The nightmare is back again. Her heart races and her skin is covered in a sheen of sweat. Her body is heavy and sluggish and she has trouble emerging from the stifling haze of sleep. But at last she yanks herself out and wakes with a gasp.
Immediately she is lost. Something is missing, that relief when the light hits your eye, the objects in her room. Total darkness. Not a single contour or shadow. It smells like earth and mould, and there’s a draught from an open window.
There’s something wrong with her body. A heaviness in her head and eyelids. Dizziness and nausea. Her brain is on strike; it can’t seem to get into gear. Her breath carries a dull fear, but it doesn’t quite take hold. Her mouth is itchy and her eyes sting. Her memory seems empty. She battles the void for a moment before the images return. The bed in the apartment. The wine, the drowsiness. A hand on her forehead. Relax! One word before the room seemed to dilute and vanish. A flash of sharpness much later. The shuddering and the sound of screeching gulls. A quick glance upward, and she saw fog, fog everywhere. A sting in her thigh before darkness returned.
Her stomach sinks. Now she knows. She doesn’t want to let any more images in. Doesn’t want to understand what happened. Yet she knows. Somewhere inside, she has always feared that this is what awaited her.
The light that streams in when the door opens gives her a spark of hope – until she hears the familiar footsteps. The scent of his aftershave floats on the air. His proximity is like a maddening itch that spreads all over her body. Then comes the impulse to get up and run, so strong that it sucks the air out of her. But she is pressed back down, a burning force against her chest. She can’t breathe. The energy drains from her muscles. Her heart pounds unevenly. Tiny black dots dance before her eyes.
His voice is calm and friendly.
‘Welcome back.’
The door closes with a hard thud.
A bestial whine comes from her mouth. Her scream begins as a tickle on her palate, rising from her lungs, pouring from her throat like a wave, and its crescendo is so loud it is deafening.
Then: silence, and it’s just the two of them in the dark.