Ch.15: Sleeplessness

 Sam

  I find my way to the meadow and walk the path towards where the truck is parked to see if Chris hasn't forgotten about me. When I go around the bend, I hear a voice, 

"Samantha! Where are you?!" It's Chris! I start trotting down into the trees to his voice and ram into him like an angry bull. I fall on top of him, he coughs and groans in pain. 

"Chris, you alright?" I quickly scuffle off him and grab his hand to help him up, he slowly sits up and tries to get air inside of him, He grabs my face and looks into my eyes, 

"Sam? I tried to find you. I couldn't find you, I thought the wolves…" He stops imagining the worst. I shake my head quickly,

 "Nope, I hit my head on a branch when I was running. I'm okay, it's fine… Uhh… how long was I gone?" I look around, everything looks different than before but true, we are in a different area. But the time of day is different, everything is brighter. Chris looks at me and closes his eyes worriedly, 

"You...you were gone for two days. That's why I was scared when I found you…" I can tell that he cares for me a lot… even loves me. I think of something to say but he shakes his head quickly and shivers. 

"I'm sorry… I…" I think of trying to evade the fact that I just left a beautiful dragon in the forest and spoke to her… in a way… 

"I… after I hit my head… I was knocked out for a while I think… I woke up and tried to find you… and here we are." He smirks a bit, back to his old self, I hope he doesn't see the fact that I've been asleep for two days! Quote-end-quote by my.

"Well, we found you now so that's what matters," He stands up and puts his arm around my shoulders, guiding me. 

"Let's get you home and get you changed if you know what I mean…" He quirks an eyebrow and I can't help but laugh… still… in the back of my mind, I still don't want him to leave me…

We get home in what felt like five minutes and Chris helps me out in the truck. 

"I'm fine, Chris," I say reassuringly but he doesn't budge until we're in the house. 

"At least you're at home safe, that's what I want." He says as he holds the door for me and goes sit on a couch, I shiver by the sudden warmth inside the house, I tell him I'm going to change and go down the hall, second door to the right is my bedroom. I don't have a lot, but enough. I have a dark black bed frame with dark blue sheets, a big window behind my bed frame and ugly brown carpet. I also have a tall mirror leaning against the wall next to my closet. What I like is my dresser is underneath my bed frame. Less space taken up, I guess. So I look for the special sweater that I only wear on cold nights and put thick sweatpants on with socks. I brush my dark roan hair in the mirror and fix my bangs. Good enough. I sigh, I look so pale, as I'm about to leave, I think I see something behind me in my reflection, something black something reptilionish. I look back and nothing's there. Must've been my imagination. I shake it off and leave the room, when I arrive I immediately smell hot cocoa. My favorite! I love anything chocolate. I slowly jog to the kitchen and round the corner, 

"Hey Chris, is it done ye-..." Guess who I see. Yepidootles, if you said my dad you are right. 

"Hey, Dad... You the one makin' hot cocoa? Where's Chris?" I try to hide the fact that my father is still wearing his police uniform, which is always intimidating. He looks at me and I can tell he hasn't gotten enough sleep, most likely because I was missing for two days… He's tall for his age, 6'2 exactly I think… he's really pale and bulky; what's really funny is when he's upset, his ears turn bright red. Just like me when I'm really upset or very embarrassed, except that my face down my arms to my elbows get splotched with red. He looks at me with a quirked eyebrow, 

"I told him to go home, he was stubborn to leave, he was worried about you...You warm enough Sam?" He chuckles softly as I nod my head, I come to sit down at the table and with two cups of cocoa, he sits in front of me. 

"I'm sorry about the whole incident, I'll be more careful about running in the woods, I just got scared because I heard howling and I wasn't paying attention," I say while taking my cup and playing with my spoon. He nods solemnly while I talk and he waits for me to finish my apology. My thighs tense up a bit shakily, a sign that I'm scared that I'm gonna get in trouble. 

"Well… " Dad says, Oh how I hate the "well" statement, that means he's thinking if he should ground me or not. I wait, quietly barring myself for the punishment.  

"Well, you were honest with me. You seem to be alright... Are you getting yourself ready for me to ground you, aren't you?" He chuckles lightly, and I look at him, surprised.  

"How'd you know?" I raised my voice a bit. He makes a weird gesture, almost like he made it up just now, 

"Magic!" He whispers while making a funny face and I can't help but giggle hysterically. Dad always knew how to make me laugh whatever the situation. 

I calm down and yawn loudly, I look at the oven for the time. It's 7:25 in the afternoon, on the first Sunday during winter break… and I'm tired!!! This is ridiculous! Dad sees me yawn and takes my cup from in front of me and takes it to the sink, 

"Get to bed Sam, Take it easy for a while, Chris asked if he could be here tomorrow. Around… I think fiveish somewhere around there." I nod and walk to my den. 

"Oh, Sam!" Dad calls me, he pops his head into the hallway, 

"BTW, some guys came over to ask you some questions but you were getting dressed so I told maybe tomorrow… I hope that was alright..." I watch him, why would some strangers want to talk to an ordinary, nerdy, teenager like me? But it's whatever, 

"Sure Dad what time tomorrow?" I asked I would not like to be woken up at eight in the morning, my back starts burning again and I'm really not liking the burn but I try to hide it by stretching which doesn't help a bit. Dad thinks, then says, 

"Umm, maybe noon, noon-ish, I don't know exactly." I nod, 

"G'night Dad." And leave it at that, by closing my bedroom door and I look in the mirror and something strange is happening to my eyes, they look as if the color blue is taking over and invading a chestnut brown if my eyes from the outside. I think the same blue as Emberlynn's eyes, or very similar. The space in between my shoulders is on fire!! I quickly take off my sweater and turn around, guess what I see. It's hard to explain like my skin is turning into scales. It burns again, and the scales glow, brightly. I look away and I feel this weird extending thing going on with my back, and it hurts! I bite my tongue to keep me from screaming and I taste blood. Yuck! I hear a shredding noise, hopefully, it wasn't my bra clasp! Embarrassing! I feel this new sense... feel a thing, I don't know! I turn around and guess what I see. If you don't know, don't peek! You better not! Cause I'm telling you right now. It's chicken wings! Nope, just kidding, it's wings that are covered in pale white scales, they're dragon-like wings! They're about eight to ten feet long and surprisingly graceful. I try to move them and they respond immediately, oh I'm so going to tell Emberlynn about this! 

Hey Emberlynn? Can you hear me? I try to say telepathically and wait a few seconds, which felt like decades, I keep my eyes peeled on the wings. I realize my eyes are completely pale blue now, looks pretty with my dark brown hair.

Yes, what's wrong? Did something happen?  I hear an urgent voice say, I smile brightly and start telling my story.

You'll never guess what just happened to me!...