Sleepwaker

Without even locking the front door of her apartment behind her, Sam gulped down pain medication and a pair of sleeping pills. Only then, did she drop her coat onto the floor with the rest of her dirty laundry and sink down onto the couch. She found sleeping in bed almost impossible. It was too much pressure. It was easier just to take the sleeping pills, switch on the TV, and drift into a fog that eventually resembled dreaming.

As the medications started to kick in, the pain went from feeling like someone had stuck a butter knife under her kneecaps to an almost friendly throbbing. She tried to focus on what the unrealistically beautiful TV homicide detective was saying, but already it felt like she was looking out at the world through warped glass. She liked it better that way.

A strange buzzing seeped into her dream. The humming of a neon sign. A swarm of bees. The whirring blades of a helicopter. She bolted awake. It was her cell phone vibrating. The screen showed a number but no name. Mostly to make the sound stop, Sam hit the green button. She expected a cold robotic recording from her pharmacy telling her she needed to have a doctor renew her prescription. Instead, a tearful voice gasped: “Sam? Sam, is that you?”

“It’s the middle of the night,” Sam mumbled. As soon as she said it, she knew it was a lie. It must be at least noon by now, but her blackout curtains were doing their job.

“You’re not sleeping, are you?” The voice had gone very quiet. “Sam, do not go to sleep.”

“Who is this?”

“It’s Jennifer. I need to know why you said what you said about the Sleepwalker.”

Jennifer Benally had been her best friend when they were kids, but other than a few Instagram comments, they hadn’t spoken in the eleven years since they graduated high school.

“Why are you calling me?”

“Beth’s dead.” Something about the whine in Jennifer’s voice sent a shiver down the back of Sam’s neck. The blue light from the TV screen flickered and the shadows cast by the stacks of dirty dishes accumulating on her coffee table crept across the wall.

“Beth Joe?”

“They’re saying she had a heart attack in her sleep, but . . . we both know that’s not true,” Jennifer said in a manic whisper. “Her palm was all burned. Just like the Sleepwalker.”

Through the thick fog of chemically induced sleep, Sam struggled to understand what Jennifer was trying to say to her. The word “Sleepwalker” triggered feelings of youthful terror, but when she tried to grab onto it the details slipped through her fingers.
“How did you know?” Jennifer’s desperate voice cut through the confusion. “Sam, how did you know what was going to happen? Sam!”

The line went dead.

Read Sleepwalker here.