Janet Lang woke up in fright from another soul-disturbing nightmare. This time, she saw her sister, Melissa, begging her for help, but Janet could hardly understand what she was saying. Melissa wasn’t hanging from a cable, but she did have a giant hook through her lower jaw and every time she spoke, blood splattered from her mouth, coloring the air with a crimson mist. The mist would turn into clouds and blood would rain in the living room.
Since Sunday morning, the morning Janet had found Melissa’s body, her days and nights consisted mainly of her dozing off – sometimes due to medication, sometimes due to pure exhaustion – and then being brutally awaken by nightmares so unsettling and vivid her whole body would shake. Twice her dreams had been so terrifying that Janet had lost control and wet herself.
This time, Janet had fallen asleep in her bedroom, while Tom was in the kitchen, preparing himself a sandwich. The one he had made for Janet at 6 a.m. was still untouched, sitting on a plate on her bedside table.
Tom had taken a week off work to stay by her side and he would have been lying if he hadn’t admitted that he was very concerned.
He knew that mentally, Janet had always been a very strong person, but even the strongest of minds could break if pushed far enough. It was true that there weren’t many life events that could, with a single blow, fracture a mind way beyond the point of no return. Unfortunately, finding a loved one brutally murdered was right at the top of the list of such events and Melissa had been much more than just a beloved sister to Janet. She had been Janet’s best friend and the rock she could always lean against no matter what. Without Melissa, Janet could easily become a lost soul. Tom knew that too.
He had just taken a bite of his peanut butter and jelly sandwich when he heard Janet’s muffled scream. He dropped the sandwich on the kitchen counter and hurried into their bedroom. Janet was sitting on their bed, knees against her chest, sobbing, with her face buried into her hands.
‘It’s OK, baby,’ Tom said, as he reached her. ‘It was just a dream… just a dream.’ He placed his arms around her and brought her towards him.
Janet allowed herself to be hugged, but she didn’t hug back, keeping her face hidden in her hands.
‘I’m here, Jen… I’m here.’ Tom reached for her hands. ‘Look at me, baby. It was only a dream.’ He kissed both of her hands and caressed her hair. ‘Please, look at me, Jen.’
Still sobbing, Janet finally allowed her hands to drop and locked eyes with him.
He kissed her cheeks and tried wiping away her tears, but Janet couldn’t stop crying.
‘It’s alright, baby,’ Tom tried again. ‘It’s gone. It was a dream… nothing but a bad dream… that’s all. It’s not real.’
‘That’s where you’re wrong, Tom,’ Janet hit back, her tone full of pain. ‘Because it is real… Mel is gone, Tom…’ Her voice thinned. ‘She’s gone. Mel is dead. She’s dead. My sister is not here anymore.’ Her hands returned to her face.
Tom couldn’t believe that he had chosen his words so poorly. He hugged her tighter, his heart broken inside of him. ‘I’m so sorry, baby.’ It was his turn to fight back tears. ‘I’m so, so sorry.’
In his arms, he could feel Janet shaking. Not knowing what else to say, he simply held her tight, until the sobbing had turned to sniffles.
‘Why don’t you come sit in the living room with me, Jen?’ Tom asked, once again wiping away tears from Janet’s face. ‘We can watch some old show re-run. Something light… something easy to watch. What do you think?’
Janet stayed silent.
Tom kissed her forehead and then her cheeks. ‘C’mon.’ He got up, but kept her hands in his. ‘Come with me. Let’s sit on the sofa for a little. I’ll make popcorn.’
Janet looked away, trying to decide what to do. She really didn’t want to face reality. At least not at the moment. Every second she spent awake, she knew that she would spend thinking of her sister, who she would never, ever see again… but despite how exhausted she felt, she was also terrified of falling back asleep. Actually, she was terrified of even closing her eyes because every time she did, the images that she saw that Sunday morning were there, waiting for her, as if they had been forever etched on the inside of her eyelids.
Tom read the indecision in Janet’s face – stay awake, or try to fall back asleep. She needed rest, he knew that, but sleep wasn’t bringing her any. If she came to the living room with him, he could at least be by her side. He tried again.
‘C’mon, baby. Sit with me just for an hour or so.’ His tone was pleading and tender.
Still sniffling, Janet finally nodded and slowly got to her feet. Tom let go of her hands and she used a paper tissue to dry her face. As they got to the bedroom door, Janet paused.
‘My phone,’ she said, pointing at her bedside table. ‘Let me get my phone. I haven’t checked it since last night.’
Janet had put her cellphone on silent – no ring and no vibration.
Tom waited.
She grabbed her phone and checked its screen – ten missed calls and over twenty messages. She breathed out and rejoined her boyfriend.
In the living room, while Tom searched through seemingly hundreds of satellite channels for something watchable, Janet scrolled through the missing calls – one from her doctor, eight from friends and one from her boss at work. She decided that she would call them all back later. She just didn’t have the strength for a phone conversation with anyone right then. Instead, she moved on to the messages. Most of them were from friends – twenty-four WhatsApp messages and one SMS text. The SMS had come from an unknown number. Janet thumbed down on her screen to check the message preview and was instantly surprised. The preview read ‘Melissa’. The body of the message contained just a video, no text.
Janet’s response was automatic. She simply tapped the preview to open the message. As it did, the sent video filled her screen and her heart immediately shot up to her throat, almost choking her. Her body lost all of its strength, her arms went limp and she dropped her phone onto the floor.
The shriek that came out of her vocal cords was a sound that Tom had never heard before… and it frightened him stiff.