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Grand jury finds there is not enough evidence for charges in Taylor death.
After 3 hours of deliberations a Woodsville county grand jury found that
there is not sufficient evidence to support murder charges in the suffocation
death of college student Greg Taylor. The 19 year old Hayward College
student was suffocated with a pillow by his roommate, 18 year old college
student Luke Collins. Collins had been treated for sleepwalking when he was
younger, and claimed to have been sleepwalking when Taylor died. Sleep
disorder experts Edward and Susan McMillion testified that they had treated
Collins for sleepwalking some years ago, but he had not had a reoccurrence
since he left their care. They also testified that lack of sleep, stress,
and dietary factors probably all contributed to Collins sleepwalking. The
prosecution contends that the sleepwalking defense is nothing more than a
cover for 1st degree murder. After considering all of the evidence the grand
jury found there was not enough evidence to charge Luke Collins with 1st
degree murder and Collins was released to the care of Edward and Sue
McMillion.
Fred Haskins-Union Sun
I set down the scrapbook containing the clipping about Luke and his roommate that had died. Its been a couple of weeks since Luke dropped the bombshell on me. It seems so unreal. But in front of me laid a book full of news paper articles giving proof that the incident actually happened. The incident happened 5 years ago, when Luke was 18, now he’s 23. After Luke told me, I asked Sue and Ed about it, and Sue gave me a scrapbook containing articles about it. She said she didn’t tell me about it because she felt it was Luke’s place to tell me and he would do it when he was ready. Since then I have gotten my hands on everything I could read about what happened. I guess somehow I wish there was something to say it didn’t actually happen. But everything I read just validates that it happened.
The past weeks have gone by in a bit of a haze. More training and preparing for my presentation ceremony, filling out paperwork to get ready to start classes, still doing driving lessons with Luke.
Things with Luke have been awkward to say the least. I’m not quite sure how to deal with the fact he took a life, and I know he’s a little freaked out that I lied to him about Paul. So things have been more business-like in our dealings. I hope at some point we can continue the relationship we had started but for the time being I’m just focusing on getting through the upcoming presentation ceremony.
Sue’s been teaching more about what it means to be a dream catcher and the dream world , and Ed’s been helping me strengthen my physical gifts and minimize my weaknesses.
My dream life hasn’t been going very well of late. I’ve been having the worst nightmares that I’ve ever had. There’s no pattern, sometimes reliving the crash, sometimes falling, sometimes monsters chasing me. Each night worse than the night before. Its getting to the point I’m running on just a few hours of sleep a night and even then, I wake up either crying or screaming. Ed and Sue are doing their best to help, but there is not much they can do.
I thought I was just getting back on my feet and once again life seems to have decided to take everything away from me. To make it even worse I even managed to help it.
I made choices that have driven away the people I care about most. That burns me more than anything, I managed to hurt people. I have my mind set to make things right, I just don’t know how I’m going to do it.
After finishing my reading and having dinner I have my meeting with Sue. Over the past couple of weeks we’ve discussed more about the dream world, dream catcher lore, and the specifics of the presentation ceremony. Today we focus more on the presentation ceremony.
“Each set of trials are custom designed for the potential dream catcher. The tests pinpoint certain things that will prove or disprove that any particular person is a dream catcher. There are certain challenges that only a dream catcher can do. Things that test the persons physical, mental, and emotional readiness.” Sue explains to me.
“Will you be there with me?” I ask Sue.
“Yes, both Ed and I will be there. We’re as much under examination as you are.” Sue replies.
“Oh. How will they be testing you?”
“They will test how well we’ve prepared you, our bond with you, that sort of thing.”
It starts to sink in that I’m not the only one under scrutiny, my performance impacts Sue and Ed too. This isn’t just some game. For the first time it hits me the gravity of the situation.
After a moment of silence Sue says “Keep in mind the presentation ceremony is simply the start, from there things only get busier.”
“Gee that’s comforting” I reply sarcastically.
“We’re just going to have to take one thing at a time. We’re going to need to all work together on this.” Sue responds.
Sue’s words slowly settle in, again reminding me that I don’t have to do this alone.
Sue looks at the clock, time for the session is almost up. She hands me the schedule for the rest of the week.
Stepped up sessions with her, and even more training with Ed. Starting Wednesday I have tutoring session with a teacher from the community college to prepare for getting my HSED, and entrance exams for spring semester.
Just thinking about all of this is making me tired. I head back to my room for a couple hours of rest and relaxation.
When my folks stopped by they had brought my CD player as well as my keyboard. I used to play piano before the accident but considering the lack of space I had to settle for the keyboard.
Next to gymnastics, music was my passion before the accident. Now I putz around on my keyboard every so often. I think I played our piano at home once the entire month I was back home. For the first month I didn’t even have my CD player, now at least I can listen or play music for an hour or two a day. Music seems to soothe me in a way that nothing else seems to. I listen to everything from classical, to country, to rock, hip hop, and pop. Now music is the only thing that helps me relax enough to sleep. After playing keyboard for a while, and listening to music I, I drift off into an uneasy sleep.
I’m in a city I’ve never seen before, the building seem to extend as far as the eye can see. A city this size the streets should be bustling but they are abandoned. As I go from building to building trying to find someone or anyone to tell me where I am.
Clop, clop, clop, I hear footsteps behind me. I turn down a hallway to get away, but the steps continue to follow me.
At this point I’m getting scared, my heart rate picks up and so does my pace.
Click clop, click clop. The steps are getting closer. Then for some reason they stop. There is a moment of silence, then I feel hot breath down my neck. I turn to face the stalker....
I wake up screaming and dripping with sweat. This dream is new, my dreams are almost always in the jungle or back at my home. Areas that I am familiar with.
I’ve never been in the city I dreamed about, that city was bigger than any other city I’d been to. On top of that, why was the city abandoned?
It was just me and the stalker, but even at night there should have at least been one or two other people. The whole thing is just foreign to my experience.
I sit in my bed making notes in my journal and trying to figure things out.
“Are you ok?” The head nurse asks me “I’m fine now, I had a really bizarre nightmare.” I reply.
“Is there anything I can get for you?” She asks with a smile.
“Just the usual glass of water.”
“I’ll be back in a moment.” The nurse leaves the room and I take a deep breath to cool myself down.
I turn and look at the clock, 3 am.
Great, another night of less than good sleep. What am I doing to deserve this?
This really isn’t fair.
“Here you go.” The nurse says cheerfully as she comes back into the room with a glass of water.
“Thank you.” I say as she leaves the room.
I finish making my notes in my dream journal.
I’ve got lots to talk to Sue about during our meeting.
I settle back down into bed, after lying awake for a little while, before I finally drift off to sleep.
A couple of hours later I wake up to the sound of my alarm clock going off. It takes every bit of self restraint and willpower I have to not roll over, shut the clock off and go back to sleep.
I know I have a busy day ahead of me and I’ll need every minute of the day to get done what I need to get done. I yawn, stretching my arms, and wiping the sleep out of my eyes.
I get into my lift, out of bed, and my work out clothes on, and go to meet Ed.
He greets me with a smile. “Hello sleepyhead. The nurse tells me you had a really bad nightmare last night.”
I nod in response. “Yeah, I haven’t been sleeping well lately.”
“Have you been doing the relaxation exercises I taught you?”
“Yeah I’ve been trying but I’ve been wound so tight lately nothing seems to relax me.”
“I have an idea. Why don’t you go back to your room and change into your swimsuit and meet me back hear as quick as you can.”
“Ok” I say hesitantly. Swimsuit, why a swimsuit? I had packed one as it was part of the list Ed and Sue gave my parents before I came here.
I wheel my way down to my room grab the one piece black swimsuit and put it on, putting on a robe over it for modesty sake. I make my way back to the training room to meet Ed.
“What’s going on?” I ask full of curiosity.
“This is the next step getting you to relax. Come on follow me.” He says as he leads me to the back.
There is a Whirl pool tub with rails on the side to help me get in and out.
As I look at the tub closer it is clear that someone has gone to an awful lot of work to get it to the point I see it.
The rails are bolted into a wooden base that surrounds the tub, there is a seat in the tub for me to sit on, everything seems to be taylor made just for me.
“Wow this is really cool.” I say with awe in my voice.
“Luke’s been working on it a couple of hours a day for the last few weeks.” Ed says with pride in his voice.
“Luke, did this?” I stammer.
“Yeah. Well you don’t have a lot of time, so why don’t you give it a test drive.”
I take off my robe, and with Ed’s help I ease down into the warm water of the hot tub, but my head seems to be doing the swimming.
Why did Luke go through the trouble of doing this? God knows I don’t deserve it after lying to him about Paul. This doesn’t make any sense.
“Here come the jets.” Ed says with glee in his voice.
The water jets turn on and I begin to relax. The past few weeks have just brought up so many unsettling questions.
I guess worst of all I’ve been questioning myself and my own decisions. I feel my heart rate go up as I get more agitated. Stop, slow down, breathe. I close my eyes. I do my best to focus on the sound of the water and the feeling of the jets on my arms and upper back. Ed had turned the lights down to add even more to the ambiance. My heart rate starts to slow slightly and I begin to notice how good the warm water feels.
“Hey, are you feeling better now?” Ed says bringing the lights in the room back up.
“Did you leave the room?” I ask Ed.
“I felt you needed some time to yourself.” Ed says softly.
“Thank you.”
Ed hands me a towel and helps me get myself out of the hot tub. I wrap in my robe and settle into my wheelchair.
I look at the clock and figure I have just enough long enough time to take a bath, fix my hair, and grab lunch. I have driving lessons with Luke and then my daily meeting with Sue.
“All set?” Ed asks.
“Yeah, I’m going to clean up and grab lunch.” I reply.
“Sounds like a plan. I’ll see you tomorrow then.”
I wheel back to my room as quick as I can as I don’t want anyone to see me in my robe and my hair wrapped in a towel.
I get back to my room to find Luke seated on my bed.
“Hi there.” He says shyly.
I sit stunned for a moment. “Hi.” Is all I can come up with.
“I see you tested out the new hot tub.” Luke says with a tone of bemusement in his voice.
“Yeah I did, you must have put a lot of work into it.” I comment.
“A week and a half, a couple of hours everyday.” He says with a smile.
“Well, I’ve got to take a bath, grab lunch, and then our driving lessons.”
“I’ll wait. Do you want to join me for lunch in my room.” He asks with a hopeful note in his voice.
I feel backed into a corner, all I can say is “Um, um, I don’t know how long I’m going to be.”
“That’s not going to be a problem, like I said before, I’ll wait.”
After a pause I give in saying, “Ok, I guess, make yourself comfortable.” I say with a sigh.
“Listen, if I’m making you uncomfortable I’ll leave.”
“No, no, don’t go. I’m sorry. You just caught me off guard.” I stammer.
“I know, considering what a monster I am, I don’t blame you for being uneasy.” He says his voice deflating.
“That’s not it, that’s not it at all.”
“Then what is it?” Luke asks.
“There’s just so much I need to figure out. I thought I had blown things with you.” I say trying to keep the panic out of my voice.
“You messed up? No, no, I’m the problem, not you.” He says in the most dejected tone I’ve ever heard. His head drops down to his chest.
All I can do is reach over and with a finger to pick his head up. “I adore you, I don’t deserve someone as good as you.”
Luke sat speechless for a moment, gives me a soft kiss on the cheek, “You better get ready.”
So I grab the clothes I had laid out earlier and headed into the bathroom to take my bath. I take my bath as quick as I can, knowing that Luke is sitting on my bed waiting for me. I get out of the tub, dry my hair, and slide my clothes on before exiting the bathroom.
For the first time in a couple of weeks I am happy. I know that things won’t go back to the way they were, but at least we can start to work on things.
“I’m ready.” I say with a coy tone in my voice.
“That was quick. Hey I’ve done some thinking, maybe it might be best to go to neutral ground. I know we don’t have a lot of time, so why don’t we grab something to eat from the dinning hall?”
“No arguments here.” I say with a smile on my face.
Luke opens the door “Ladies first.” following behind me pushing my wheel chair.
“Thank you” I reply.
Through the winding hallways we make our way to the dinning hall. My head is spinning, I feel a mix of euphoria and sheer terror. I know one mishap and we are done before we start.
Luke spots an open table by the window and pushes my wheelchair weaving between through the other tables.
Luke pulls out the chair facing the window and gets me settled in at the table. Luke then seats himself.
One of the staff comes over with a check list and menu. The lunches are usually on the lighter side, nothing too fancy but good food none the less. Luke goes for a chef salad, I go for chicken dumpling soup.
“I’ve told you what I’ve been up to the last couple of week, what have you been up to?” Luke asks breaking the silence as we wait for our food.
“Re-habbing, building strength, cardio, usual stuff. Getting ready to start tutoring to get my HSED.” I reply with a matter of fact tone of voice.
I really wasn’t sure it was OK to let Luke know about the upcoming presentation ceremony.
The staff person brings me the chicken dumpling soup, and Luke’s Salad.
I look down at my watch. We have just a little bit of time then on to driving lessons.
“I have something different planned for driving lessons today, I have some exercises to help your ability to control the vehicle, I also made some modifications to help the responsiveness of the hand controls. You’ll have to tell me how you like it.” Luke says with a little bit of excitement in his voice. He takes so much joy in fixing and improving things.
“That sounds so cool.” I tell Luke smiling because he is happy.
I look at the clock, it’s time to get going. Luke reads my cue, and we both finish our lunches. He gets up and takes his place pushing my wheelchair.
We head out to the far corner of the parking lot, where to my surprise Luke has already set up a whole series of cones.
“What’s this?” I ask more out of curiosity than anything.
“A little driving course, I designed it myself.” Luke says smiling big.
“Ok.” I say just slightly at a loss for words.
“Trust me on this Sara, if you can navigate through this you will be fine out on the road. We can work on much as we need to, but you will be able to do this. I know you can.” He says with supreme confidence in his voice.
I just wish I was that sure myself. “Well, I’ll try my best, that’s all I can promise.”
“That’s all I ask. We’ll start off by getting you used to the upgraded controls and we will go from there.” Luke replies
Luke pushes me in my wheelchair down to the van, and helps me get in. I look around the van. Luke made a ton of modifications, it blows my mind how much time he put into the changes.
“My goal is to be able to make the accessibility modifications completely mobile.”
The words go totally over my head. “Huh?”
“That means whenever you decide to get a car of your own, I should be able to make the modifications for you to be able to drive it.”
My jaw physically drops. There is nothing I can say to that.
“Are you OK?”
I nod my head still in shock. Then a tear rolls down my face.
“What, Sara, what did I do wrong now?” He says panicking.
I am finally able to spit out “Nothing, I’m just so happy. Do you realize you’ve given me hope? The possibility of getting my freedom back?”
“I just want you to be happy.” Luke says emphatically.
“I am, I am.” I say with a smile.
“Good, because that is my mission.” Luke says softly.
We pause taking a moment to stare in each other eyes. Luke breaks my gaze, saying “We’ll lets see if this works.”
I start the van up.
“Put it into drive, like this” He takes my hand and helps showing me how to shift the new control into gear.
I can’t help but smile.
We go through all of the different gears, forward, reverse, right turns, left turns. The hour we have passes quickly.
“Well, that’s all the time we’re gonna have for today. Sue is gonna be waiting for you. I have a bunch of modifications to make on the system yet tonight.”
“OK, I will see you tomorrow then.” I say looking forward to spending more time with him tomorrow.
Luke helps me out of the drivers seat, and back into my wheel chair. He wheels me back to the main entrance, I grab my papers from my room, and I hurry to my meeting with Sue.
“Hi there Sara, you’re looking to be in a good mood.” Sue says.
“I am.” I reply.
“Good, as usual lots to do. Do you have your papers with you?” Sue asks me.
Yep.” I reply.
“Excellent.” She says as she takes the papers and starts to look them over. “Any unusual dream activity lately.”
“Actually, yeah. I had this dream last night about being chased in an empty city, I never did see what was chasing me.” I tell sue.
“Very interesting. I have a couple of different theories as to what that could be about.” She grabs out a book from the stack at her desk and starts to flip through. “Ok, no, Ok, yes, Ok.”
“What, What?” I ask impatiently knowing that there is a lot hanging on this dream.
“Well there could be a couple of different interpretations. One thing I can figure for sure is that you feel or sense you are being chased by a force you either can’t see or don’t fully know about. Now whether that threat is psychological, or an actual threat is yet to be determined. There is one other possibility, and that is this is your first intervention dream, meaning there actually is a monster chasing you.” Sue says pondering the possibilities.
I gulp, and reply by saying sarcastically, “That’s a comforting thought.”
“Well its actually a good sign, because only a dream catcher would have an intervention dream.” Sue tells me.
“How will I know if its just one of my normal dreams or if its an intervention dream?” I ask.
“The only way we can tell is if or when you have the dream again.” Sue says in a matter of a fact tone.
“Trial by fire?” I ask.
“Hey, remember when I told you there are some things you can only by experience? This is one of them.” Sue says with a smile.
“Gee, thanks.” I reply dryly.
“Just let me know if anything more happens tonight.” She says looking at the clock as our meeting time is up.
“I’ll keep you posted.” I say as I grab my things to leave.
I head back to my room to settle in for the evening. I get out my keyboard and start to play a little bit. My thoughts wander from the dream and what Sue had said, to things with Luke, to the upcoming presentation ceremony. So much is happening at once.
I continue to tinker on my keyboard to relax myself. I start to do my scales. I think back to all the time I spent in my parents living room playing piano. I can’t help but smile thinking about those good times, yet at the same time a little bit of sadness that things had been irrevocably changed.
After a couple of hours I grab the books and start to do a bit of research. I look up at the clock and realize its getting late. I turn off the lamp and settle down for bed. I go to sleep with a smile on my face as I think about seeing Luke the next day.
I’m back in the abandoned city. Clueless as to where I am in the city and where I’m even supposed to be. So I make my way through the dark and dreary streets, exploring as I go. There the footsteps start.
Clop, clop, clip, clip.
Here we go, I think to myself. I start to walk faster, the steps come faster. My heart rate skyrockets.
What am I going to do? How am I going to deal with this? I collect my thoughts and start to think about the lessons I already learned. I then remember one key lesson I learned early on, confront your problems.
I then stop dead in my tracks, spin around to confront the monster that is behind me.
What I find myself confronting is a large dog, a doberman, vicious looking, and growling.
Then to my amazement the dog sits down, dropping a large tube in front of me. I open the tube to find a piece of paper with a message.
“Next time I won’t be so nice. Don’t interfere, or you will pay.” The words of the threat echo in my mind as I wake up sitting bold upright in bed.
“Everything all right in here?” The head nurse asks me.
“Yeah, I’m Ok.” I tell her panting, and after a pause I ask her “Can I have you get me some water?”
“I’ll go get it.” The nurse says with a smile.
As she leaves I take a look at the clock, time to get up anyway. I notice I’ve got a death grip on something in my right hand. I look down to find that I’m holding a piece of paper. Upon closer inspection I come to realize it’s the same piece of paper from my dream.
Word for word the message was the same, “Next time I won’t be so nice. Don’t interfere, or you will pay.”.
I check the handwriting thinking somehow I wrote it myself in my sleep. But I know my own handwriting and the message certainly was not in my writing. I tuck the paper into my dream journal as I hear the nurse coming down the hallway.
“Here you go.” She says.
I drink the glass of water, and get going for the day. I then remember that I have to meet Caroline for breakfast before she goes to school.
I grab my clothes sitting in my wheelchair, get into my lift, slide my clothes on, get into the wheelchair and head out to meet Caroline. I end up being a few minutes late but Caroline is OK with it.
My stomach is so tight I can barely get down two pieces of toast.
Caroline tells me about how things are going at school, things with Kraig, how things have changes since homecoming. We agree to meet Saturday to go shopping.
I head out to meet Ed for morning training. I take 10 minutes in the hot tub to loosen up, followed by a series of stretches. We do some sparring and work with the training sticks. Ed can tell I’m off my game, and we call the training lesson short.
“What’s wrong?” He asks sounding more like a father than a trainer.
“Just distracted. I had a really bad dream last night.” I reply unconvincingly.
“Well, try to stay calm. We’ve got big times ahead of us. The presentation ceremony is coming up.” he says.
“I know.” I respond.
“Stay on your toes.” Ed says.
We part ways, with Ed’s final comment ringing in my ears.
I wheel back to my room and get ready to meet Luke for a quick lunch. My mind is racing.
The dream, what Ed said, things with Luke. My heart starts racing. I stop myself, I can’t afford to panic. I grab my good clothes for the day, and drop my workout clothes into the hamper for when I do laundry next.
I grab a quick bath, and dry my hair in a rush so I’m not late to meet Luke. Just as I get ready to leave I hear a knock at the door.
Luke is standing there with a smile across his face. “Hey you, ready to go?”
“Yeah, I’m ready.” I tell him.
We grab a quick lunch, again I don’t feel like eating much. I pick at my sandwich as we talk. We talk about the rest of the plans for the day, including the driving lesson. I tell Luke about the plans I’ve got to go on a shopping trip with Caroline on Saturday.
Luke and I finish up eating we head out for driving lessons. I’m getting better and better at using the new controls for the van. It still blows my mind to think he put so much time into doing this for me. We work the line of cones, weaving in and out, left turns, right turns, reverse. Luke’s calming voice keeping me on focus. This is the most at ease I’ve been in weeks. The time goes by way too quickly. It seems like only after minutes, we are parting ways with a goodbye kiss and I’m on my way to my meeting with Sue after a brief stop at my room to pick up my papers.
Sue is waiting for me outside the office. “Hi there Sara.”
“Hey Sue.” I respond.
We go into her office. Sue starts the session by looking over my charts.
She asks me if anything further happened with the dream I had the night before.
I tell her about the Doberman in my dream the night before. “A doberman? Are you sure it was a doberman?” She asks a slight tone of concern in her voice.
“Yeah, positive. I know what a doberman looks like.” I respond with confidence.
“Oh dear.” She says. “Ok, I have to make a phone call. Just sit tight.”
“No problem.” I reply.
“Hey Ed, honey, please come in here now.”
The tone of alarm in Sue’s voice concerns me. Apparently it concerns Ed too, because he comes to the room almost immediately.
“What’s wrong?” Ed asks.
“Remember I told you about Sara’s dream. She had a follow up dream. She said a DOBERMAN delivered her a threatening message.”
“A doberman?” Ed asks looking at me.
“Yeah, a doberman.”
“This may not mean anything to you Sara, but it is very significant to us.” Ed explains.
“A doberman is the spirit guide for a former trainer named Simon.” Sue tells me.
“Former trainer?” I ask.
“Power corrupted him and he went dark. We have crossed paths with him several times, not to good results. He even has his own group of dream catchers he has trained to carry out his dirty work” Ed says.
“Oh.” I say as it sinks in. “Thank you for telling us.” Ed and Sue say in unison.
Ed slowly gets up like he’s getting ready to leave. He starts to walk around me, then he abruptly turns and comes behind me.
“I’m sorry Sara.” he says as he takes a rag and puts it over my mouth.
I struggle but Ed is way too strong. Slowly everything starts to go black and I stop fighting Ed.
I feel my body slump in my wheelchair as I pass out.
