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🪷 LYRA 🪷
"Oh God..." Bodies lay scattered across the floor. Students in Ravencrest uniform, some twisted unnaturally, some face down and some staring upward with eyes that looked too dry.
The bodies were piled, all of them were facing the door. Every single one, like they had been trying to get to it...or away from it. She couldn't tell.
For a moment she couldn't process what she was seeing. Then the rotten smell hit her. Decay.
The buzzing sound filled the corridor. Strange insects crawled over the bodies in thick clusters, moving and gathering at their mouths and open eyes. At torn seams of uniform jackets.
"Oh fuc..." They rose in waves, lifting from the bodies around her. They were coming toward her.
"No," she said, her voice breaking. They hit her face first. Their tiny bodies colliding with her cheeks, her eyelids, her mouth.
She screamed. She tried to brush them away, swatting at the air, at her arms, at her hair.
They tangled in her hair. Crawled along her neck. Slipped under the collar of her shirt. The buzzing filled her ears until it felt like it was inside her head.
She stumbled backward, slipping on the floor, nearly falling over one of the bodies.
She could feel their legs moving. She clawed at them desperately, trying to shake them off. She felt a sharp sting in her arm, like something had pierced her skin.
She gasped and looked down. One of the insects was clinging to her forearm. It was larger than the others, its body dark and thick.
She shot upright in her bed, breath tearing out of her throat. Her heart pounded so violently it made her dizzy.
She grabbed her arm immediately, fingers shaking. She pushed up her sleeve in hurried panic, her skin was damp with sweat.
"Uh.." She scanned her forearm frantically and whimpered, there was a swollen red bump right there.
Exactly where she had felt the sting. She pressed her fingers against it.
"Ow..." Sweat dripped down the side of her face, along her temple, down her neck. Her shirt clung to her back.
She looked around her room like she expected something to be crawling on the walls.
"There's something wrong with me," she whispered. Her voice sounded unsteady as she looked down at her arm again. "There's something...really wrong with me."
Slowly she swung her legs off the bed, her legs shook as they landed on the cold tile. She put on her fluffy bunny slipper and walked towards the door.
She paused when she touched the door knob. Her aunt was probably asleep, she couldn't tell her about it. She would sound crazy.
She placed her hand back down and leaned against the wood, breathing carefully.
"Those... bodies..." She swallowed and pressed her forehead lightly against the door.
It was a dream. It had to be. Dreams could feel real. People had nightmares all the time. Stress could do that.
She pulled away from the door and walked back to her bed. Her legs still felt weak. She sat down and looked at her arm again.
Her hands started trembling, she pressed her palm against her mouth to stop the sound building in her chest, but a sob broke through anyway.
She bent forward, elbows on her knees, fingers gripping her hair tightly like she could hold herself together that way.
"I'm not okay," she whispered, and her voice shook badly now.
Tears slipped down before she could stop them. She hated crying, hated how weak it made her feel. But she couldn't stop.
"What's wrong with me?" she choked out. "I don't want this," she whispered through tears.
She wiped at them angrily, but more followed. She didn't even know exactly what she was crying about.
The dream? The bodies? The insects crawling over her skin? The sting that followed her into reality? Or the possibility that none of it was real and she was losing her mind.
What if nothing was happening. What if this was just her.
"I'm not crazy," she said quietly to the empty room. She hugged herself tightly, rocking slightly without realizing it. Her whole body felt too small for what she was feeling.
She couldn't tell her aunt or anyone. She was scared that she wouldn't be able to explain it to anyone without sounding insane.
If she told someone about bodies in a hallway, about insects crawling under her skin, they wouldn't look at her the same again.
No one would believe her. And if they did believe her, that would be even worse.
"What if I'm losing it?" She let out a broken laugh through her tears.