Double Life: Fall Asleep

A/N: I can´t think of a tittle for this one ¬¬ I feel like a lot happened in this one and I hope it makes sense well, except for Josh´s part in his room, he´s sleepy hahaha my sweet Josh lol Ok, I can´t think of a name for this one agggggggggghhh >_<

*** 

The first day of the New Year had arrived with rain. It had been an hour since the Arlingtons and their guest, Nichole, had arrived home. They had all spent the New Year´s eve at the twin´s grandpa´s house, along with their aunt and uncle and cousins.

The Arlington’s house was completely dark and quiet except for the drops that hit the roof and windows and the distant thunders and the blue light that they produced.

“Are you leaving us?” Nichole heard a voice ask. Joshua was coming out of his bedroom, his hair disheveled and a worried stare. The sound of the thunder hadn´t let Nichole listen to him coming out of his room

“No” she wore a soft smile “I´m just going for a walk” she spoke softly

“Under the rain?” he took a step forward, he was barefoot.

“I saw a couple of umbrellas downstairs in the closet in the foyer, I thought that your mom wouldn´t mind me taking one”

“Are you leaving?” the boy asked again. The girl was fully clothed

“I already told you I´m just taking a walk” she walked closer to him “why are you awake?”

“I… got thirsty” a thunder was heard, his eyes drifted to the window at the end of the hall and then his eyes closed very slowly and quickly opened

“Is it the rain that woke you up?”

He laughed without humor “I´m not a that coward”

“Never said you were… but everybody is scared of something and that is ok”

“What are you scared of?”  his tone was harsh and Nichole didn´t like it, she wanted to return it or maybe just turn around and leave, most likely the latter. She took a deep breath

“…To fall asleep, to faint and to giant clowns with green hair” she joked at the end making him chuckle a little as she shook his head

“I´ll go get your water” she started to walk towards the stairs

“Are you still going for your walk?” he asked as she was about to put her feet on the second step, she turned her face his way

“Yeah” she mouthed and nodded

When she came back Josh was still on the same spot with anxious eyes that he tried to conceal. She gave him the glass and he drank a big gulp.

“I´ll go with you”

“You don´t have to go” she touched his shoulder

“Aren´t you afraid of going under the rain a place you don´t know at three in the morning?”

“This is a nice neighborhood, no thugs or bad people that hurt a girls just because they can’t afford living here and the ones that can, they won´t do that in their back yards… plus I can defend myself and I enjoy the cold drops”

“Do you really just want to walk under the rain?”

“Do you really just want to walk under the rain? I can drive you wherever…” they stood in silence for a moment

“You won´t let me go, will you?” she breathed out though her mouth when he said nothing “Ok,… what if you think that you never saw me here?”

“I am looking at you”

“Ok, what if instead of me going out we keep company to the other?”

“Will you be waiting for me to fall asleep and then leave?” He motioned towards his bedroom

“As much as you will be waiting for me to fall asleep first” she smirked and followed him

“You have a comfy bed” Nichole plopped on the bed and adjusted a pillow behind her back. Josh smiled and gave her a blanket. They stayed in silence for a long while

“If… if by any chance your mom or dad found me here…” Nichole raised an eyebrow

“Mom would kill me in questions and we´d probably have the talk”

“I guess your mother would ask to speak to my family as well…”

“It is likely but that ID of yours might stop her”

“I see…”

“But I doubt any of them will wake up and come to my room…”

“I don’t want to leave it to chances”

“Oh –he finally understood what she was saying- the lock, ok” he went to the door

“You’ve never brought anybody in here?” she asked, he blinked and then laughed

“Not to spend the night in my room, when my parents are home, no” he shook his head and she laughed

“And here I thought you were a guy who played by the rules” she poked him “you´re a weasel” she poked him again making him poke her back trying to tickle her

“I am not ticklish”

“Don´t believe you” he tried again

“Not touching, boy” she locked her gaze with his and he stopped and flopped back on the bed looking at the ceiling.

“Ok” he said barely a whisper. She slid on the bed. Silence fell over them.

“Are you asleep?” the boy asked

“Are you?” Was the reply he got.

“Don´t you feel tired?”

“Yeah”

“Then…”

“What about you?”

“I am tired but my mind won’t let me fall asleep”

“What’s on your mind?” Nichole turned to her side and looked at the boy who glanced her way

“Mostly a nightmare, I guess”

Nichole saw a crease between his eyebrows she reached and poked it making it go, the boy turned and faced her, she smiled.

“I woke up because I saw and felt myself falling in the pool, fighting and drowning”

“Are you always having that nightmare when it rains?”

“Sometimes but this time it quickly changed… I saw the little girl on the other side of the glass, her eyes all red and puffy like she´d been crying…”

“It was her or you inside?” Nichole asked and he seemed to ponder about it

“I don´t know… I guess we were both in somehow… yeah, it´s like we were both patients there…”

“Can you tell me more about your time there?” she asked just barely above a whisper, her hand caressed Josh´s hair, ear and jaw once and then fell back on the bed

“I don´t remember anything of the first few weeks –he sighed- then the first person I remember seeing was this little girl about my age, in the bed next to mine… we were both attached to some machine by these needles coming out of our arms and hands, she was looking at me with her warm big brown eyes when I tried to talk to her, my voice wouldn´t come out but something like coughing happened instead…my throat hurt a lot, I remember my grandpa hovering over me and telling me to breathe from a mask and I fell asleep…” the crease on his forehead had  formed again. Nichole smoothed it with two soft fingers and smiled with the side of her mouth then moved her hand to his head and stroked his hair, he blinked once very slowly, she kept her hand on the base of his head, running her fingers in his hair.

“The next time I woke my parents were there, I remembered my mom’s smile and the relieve that washed over my dad´s face. I looked to a side and saw a glass window, the curtain was closed…My throat still hurt; it even hurt when I breathed… That day my mom read for me but then they had to leave. I didn´t want them to leave –he laughed humorlessly, Nichole gave him her half smile- I pushed the curtains that were close to my bed and found the little girl sitting on her bed, only the wall and the glass separated our beds she was watching the tubes and needles coming out of her arms and hands, she looked at me for a long while until some nurse that came to my room shut the curtain and made me breath through the mask again.

 I don´t know how many more days this happened. After a while I got better but the little girl kept getting paler and paler, her arms were bruised and her eyes were glassy, she looked sick. When I asked grandpa who the girl was he asked which girl?  When I moved the curtain to look for her, she wasn´t there it was as if I had imagined her and after a while it was as if only I saw her when we were alone, well, when I was alone, nurses and doctors came in her room to check on her all the time…”

“Had you imagined her?” Nichole´s voice was soft

“That´s what everybody told me but I know it was real” he shut his eyes close

“It´s ok, Josh… maybe they didn´t want you to worry about her”

“...One time she was sitting on her bed, her eyes puffy and by that time I could sit and my throat felt better, she pressed her palm against the glass as if trying to reach me and I did the same and the tiniest smile appeared in her mouth...

...Having drowned made me have to learn many things over again, like walking. I remember  this one time being with a physical therapist that was teaching me how to walk with the help of these two rails, I don´t know why but the lights in my room failed and I saw through the glass, there was the little girl with a hat similar to mine, you know the type with a lot of wires coming out like to measure your brain activity, I had stickers on my back and joints with wires too, she had the same thing, we were doing the same thing, maybe she had drowned too, she seemed to sense me looking at her  because she stopped and looked at me with a tiny smile. I tried to wave but when I let go of the metallic bars the lights returned and I fell down –he chuckled- the nurses rushed to pick me up and the glass was dark again, I couldn´t see anything but my reflection…”

“Who left first…?” Nichole inquired; the boy seemed to get sleepy, his eyes were half lidded, her touching his hair had seemed to relax him enough to fall into sleep

“I am not sure… when I got better I was moved, we were on the bottom floor under the ground level, it was always  cold there, the nurses and my grandpa took me out of my room in what looked like a labyrinth of rooms and glass doors and metal detectors and then through  a stain steel elevator up a couple of floors and to what looked like a hotel room where my parents and Aaron were –the boy had closed his eyes and had smiled at the memory –the last time I saw the girl she was crying and a nurse was patting her back. When the nurse left she looked my way I put my hand on the glass that separated us and with a sad smile she did too. I never saw her again and when I asked about her no one had seen her. Aaron used to tease me and said she was a ghost and mom said she was an angel that kept me company” the boy smiled with his eyes closed his breathing was already even and after a moment his lips parted a tiny fraction. Nichole let her hand fall on the bed

“Sweet dreams, Josh” Nichole whispered watching the lights outside changing from night to day.