To those of you who are wondering whether or not I've finished writing this or not, the answer is no. This story has made it possible for me to know some amazing people, including my best friend, Katie. This story means more to me than I could possibly describe. I have not stopped writing, I've just been blocked. So... here you go.
"You are seriously starting to annoy me." Carter mumbled as she stared down at her red Gameboy Advance. "You're going to make me lose and then I shall kill you."
Carter and Isaac were sitting in Melissa's hospital room, waiting for her to return from physical therapy. Carter had spent the better part of three weeks in that room sitting with her sister. Melissa seemed to be doing a lot better but her doctor still wouldn't let her go home.
Isaac was sitting on the floor against the wall, leaving the chair to Carter, scribbling out what looked like an entire page full of random prose. "And that thing in your hands isn't annoying? All I hear is "kaboom" and then giggling from you. What the hell game are you playing?"
"Who cares. I get to blow up stuff." Carter glanced down at Isaac and made a face. "What exactly are you writing?"
"Nothing." He scribbled out another word almost violently and an enormous hole in the center of his paper. "Crap."
"Smooth."
Isaac wadded up the ruined paper and shoved it into his back pants pocket. "Shouldn't she be finished by now? I thought she only had to do an hour today."
Carter frowned and turned off her game. "You seem to be spending a lot of time lately writing 'nothing'. Yesterday it looked like you filled an entire notebook with 'nothing'. What's up?"
"It's just something I've been writing. I guess you could call it a book." He shrugged and absent-mindedly played with his hair.
"Seriously, Isaac, knock it off with the hair. Combing your hair into a point on the center of your head does not make it a mohawk. However, it's still an improvement over your usual hairdo."
"You should talk." He grumbled and leaned his head back against the wall. "Do you think they'd mind if I laid down in her bed? This floor is hard as balls."
Carter chuckled. "Hard as balls, eh? And there's nothing wrong with my hair." She twirled a loose strand of hair self-consciously. About a week ago she was sitting in her bedroom by herself, still not used to the house being so quiet, she took a pair of scissors to her own hair and cut it into a razored, short, bob. She was quite proud of her homemade haircut but Isaac hadn't stopped making fun of her for it since.
Carter sighed loudly. "If they don't let her come home soon I'm going to drive myself crazy. The fact that they won't let her leave here is starting to scare me. They tell us she's almost back to normal and yet she still has trouble walking for a long time. And sometimes... I don't know... sometimes when I'm talking to her she just doesn't seem like she's all there."
Isaac pushed himself off of the floor and walked over to Carter. "Ok... I am going to hug you now. It's a sympathetic, friendly gesture and it is in no way a plot to touch your boobs. So please... don't run my balls over a cheese grater."
Carter laughed and accepted his hug. "I only ever threatened you once."
Isaac raised his eyebrows.
"Or twice. Who's really counting?" Carter smiled and shrugged. She was about to make another joke about Isaac's hair when the door to Melissa's hospital room opened slowly. She expected to see her sister being wheeled back into the room but instead, Katie stood in the doorway, the light bouncing off her blonde hair.
Saying that Katie looked tired would have been an understatement. She looked as if she hadn't had a good night's sleep in 6 years. She smiled sheepishly and waved. "Hey guys."
Carter jumped up and gave Katie a huge hug. "Hey! How are you? I haven't seen you since... yeah. Hey."
Katie smiled again. "Yeah, sorry I haven't been around I just..." She took a deep breath. "I didn't think you guys would want to see me after Zac told you about my dream. I know it's freaky."
Carter shook her head and glanced at Isaac who was still scribbling words into his notebook. "It's not freaky. It's ok. I'm glad you came to see Mel."
"Actually, I came to see Isaac?"
Carter stared. "Eh?"
"He left a message on my cellphone. I've been looking for you guys all day. Ike, you said you wanted to tell me something or talk to me or something?"
Isaac nodded and put his notebook down. "Er, Carter, can you like go... somewhere else?"
Carter laughed. "Smooth, man. Real smooth. I'll go down to the physical therapy schmucks and yell at them for a while for holding my sister hostage."
Katie sat down in Carter's chair and waited for Isaac to sit on the floor in front of her. "What's up?"
"Ok, so all of this is probably going to sound very strange."
She laughed lightly. "Strange to me?"
Isaac smiled. "Well, yeah. Nobody knows this but I've been writing this book for the past three years."
"Book? I didn't know you write."
"Yeah nobody really shows much interest so I guess I just don't care to tell anybody. But yes, I write a lot."
"So what's this book about?"
Isaac paused. "Uhm. It's about the existence of paranormal and supernatural presenses in our world."
Katie stared at him for what seemed like a very long minute, absorbing what he had just told her. "Cool, so it's non-fiction?"
Isaac nodded, surprised. "You're not turned off or weirded out by that?"
"No, I think it's really cool. Non-fiction is very difficult to write. I didn't even know you were into this stuff. I take a few metaphysics courses at T.C.C. but only Zac really knows that. I try to keep it to myself, which I guess you understand." She stopped. "I don't usually talk this much."
"It's wonderful." He laughed. "I've never really had the chance to talk to you. I kind of thought you were a quiet loner. I like the talkative side. So you study this stuff too? I guess that's good that you have information to back everything up."
"Everything? You mean the stupid dreams?"
"Yeah." Isaac picked at his cuticles and then looked around the room like he was trying to figure out what to say next.
"Ok, so what's up? I highly doubt you called me just to chat about creepy stuff. I mean, if that was true, you'd have done it a long time ago."
"Yeah. I'm sorry I haven't done that. I just figure Taylor and Zac's friends want nothing to do with me. That's how it usually works. Plus I don't like to talk about supernatural stuff when Carter is around. She likes to turn it into a debate about which Charmed episode is the best and why."
"Well, I'm a highly unusual girl. So talk."
Isaac took a deep breath. "I have this theory. Or more like a thought... I don't know."
"What is this theory slash thought slash 'I don't know'."
"What exactly was in your dream? The one you had the night Melissa was in the car accident?"
"Uh. We were all at a funeral. All of us except Melissa, who was in a caskit."
"Did you actually see her in a caskit?"
"No." Katie shrugged. "But she didn't die. So what's the point?
Isaac shook his head. "I actually don't think she's going to die. How many times have you had these creepy dreams where you had the distinct feeling that something was going to happen? I'm guessing a lot. And how many of them never came true?"
Katie sighed and rested her chin on her hand. "None. They pretty much all come true in some way or another. Most of them are little things. I'll dream that I lost my favorite necklace and then the next day it's gone. Or I'll dream that I'm waking up and then I'll wake up." Katie waited for a laugh but then sighed again. "Ok so that was what we like to call a joke."
"Sorry, I'm just ... stupid." Isaac smiled. "My point is that your dreams always come true. Or, they're always real. So why didn't this one?"
"I don't know, maybe it's a new trend. In fact, I hope it is. I hope that from this point on, everytime I have a scary dream about a funeral, everybody turns out to live long and healthy lives."
"Me too. But... ok here's where the theory comes in."
"Alright, get on with it." She frowned. "Sorry, that sounded rude. Go ahead."
Isaac bit his bottom lip and ran his fingers over his head, messing up his hair. "What if it just hasn't come true yet?"
"What? You think she's going to die? Zac told me the doctors think she's going to be ok."
"No, that's not it. What if it's not her?"
Katie shook her head. "You've lost me."
"What if the reason Melissa wasn't at the funeral is because she was still in the hospital, and just couldn't be there. What if it was somebody else's funeral?"
Katie stared at Isaac and shook her head slowly. It was wrong. He was wrong. He had to be. She was so sick of being afraid of this one stupid dream. She hadn't slept in days. She felt herself starting to shake as she slowly realized that maybe Isaac's theory was true. The dream just hadn't come true yet.