Anita

Teeth nipped at her heels, tied down she couldn’t move. Figures paced around, each one holding a crackling whip they didn’t hesitate to lash across her back. Anita was helpless in the face of them, snarling jaws snapping inches from her face. A horde of them, getting closer, closer, a brutal agony that never ended. Takeem’s sick smiling face hovering around her limited vision. “Anita!” Anita groaned as poison soaked into her skin, like a fire raging in her blood. “Anita!”

“Anita!”

Anita snapped back into consciousness, drenched in a cold sweat. Meriam hovered over her, pinning her arms against the soft surface of her mattress. Anita shifted around to glance at the clock by her bedside, harsh red numbers lighting up the darkness, 3:24. She groaned and Meriam released her, making the bed sag under her weight. “Again?” Anita swore, pushing herself up into a seating position.

Meriam yawned and rubbed at her eyes. “Anita, it’s been three weeks. You need to see someone about these.”

“They’re just dreams.” Anita leaned over and flicked on the bedside lamp, illuminating Meriam’s concerned face.

“Dreams don’t make you wake up in the middle of the night screaming.”

“I’m sorry I woke you up.” Again. Anita glanced at the floor and fiddled her thumbs. Meriam had been coming into her room to shake her awake every night. She wouldn’t say anything but Anita knew the loss of sleep was taking its toll on her.

“I’m not worried about that,” Meriam cupped a hand under her chin, “I’m worried about you. It’s just getting worse and worse. You need to talk to someone, a doctor or something. Maybe they can get you a sedative that’ll keep the dreams away.”

Anita shuddered and swallowed thickly. Drugs were the last thing she wanted. After spending so long in the hospital, hyped up on pain medication, she was officially sick of needles and pills. “I’ll be fine. You should go to sleep.” Anita curled up under the blankets, pulling them up to her neck and kept her back to Meriam. She heard the girl sigh and the bed shifted some more before Anita felt arms wrap around her waist. Anita tensed up under her touch. “What are you doing?”

“Go to sleep,” Meriam murmured, pressing her head against Anita’s back. Anita swallowed her protests, her assuring presence was comforting, and allowed herself to relax. She listened to her steady breaths until she could no longer keep her eyes open and drifted back to sleep.

The first thing she noticed when she woke up was Meriam’s disappearance. The second was that it was cold. Anita curled the blankets around her shoulders like a cloak and headed downstairs, cursing the freezing floor under her breath.

She found Meriam in the kitchen, drinking her regular coffee and reading a paper. Meriam glanced up at her arrival and smiled. “Good morning. How’d you sleep?”

Like a dream. Anita swallowed and shrugged, plopping down with her fortress of blankets on one of the bar stools around the island. “Why is it so cold?” she muttered, pulling the blankets tighter around her.

Meriam chuckled at the child-like behaviour. “The power went out sometime last night so the heaters weren’t going. It’ll warm up soon,” she promised. “In the meantime, hot chocolate?”

Anita nodded at the offer and reached across the counter, immediately regretting the movement as icy cold air penetrated her cozy walls. She shoved her hands back under the blankets and dragged the paper over using her fleece covered hand.

“It’s not that cold,” Meriam pointed out, sipping her coffee as she waited for the water to boil. Anita couldn’t understand how she wasn’t freezing in her t-shirt and pajama bottoms. She knew she was slightly more sensitive due to her previous malnutrition but it couldn’t be by that much.

“It’s definitely cold,” Anita grumbled. Meriam finished making her hot chocolate. She picked up her coffee and brought the two mugs over so she could continue reading her paper. Anita scooted to the side a bit to give her more room and read over her shoulder, content to let the brunette flip the pages so she didn’t have to brave the cold. There wasn’t anything new, the main headline had been the same for weeks: Sanctuary is a Lie, Guardian Protest Leads to Renovation of Compounds, followed by a long spiel about how bad the conditions were. The rest of the paper was mostly routine, lost cats and properties for sale.

Nothing caught her eye so she focused on drinking without uncovering her hands until Meriam pointed at one of the houses for sale. “What about something like this?”

Anita rested her head on the brunette’s shoulder to read the description: Modern, 5 bed, 3 bath, spacious & gated yard, 2 car garage with lots of driveway parking, friendly neighbourhood with park & schools nearby.

“Five bedrooms?” Anita remarked.

“One for like, a spare room if someone comes over and the other could be an office or maybe a playroom. And there’s a park for when he gets a little older and it’s gated so we could get a dog or-” Meriam cut off her rambling and chewed on her lip.

Anita shrugged and moved back to her seat. “It’s your money.”

Meriam made a frustrated noise and spun around to look at her. “Yes but still, do you think it’d be nice for him or what? I need some opinions.”

“Whatever you want is fine by me. Do you want to go to the open house and get a bit more information? We could tour the neighbourhood while we’re there, and make a day of it.” Meriam lit up at the suggestion and nodded eagerly.

Anita quickly drank the last of her hot chocolate then quickly ran to the bedroom to change, hissing at the cold. The heaters were beginning to warm up but it was still freezing as she stripped out of clothes and tossed new ones on. By the time she was finished, Meriam was already waiting at the door and urged her onward.

They drove out to the neighbourhood, taking their time driving down all the streets and making note of where everything was. Anita was expecting the park to be a few swings and a slide but it turned out to be much better than that. There was a small section with slides and swings but it was mostly winding trails around small ponds and creeks of water. Meriam nodded with approval and they wandered the park before heading over to the open house.

Meriam gaped as they pulled up to the house. It was much larger in person, with a gate outside that they needed to buzz to get in, earning another approving mark. A real estate agent greeted them at the door and Meriam ran off to explore. The brunette was already planning what she was going to change to make it perfect and barely even looked at it all before she was making a deal with the agent.

“Almost a million dollars. You’re insane.” Anita shook her head in bewilderment as they drove away.

“It’s really not that much for that kind of house, I mean did you see it? It’s perfect. Two floors, balcony overlooking the garden, schools in walking distance. Plus those bedrooms were huge, and although the colour was god awful that’s easy to fix. A few thousand will update all the appliances and it’s perfect."

Anita didn’t have the heart to argue with her and went along with it. They stopped for Chinese takeout on the way back, the day had passed by so quickly she hadn’t even realised how late it was as they devoured chow mein and rice.

Meriam crawled into bed with her at the end of the day - not tolerating any of Anita’s protests - and drifted off into the first dreamless sleep she’d had in ages.