Chapter 4: Hallucinations

Stella stared at her beeping alarm as her hands were still shaking from her fearful nightmare. She took a deep breath and tried to shake the lingering thoughts of her scary dream out of her mind. She then reached out and tapped the snooze button on her phone before slowly lifting her blanket off and getting up to get ready for work. As she stood up, she began to feel dizzy, something felt different today…

She quickly washed up and got dressed, ready to start her day, although she was moving in a rush, she felt as if everything was slowed down. She headed for the door, but as she reached for the doorknob, it started to shake as her vision blurred causing her to nearly fall over. She quickly snapped out of it and forced herself to stand up straight and focus! The view of the door became clear again and she was able to exit her apartment safely.

"That was weird." Stella mumbled to herself as she approached her car in the parking lot. As she reached the door she paused and looked all around her, but there was nothing and no one there. She felt as if she were being followed, but it could just be paranoia from the night before. She quickly got into her car and drove to work, she sipped from her cup of coffee as she used her other hand to drive.

She watched the road in silence as other cars passed her by, she was driving the speed limit, but felt like she was hardly moving. The strange feeling started to come back as she felt goosebumps started to form on her skin. She felt like someone was following her again, so she quickly checked the rearview mirror, but there was nothing there except for an empty back seat and a man in his car struggling to drink a hot cup of coffee. She tried to stop overthinking and continued to drive, forcing herself to only focus on the road and nothing else.

After a few moments of driving, Stella approached a red light and sat in silence, keeping her vision on the road and nothing else. She took a deep breath and tried to shake off the memory of the nightmare she had the night before. She couldn't keep herself together though, her hate rate sped up while she started hyperventilating and her hands gripped the wheel even tighter as they started to shake. She kept taking deep breathes, trying to convince herself that last night was just a nightmare and the past few days she was just overworked and too tired to function properly. She told herself these things inside her head, even though deep down she knew they weren't true…

After a few minutes, she was able to steady her breathing and relax the muscles in her hands. She felt okay for a moment, but just for a moment. A dark figure suddenly popped up in the rearview mirror causing Stella to jump up and scream! She swerved the car and pulled over to the side of the street, almost getting hit by three other cars! After she pulled over, she jumped out of the car and took another deep breath before slowly opening the door to the back seat of her car.

Stella watched as the car door slowly opened as she pulled on it in caution. Her whole body trembled as she feared for her life. If someone was really in her car, she should have called the police, but it was too late for that, now she had to face it on her own. The world seemed to pause around as the car door slowly fell open to reveal…nothing. There was noting and no one there, it must have just been a hallucination.

Stella stared at the empty seat, feeling totally defeated and helpless because of her OWN mind. She slammed the car door shut and climbed back into the driver's seat as she headed to work. Luckily, she made it to work without crashing into anything or anyone as her mind remained scrambled and terrified. When she arrived at work, she spotted Will in the parking lot. She quickly ran towards him and jumped into his arms, embracing him in a hug. It was such a relief for her to see him after what she just went through, he was the only one she felt safe around.

"What's all this affection for? Not that I'm complaining." Will said as he chuckled while he slowly joined the hug by slowly wrapping him arms around her waist. "I'm…just…happy to see you, that's all!" Stella mumbled into Will's chest as he continued to hold her in a tight hug. They stood still in each other's embrace for a few moments before Will broke the silence. "Well, as much as I'm enjoying this Stella, we should probably clock in before our they start docking our pay." The hug abruptly ended when Stella quickly pulled away and mumbled "Sorry" before they both headed inside.

They walked in silence for a few minutes, Stella couldn't help but to feel awkward after ambushing Will with that hug. She was lost in her thoughts before being interrupted by a light tap on her shoulder. She then looked over to will who was flashing a wide grin. "There was no need to apologize for the hug, Stella, I really enjoyed it. In fact, you should suggest that morning routine to our boss so maybe grumpy Gary won't be so uptight all the time."

Stella looked back at will as the corners of her mouth lifted upward forming a smile as she let a high-pitched laugh. Her coworkers began to stare at her, but she continued to laugh, this went on for about a minute and a half. Will walked Stella to her desk as she finally settled down as she sat in her desk chair. "Meet me in the lab in 10 minutes." Will said as he was still chuckling a bit due to Stella's laughing scene in the middle of her coworkers. Stella fixed her posture and began to check her emails. The first email was from a "Doctor Selene Jacobs" about some forms that Stella needed to fill out. She didn't know of any Selene Jacobs at her work, maybe she was new.

The email consisted of a phone number to send the doctor a message for my information about the documents that needed to be signed. Stella found a bit unprofessional, but she texted the number anyway and the doctor replied right away telling stella to meet her in the inventory room at 2:00pm. Something about this message gave Stella a weird feeling as she felt her stomach churn as she stared at her phone screen, but she figured it was her paranoia from earlier this morning still getting to her head. Before she thought about it any longer, she replied with an "Okay" before heading to the lab to meet Will and begin some more DNA analysis.

The ticking clock on the wall ticked the time away, but every move Stella made somehow seemed everlasting. Daily analysis passed, lunch break past, more tedious passed by and it was finally 2:00pm! It was time to meet with the new doctor, "Selene Jacobs" and Stella wondered what she had to tell her that was so important and who the lady really was. Stella took off her lab coat and headed to the inventory room to meet the new doctor.

As she entered the inventory room, she suddenly jumped back as she was startled that Dr. Selene was already there. "So, you're new here at the forensic lab, Selene, you are "Selene Jacobs" right?" Stella asked politely. "Um…my name is Sarah, "Sarah Johnson" and I just wanted to meet you here because I need you to sign this form agreeing to train me and allow me to shadow you as the new employee." Sarah said with a blank expression on her face. "What? The email said "Selene Jacobs" here, take a look! Stella said as she whipped out her phone only to open her email and see that she was requested to meet a new employee and sign a trainee form by someone named "Matthew Johnson" and the texts she received about meeting was also from Matthew and he wanted to meet by her desk tomorrow morning…

"What this must be wrong! How can this happen? The email and text must be here! I just saw it this morning!" Stella shouted as she suddenly looked up from her phone screen only to see that Sarah Johnson was gone. She leaned her back against the wall before bursting out the door and heading straight to her boss' office. As she suddenly barged into her boss' office(while he was eating his tuna sandwich for lunch) she demanded to see his personal record of office emails to double check the name of the woman who approached her earlier. Stella's boss double and even triple checked all email records for a "Selene Jacobs" and "Sarah Johnson" but there was no record of them. There was only a record of a trainee named "Matthew Johnson" who sent an email to Stella and he was coming in the next day to train, it showed that on her email and text records as well. Stella thanked her boss for his cooperation and slowly walked out of his office completely distraught. Stella began to wonder if she was going crazy…