"No!" Aria's voice broke out at last, but it is long too late. "No, please! Please! No! No!, stop please! No more.
Hands grip her shoulders, aggressively yanking her back. Now she remembers. She remembers what she was running from.
She flails her limbs, kicking, screaming, fighting...
Aria ! Aria wake up, it's all a dream, it's not real!"
Another hard swing of her arm, and she just misses her roommates face, her eyes snapping open on the end of a wail.
She's back in her bedroom, her sheets tangled around her legs and sweat causing her hair and tank top to stick to her skin.
Her roommate's face is frozen in terror, her lips parted and her brown eyes bulging, her dark curls frazzled with sleep and panic.
Judging by that look alone, you would think this was the first time she'd had to awaken her from such an endeavor. But no. It wasn't even the first time tonight.
"Hey, you're okay," her roommate manages with a heavy exhale. "You're alright."
Shock and confusion quickly morph into frustration, Aria slapping her hands against the mattress.
"Fuck! "Hey, it's alright, Aria. It's okay."
Tell that to the bags under her eyes, the loss of appetite, of hair. Nothing had felt 'okay' or anything near it for the past twelve months.
That's how long it had been since she'd slept through the night. twelve months since the night terrors had tormented her sleep.
She was afraid to sleep, afraid to fight the monsters that plagued her sleep.
She did not know how long she could go on like this. She could barely get out of bed, and she can rarely go back to sleep. It was taking its toll.
"I don't want to take anymore pills, Gwen," she sighed.
"And I get that, but you are going to burn out." Gwen responded.
"I am burnt out Gwen look at me." I say.
"Okay, listen to me." Gwen grabbed my shoulders, pulling her up into a sitting position.
"Just try it once. If you still feel the same tomorrow, I promise to flush them myself.
Please, Aria, I'm worried about you. You are not getting better, it's been over twelve months now yet you're still running on fumes, and it isn't healthy. I know I don't need to tell you that."
Aria chewed her lip, staring down at her hands. They were still trembling. She pressed her nails into her palms and squeezed until it ached. She had nothing else to say.
They had said it all over the past few months. Aria being right did not negate the depth of the struggle. Nor did the extent of her will and the excess of her exhaustion.
Gwen simply couldn't understand. Nobody could. Because what happened had been the worst thing to ever happen to Aria.
And yeah, now it's been twelve months without sleep or any sense of peace.
Twelve months of struggling to crawl out of bed anyway. Twelve months of regretting every breath she had taken since. She was beginning to lose sight of a point.
"Come on," Gwen urged. It wasn't that she didn't miss their dad. It was that she was much better at suppressing the urge to fall apart.
Especially since she wasn't there. "Let's go get breakfast."
"I'm not hungry."
"Then you can watch me eat, but I'm getting you out of bed. We'll go out, get food, come back, and watch movies until it's time to take a pill and go to sleep.
You can even sleep in my bed, so I can watch you."
"Seriously, Gwen?"
"Seriously. Now come on."
Aria stared at the bottle sat in front of her, her fingers tapping against the table's surface in an erratic pattern. Deep breaths…Deep breaths.
She shut her eyes, the burn that came with not blinking merciless and antagonistic. She opened them again quickly.
She was exhausted.
She picked "the bottle, dragging the pad of her thumb across her name printed on the label.
Aria was sure she didn't wanted to sleep. Every time she closed her eyes, quite literally, all she could see was that outline, darker than the dark around it, hulking and harsh in the corner of her room.
That figure had been there ever since, in the corner of her eye, watching, waiting, her father's screams permeating the air like a foul stench.
What could possibly be more terrifying than that? Sleep was not the problem. What awaited her within it was.
"You have to sleep," Gwen commanded as she entered the kitchen. She was like a broken record.
"I'm not doing this with you anymore, you need to get your shit together.
Nothing short of the truth, Aria knew.
"Really?" Gwen"sighed, looking up at her sister. "You are really pulling that card,fine then.
Aria gathered her jet black hair and piled it atop her head in a messy bun, her bronze skin glistening with the aftermath of their face mask treatments.
"She screwed off the cap, staring down at the light purple tablets within. The room seemed to hold its breath, waiting to see if she would give in or not.
It made her uneasy, rolling her shoulders and stretching her neck with a hard swallow.
Before she could slap the cap back on, Gwen reached into the bottle, extracting a single tablet and placing it on the table.
She already had a knife in hand, and she used it to break the tablet in two, sliding one half to Aria with an expectant look.
Aria stared up at her, mouth slightly agape and eyes blown wide. Fear crept up her throat , or was that bile? Maybe both.
Sweat collected on her brow and the back of her neck while her mouth went dry.
What would she see when she succumbed to sleep? Or more importantly, what would she fail to see?
"I'll be right there with you, Aria,"
Gwen assured her, brushing a hand over her hair.
"No, you won't, Aria said quietly, her eyes falling to the table. "You can't be."
"No. I'll be there to pull you out of it if I have to. And I will I promise.
"Okay," she breathed. "I'll take it."
If she was lucky, it wouldn't be a stranger she met in the dark tonight. It would be her father, and if she had even a sliver of a chance to see him again, she would take it.
After a hot shower and a cup of tea, Aria took half the tablet Gwen had cut for her and climbed into bed beside her roommate.
Gwen put on cartoons, something reminiscent of their childhood, and although
Aria groaned in embarrassment, she was secretly grateful for it. Anything to soothe her nerves and keep her calm as she anticipated the effects of the medication.
"What if it doesn't work?" The question left Aria's lips of its own volition.
"Then we'll try something else. Your therapist said that coping was a lot of trial and error, right?"
Aria bit her lip, curling her fingers into the comforter. The words bounced around in her head, Grace's voice a soulful and soothing sound.
Truth be told, Aria would be far worse off if she hadn't walked into the older woman's office just weeks after the home invasion which was a terrifying thought considering how run down she remained even now.
She had barely been able to breathe for the first two months, the panic attacks and paranoia ravaging her body like rabid animals.
Now that she had sunken to the bottom of this pit, she wasn't sure she would ever be able to climb all the way out.
Gwen never lost hope, but Aria wasn't sure she'd ever had much to begin with. Her father was gone. How could the world have the audacity to move on after that? How could it all just keep going?
It happened slowly. The sound of the TV growing softer, the room fading to black, her grip on Gwen's hand loosening.
No dreams, no memory of falling asleep; there was only the falling"It felt as though she had only blinked, and then she was waking up in Gwen's bed.
However, it was not yet morning. The room remained pitch black around them, a void she had to stare into until her eyes adjusted. Yet once they had, she wished they hadn't.
Her attention was immediately drawn to the corner. The shadows that painted it, they were alive, and they, or it had begun to grow. At an alarming rate.
And she couldn't move."
"She strained against whatever invisible bonds pinned her to the mattress, but it was of no use. She could not move.
Apart from the short range of motion of her head and the movement of her eyes, she was helpless.
She could not even speak, and although Jenna remained beside her, she could not call to her, could not reach for her, could do nothing but lay there.
And the shadow was growing bigger.
Fear wrapped around her, urgent and unforgiving, clawing at her throat.
There was no rational thought, no concrete contemplation that she could latch onto.
Although she knew what she was seeing and feeling, it was as though her mind failed to accept it. In doing so, it prevented her from regaining control.
All there was now was panic. Then…
Then the shadow started to grow smaller.
It was like she was zooming out of the frame, those shadows shrinking back into the corner until she could breathe again.
Until she was freed from this nightmare of a prison. Or prison of a nightmare.
She bolted upright with a yelp, her breathing heavy and sweat slipping down her forehead.
Gwen lay beside her sleeping soundly,
pale blue light being sifted through the curtains.
It was morning. She had slept through the night."