Julien

I don’t know if you’d call them dreams or premonitions or what, but the things that raced through my mind when I finally fell completely unconscious were enough to get my dream-self thinking I was dead or insane.

Too much had happened at once. Too much… just too much…

I never remembered those dreams, just the feeling they gave me. I’m glad I didn’t. But when I woke up, there was something very wrong. My eyes burned terribly. It hurt to see the bright whiteness of the room I was in, it hurt to move my eyelids, it hurt to hurt. My ears throbbed to the sound of a beeping, and as my sore, sore eyes finally adjusted to the sterile hospital room, I realized that it was the sound of my heart. It took a sudden increase of speed as I tried to remember. Someone must of heard it, because I heard hurrying footsteps outside the door. There was no one in the room, and it didn’t look like anyone had been there.

The heavy door creaked open and a nurse clad in a Disney themed scrub ensemble came in with a pinched look on her face. She saw that my eyes were open and breathed a heavy sigh of relief. She was young, and I had a feeling that she was nervous about being assigned my room. What could possibly be wrong with me? Did I fall down Norma Jean’s stairs again?

“Nice to see you awake,” she said kindly and walked over to all the gizmos and gadgets I was hooked up to. I tried not to look down at the tubes sticking out of my wrists. They freaked me out. She seemed slightly puzzled by what she saw. “Your heart’s having the butterflies, isn’t it?” I tuned back into the sound of my heart. It was hard for me to concentrate on more than one sound, but once I heard the beeping again, I felt my eyes widen. It sounded like a beeping symphony. But I didn’t feel like my heart was running a few dozen marathons. I felt calm, almost peaceful. If only I could remember what had happened….

“I’m going to get the doctor,” she said and took one glance at me again. “Dear, can you hear me?”

I found it incredibly difficult to move my mouth. This was when it hit me that my entire head was wrapped up in a bandage, all the way down to my jaw. My neck was in a brace too, I found as I tried to nod my head. It hurt and I gave a weird little moan from between the slight hole in my bandages. The nurse took this as a yes and told me not to move before she ran like the devil out of my tiny little white prison cell.

Over all I felt I was in very good hands.

The heavy metal door closed after the Disney nurse and I was left there to try and piece together what had happened. Images, as blurry as if they were photographs just being developed, came fading through my broken head. There was a car, there was Ricky, and there was something that drove us off the road, and there was a tree. What I was most concerned about was the thing that had driven us off the road. I remembered a face, a face that shouldn’t have been a face. It was too grotesque, to monstrous to be a face, but I knew it had been.

By this time, my heart was not just a symphony—the chorus had joined too. My chest was starting to hurt and I fell back on my pillows, panting through my little hole in the gauze as the panic reached my very being.

I blinked, and he was standing over me.

Still and as silent as a statue, he stood, his dark eyes darting carefully around the white room to make sure there was truly no one there lurking. And me being me, my heart upon seeing him actually skipped a beat. This caused his face to wrinkle into an ill-suiting frown. But he really had no idea what kind of effect he had when he stood there, in the brightest place I’d ever been being the darkest creature I’ve ever seen. His hair, slightly curly and long enough to hang in his eyes, was dark as coal while his old-fashioned coat was an off grey with brass buttons. He held a hat that looked quiet like a fedora in his pale, long fingers that twitched nervously at frightening speeds. He leaned over me, and gently reached out with one of his long hands towards my neck.

At this point I knew I had to be hallucinating. I waited for the door to slam open and for him to disappear at once, but he didn’t… and he did touch my brace. I felt the change of pressure and wanted to scream. I wasn’t just imagining this beautiful, familiar creature. Quickly, and yet still as gently as if he were touching a baby, he pulled off the gauze around my chin and mouth. I took in a thankful deep breath, and my heart steadied for a moment. It wasn’t quite quelled with its fast beating, however. The sight of him was still enough to make it a bit woozy.

“Do you remember me?” was the first thing he said, dark eyes staring down into mine. I was dumbfounded, and couldn’t find my voice to speak for a long time. It also didn’t help that I wasn’t sure if I did or not… but as he spoke again, I recognized his voice. “I had promised to watch you. I’m sorry I didn’t do very well.”

Everything clicked.

“W-why did you—who are—where’s Ricky?!” I choked out. My jaw didn’t hurt too badly, thankfully. Why had it been wrapped up like that then?

“Calm down,” he sighed in a whisper. It was a funny thing, seeing him sigh. It looked staged, rather than an actual human trait. “Now one question at a time, and I know there will be questions.” I opened my newly freed mouth, ready to start firing away before he added in a low, dark whisper, “Just be aware that the things you have witnessed tonight merit you receive answers. That does not mean, however, that they should be addressed here.”

My mind wasn’t having a great time following the mysterious expression and disposition my rescuer was giving me. Not to mention his way of talking. Who really spoke like that, especially when they’re trying to get something across quickly?

“Well…” I mumbled, finding it was hard to look up at him. I closed my eyes and winced. The florescent lights hurt. I didn’t feel him bend towards me, but when I weakly reopened my eyelids he was so close to me I could have kissed him.

“Are you all right?” he asked, touching the base of my throat tenderly, just beneath the brace.

I hadn’t meant to, but those fingers were so cold against my flesh. I screamed, but he must have guessed I was going to. So, the creature cold as death, to silence me before I gave him away, pressed his dark lips against mine.

It was the most overwhelming thing I’d ever had happen to me. All at once, my world was turned upside down. I lost track of all the world around me and was lost in the cold lips that felt like they were burning my face. A strange scent coming from his skin made me want to be even closer to him, to discover what it was.

And just like that, it was all over.

“Oh, dear lord,” he whispered when he pulled away, staring at me. I must have been a sight. I heard my heart monitor. It had been racing incredibly too fast. But once again I couldn’t feel it. I felt numb. “Amelia, look what you’ve gotten us into.”

Us. Us…

“Who… are you?” I gasped. But the saturnine being wasn’t looking at me. Just a moment before I heard hurried footsteps racing down the hallway. I was certain that he’d moved to stare at the door before they’d came into hearing distance.

“I cannot answer your questions. They must have heard your heart…” He murmured, almost too fast for me to catch. He seemed to find his last sentence rather endearing. He’d turned back to me, and was busying himself adjusting me to look as I had before he’d dropped in. He took hold of the gauze but paused for just a moment. That pale face was close to mine again. “I will return to you when you go home. I will answer everything then.”

It took all my energy to speak before he wrapped my mouth shut once more. “Who are you?” I repeated, probably too loud because he cringed and his fast, dark eyes flickered to the door.

“My name’s Julien.”

The next moment, I was alone in the room, my mouth wrapped up once again and the door bursting open with the nurse with a doctor rushing at me. They ran towards me, but I didn’t know what was going on because I could no longer hear the beeping of my heart or the sound of the nurse’s worrying or the doctor’s questions firing this way and that.

All I could feel was the cold stain left on my lips, and how it meant more to me than any kiss Ricky had ever given me.