.
The room, Mrs. Barlow had said. Makenna turned around and walked up to the door that Daniel had begged her not to open. But she had to do it now and she got a slight shock from what she saw. In the middle of the room there was a bed with white quilts and pillows. There was no carpet on the floor and no bookshelves. The curtains were drawn, covering the room from light. Different kinds of machines were scattered all around the bed, one of them even carried an IV injection and that scared her the most.
Daniel was lying in the bed.
He was wearing a Violent Times t-shirt, his eyes were closed and he seemed so vulnerable that Makenna almost wanted to run out of the room and pretend that this wasn´t happening. That this was just a bad dream.
But then his eyes flew open and there was still that fire in them, only this time it was running wild and he didn´t look so vulnerable anymore.
“You´re here,” he said and Makenna walked closer and he watched every step. “I was wondering when you would come.”
She sat on his bed, surprised by how hard it was just as if he was in a real hospital and she felt nauseated.
“Why didn´t you tell me that you were sick? I was so worried about you.”
“I wanted to see if you would come on your own,” he said and she got angry. “I wanted to see if you cared.”
“Of course I care, why would you even question that?” He didn´t respond but interlaced her fingers with his. They were smooth and cold, too cold and she held back her tears.
“Are you…are you going to die?”
Please say no, please say no.
“I suppose you could call it that in a way,” he said. “But the real term is coma. Or blackout, if you´d prefer.” He smiled a little but she didn´t smile back.
“The specialist told me something about a coma but I don´t understand how…”
“You talked to the specialist?” Daniel asked with raised eyebrows and added heatedly. “I hate that guy. He got paid a smaller fortune to help me and all that fucking specialist could say was that I was a lost cause.
It was a waste of time. I wasted my time hoping.” He stayed silent and Makenna was the one to say something first.
“What was he supposed to help you with?”
“He was supposed to find a way to prevent me from falling into the coma. It´s happened before.” His eyes closed for a second. “This will be the fourth time.”
Makenna drew in a harsh breath. Why hadn´t he told her about this? She couldn´t imagine what it had felt like, going in and out of a coma like that. His life must have felt like an inconsistent thread that had been cut several times.
“How long have you known that it would haeppen again?” she asked.
“Since roughly six months before we moved to Gravesend, but I kept hoping that the specialist would find a cure.”
“But why? Why does it keep happening?” Makenna asked and Daniel shrugged.
“The specialist says they happen because of my sleepwalking. He says that my brain waves aren´t normal when I sleep and that after a while my brain tries to recover by falling into a coma.”
“Can´t you…you know just stop with the sleepwalking?”
“You don´t think I would if I could? I´ve tried several times but I can´t avoid it no more than you can avoid falling asleep. This is just how I am. I´ve been this way for as long as I can remember.” He took a deep breath. “Are you angry with me?”
“A little. I spent so much time worrying over you, wanting to see you again and you were so mean to me at the beach party that I almost thought we were done with each other and now you´re telling me that you will…” She could barely finish the sentence.
“I didn´t want to be mean to you,” he said. “I never want that.”
“I forgive you,” Makenna said. “But I just wish that you´d told me.”
“Would you have liked me if I did? Girls like you don´t like guys with those kinds of issues,” he said with a dry laughter and she was about to protest.
“And I told you in a way.” Daniel smiled to himself but didn´t elaborate.
“You didn´t have to go through this alone. It would have been easier for you to have someone here. I would´ve been there for you.”
“It wouldn´t have been easier. It would have made it more complicated.” He determinately shook his head.
“And you are here for me. I kept wishing that I would see your face and each second, I hoped would be the one where you walked through the door.”
“I wanted to come earlier but your mom wouldn´t let me and you didn´t answer any of my calls texts.”
“I told you,” he said gently. “I wanted to see if your feelings for me were real.”
“They were, why did I practically need to break into your house to prove it?”
“Because I needed to know.” Daniel suddenly looked feverish and frantic. “And because it will make it easier.”
“Make what easier?” Makenna asked and a light flush colored his cheekbones but disappeared just as quickly. He didn´t answer and she felt a lump in her throat which she tried to swallow away but was unable to.
“You don´t know how much you mean to me. All this waiting and thinking about the coma. The thought of you is the only thing that kept me sane.”
“What are we going to do?” Makenna asked and he squeezed her fingers.
“We?” he said and she nodded.
“I wish I could help you.”
He didn´t say anything but avoided looking her in the eyes, as if he was hiding something.
“Are you in pain,” she asked but he shook his head to her relief.
“Not really, but I can feel myself drifting just like I did the last time. The specialist has given me some medicine to slow down the coma some more.”
“Did he say when you would wake up again?” Daniel had already experienced it three times, so Makenna calculated that the coma´s couldn´t last more than a few years.
“That´s the thing,” Daniel said. “He said this could be the one that I never wake up from.”
“What…?” Makenna stuttered.
“He doesn´t think I´ll be able to do wake up one more time but if I do…”
“You will!”
Daniel shot her a side eye.
“If I do then it won´t be until another 10-15 years.”
“Daniel, no. Why is this happening? Why you, of all people?”
“Why not me?” he said with a crocked smile that looked more like a grimace. “It´s the sleepwalkers curse. It was just a game to me in the beginning. I thought it was fine to manipulate my dreams, didn´t think it was more dangerous than a simple game of chess. And then it just turned on me."
“When will it happen?” Makenna whispered. “When will you fall into the coma?”
“I have two weeks left. Sometime during the fourteenth day the specialist said the coma would happen.” His voice broke and she started crying. In two weeks he would be gone, still here but gone.
“Don´t cry,” he murmured. “I can´t stand it when you cry.”
Winter break ended and Makenna had to suffer through school but as soon as the bell rang she went home to Daniel, ran up to the room without even saying hello to Mrs. Barlow and she would throw her arms around his neck and cry and cry until she thought her heart was going to break. Daniel was going to disappear and they´d never even gotten that much time together.
Life was unfair.
Makenna´s friends tried to comfort her, they even showed up at Daniel´s. Jacinda and Flora holding colorful balloons, making a big scene with Jacinda trying to stuff Daniel´s face with pastries she´d bought at the French bakery. Even Hugo would be there to express his condolences. Makenna had told her friends what was going to happen to Daniel but she didn´t tell them anything about him being a sleepwalker.
“I can´t believe Daniel´s days are numbered,” Flora said and clutched her hands in front of her chest, when they were eating lunch in the cafeteria. “I´ve always thought lovers being ripped apart sounded so romantic and now…”
“Now you still think its romantic, don´t you?” Hugo said and Flore blushed and nodded shamefully.
“It´s not like that,” Makenna said and the sounds from students laughing, screaming and throwing food around felt like a mockery with its liveliness. “It´s not romantic, at all. It feels like someone is about to chop my arm off.”
“You´re strong,” Jacinda murmured. “And remember that we´re here for you.”
“Yeah, we got you,” Hugo agreed but Parker said nothing. In fact he would barely look at Makenna and she thought that if she did, she would see some kind of gloat in his eyes.He was always clear with showing his dislike whenever they were to visit Daniel and Makenna would yell at him.
“He´ll fall into a coma,” she´d sob. “And it’s possible that he´ll never wake up. How can you be so self-centered?”
Parker wouldn´t say anything, just walk away which made her wish that it had been him in Daniel´s place. Her dislike for Parker only grew stronger. He was a spoiled brat just like she´d always suspected.
***
“I don´t think I´ll be able to deal with this,” Makenna said when she´d reluctantly followed her friend to the Seven Seas Coffee Shop that was just by the harbor.
She sat with her hands around a cup of hot tea but she could barely feel it burning. The friendly sheen of the fairy lights that hung around the windows and the scent of roasted coffee beans should have cheered her up a little, but it didn´t.
Earlier in the day she´d tried to go visit Daniel but he´d seemed angry with her and told her to go spend time with her friends and her family. It had struck Makenna as strange because even when Daniel was angry he had a pacifying way about him but this time he´d had none of that. Makenna had refused to move but wrath had flared in Daniel´s eyes and he´d almost shouted at her to leave. Mrs. Barlow had come up and told her that Daniel needed to rest.
She said that the medicine Daniel was taking made him ill-tempered but Makenna had seen something else, some type of dependence and revulsion towards that dependence.
And the look Mrs. Barlow gave Makenna before she left had been so strange, almost cautious and yet like she was worried about something but was unable to express what it was. It had made Makenna feel as if a bucket of cold water had been poured over her head.
“This is the worst thing I´ve ever gone through.”
“I can´t imagine what this must feel like but it makes me so sad to see you like this,” Flora said and the soft armchair she was sitting in looked like it was swallowing her
“In time it will get better,” Jacinda comforting. “You will pull yourself together after a while and get through this.”
Makenna tried to nod but she thought of how Daniel had told her that he had clung on to hope and if his hope was gone, then so was hers. Maybe she should´ve stayed strong and positive for him but she had a bad, horrible feeling that she couldn´t quite explain.
A customer came in and a bitingly cold ocean wind sweeped and ruffled the collar on Makenna´s shirt. The water was rocky today, like it was trying to escape something.
“I can´t think of a life without him,” Makenna murmured. “Not seeing him in school, not hanging around in his house, not…” She stopped herself. She´d been about to say sleepwalking but a promise was a promise.
“What?” Jacinda said but Makenna shook her head and fortunately her cousin didn´t insist on being told.
“I´ll just miss him so much,” she said instead and her friends nodded in unison. Makenna slouched, watching the snow softly starting to fall but it melted as soon as it hit the asphalt. There were so many more things she wanted to experience with Daniel and now none of those things would ever happen.
“All of this makes me so nervous,” Flora said and took a sip of her cocoa and some whipped cream stuck to her upper lip. “Makes me feel off balance.”
Makenna gloomily thought about that time when Flora had said that bad things were on their way. And she had been right.
“The important thing is that you say good bye to Daniel properly,” Jacinda began “and then who knows, maybe he will wake up in the future.”
“But Makenna will be older then,” Flora said and Makenna felt sick. Flora´s eyes darted cautiously between Makenna and Jacinda. “And feelings change.”
“You´re right,” Makenna murmured. “They do change, imagine Daniel waking up when I´m thirty or something. It won´t be the same.”
She had an inner image of Daniel as a grown man, showing up at her front porch while she and some faceless husband prepared breakfast for their two kids. Makenna shivered and clenched her jaw until the horrible image disappeared. It was hard to think of her life without Daniel but at the same time it wasn´t as if she had ever thought that they would be together forever. Not because she disliked the idea but because she´d never thought that far ahead.
She had just taken every day as it came and now she regretted it and deep down she was quite angry with Daniel for not having told her sooner. Sometimes she even thought that it had been quite selfish of him to start a relationship but the thought shamed her. Daniel deserved happiness just as much as anyone.
On the fourteenth day Makenna was shaking as she was walking home to Daniel.
It wasn´t long now.
In a little more than 48 hours he would disappear. This time she didn´t run upstairs to him. Her soul felt heavy and she dragged her legs behind. When she opened the door she found Daniel sitting up in his bed, looking out the window.
The curtains of the room were usually drawn but now they invited the daylight in and threw strange shadows over his face. They seemed to be playing with his features, twisting them until he looked like someone else, someone she didn´t know.
“Hey,” she said and he turned to look at her.
“Hey,” he said in a strained voice.
She didn´t throw her arms around him and place her head on his chest, like she used to. It struck her now that all the times she had wept over him; he had never done the same. Not once had Daniel shed a tear as if he either hadn´t accepted that it would happen or as if there was something giving him secret comfort.
Makenna sat, stiff and upright at the edge of his bed because something was different.
On his bedside a sketch book laid open, showing a charcoal drawing of two hands, holding on to each other. Despite its simplicity Makenna could feel its intimidating desperation and she turned her gaze away.
“Only a little less than two days left.” Daniel continued when she said nothing.
Makenna nodded weakly and her eyes flickered over his face. She was wary of the tone of his voice, there was something challenging and demanding to it.
“Don´t I get a kiss?” he asked.
She nodded again, placing her hand on his heart and rigidly bent down. His eyes watched her suspiciously but then they closed and his lips were
forgiving, eager and generous and Makenna could tell how much he had missed her and she melted against him. Daniel grabbed her by the waist, pulling her on top of him and she buried her face in his pillow, so that if she cried, she wouldn´t drench his shirt. The pillow smelled just like him and something that felt like grief stirred inside of her. It felt as if she was breaking, knowing that she would lose him.
