A Witch's Nightmares

Reader: be the Witch of Space

You heave a sigh as you toss restlessly onto your back for the millionth time.  You’ve been rolling back and forth in your bed for about two and a half hours now, and you are still no closer to sleep than you had been when your head had first hit the pillow.  A low growl resonates in your throat as your eyelids pop open to glare at the golden ceiling above.  You’d never had this much trouble falling asleep before.  Normally you slipped in and out of consciousness with ease – sometimes without even knowing that you were doing it!  But this time it was different.  Because he wasn’t there.

You flop onto your side and snuggle into the empty pillow lying there.  You think your heightened senses can still pick up the trace of his scent lingering in the fabric, but that might just be your own wishful thinking.  However, the pillow is cold and offers you no comfort.  You toss it onto the floor in frustration, clenching your fists so tightly together that you can feel your nails digging into the soft skin of your palms.

With a moan of irritation you propel yourself from your bed and onto your own two feet.  You use your pent-up energy to get yourself to your bedroom door, but as soon as you prepare to enter the hallway, you feel yourself hesitating.  He had told you he wanted his space.  He had told you that it would be better if you two spent some time away from each other.  He didn’t want to see you.

But even though you clearly know all of this, there is a tightness in your chest that is starting to make you feel sick and you know that the only way to make it stop is to be back in his arms again.  With your heart pounding in your chest and your eyelids drooping wearily over your bright green eyes, you stumble down the hallway of the big golden Prospitian ship to where you know his room resides.

His door is already cracked open when you reach it, just as it always is.  He used to leave it open so that you could sneak in late at night without rousing the suspicions of John.  He must have carried on the tradition out of habit.  Your breath catches in your throat as you silently slip into the dark confines of his room.  You can see the glowing orange outline of his arm resting above the covers of his bed.  Your heart skips a beat out of longing, remembering how easily it had once been to slip under those sheets with him and spend the night whispering to each other and sharing soft, tender kisses.

Your desperation propels you forward, and before you know it, you are crawling gingerly onto his bed, hoping not to wake him.  However, you’re nowhere near as nimble and graceful as Jaspersprite, and your jostling of the bedsprings arouses him almost instantly.  “Jade?” he asks, his voice rough and gravely in the darkness.  He squints his orange eyes at you as he sits up slightly.  “What the hell . . . ?”

“I couldn’t sleep,” you mutter awkwardly, your white dog ears bending back against your raven hair in embarrassment.  You open your mouth to tell him how much you miss him and how much you wish that things could just go back to the way they were, but you decide against it.  Instead, you lean forward and wrap your arms around his chest, his familiar warmth immediately soothing your anxieties.  “Please,” you whisper as you cling to him as tightly as you can.  “Please, just let me spend the night here.  I promise that I won’t ask again.  Just one more time.”

“Jade . . .” he sighs heavily, “I really don’t think that’s a good idea.”  You can feel his hands against your back, but they are tentative, as if he’s afraid to hold you.  What had happened to the days when he would wrap his arms so tight around you that you thought he would never let go?

“Please . . .” you beg again, your voice trailing off into a pathetic-sounding whimper.

You hear him sigh again, his breath rustling your dark hair.  “Jade, we’ve talked about this.  I think it’s better if we spend some time apart for a while.  It’s for your own good.”

Your frustration boils into anger for just a moment.  “My own good?” you demand, your voice rising despite your best attempts at retaining a whisper.  You lean away from him slightly so that you can see into those orange eyes that he tries so desperately to hide during the day.  “Why can’t I decide that for myself?  You can’t always be taking care of me like this, Dave.  I’m not a child.”

For a moment he just stares back at you in surprise.  “What did you just say?”

“I’m not a child!” you repeat, doing your best to keep your voice lowered.  The last thing you needed right now was for John to wake up and come looking for you.

“No.  You called me Dave,” he mutters, his voice low and serious.

“No . . . no I didn’t,” you stutter awkwardly.  “Did I?”

“Yes.  You did,” he clarifies, his frown deepening.  “Jade, this is what I’m talking about.  What are you going to do when we’re reunited with Dave?  I mean, the real, alpha-timeline-Knight-of-Time-Dave?  What are you going to do then?”

Once again your mouth drops open to offer a response, but your words freeze in your throat.  He’s right, after all.  No matter how many times you tell yourself that you love him, not the other Dave, you can’t help but second-guess your own conviction.  You know that they’re two entirely different people, but they’re also sort of the same.  Gog, why did everything in this game have to be so frickin’ complicated?

“It won’t change anything,” you finally reply, even though you both know that it’s a blatant lie.

Davesprite raises an eyebrow at you, instantly calling your bluff.  But at the same time, you sense the familiar feeling of his arms wrapping around your shoulders and bringing you closer.  “I’m so sorry, Harley,” he mutters into your hair as you settle back into his comforting embrace.  “I knew it was a mistake to start something with you on this stupid void journey . . .”

“Don’t say that!” you whisper back, snuggling yourself even closer under his chin.  “Please, Davesprite.  Don’t say that.  I wouldn’t have changed our time together for anything.”  You pause for a moment, your hands running along his spine and brushing against the soft downy feathers of his wings.  “Don’t you feel the same way?”

You listen to the whooshing sound of a sigh as it expands and then contracts his chest.  He gently nuzzles his nose into the crook of your neck and you can’t help but let out a small, satisfied sigh of your own.  You wait for what seems like hours for him to make a response, but it never comes.  Instead, his lips start tracing idle lines up and down your neck and making you shiver.

You don’t want it to stop, but you pull away all the same.  You’re close enough to his face now to clearly make out every repressed emotion hiding in those orange eyes of his.  “Davesprite?” you ask expectantly, if not a little breathlessly.  You want him to say it.  You want to hear him tell you one more time that he loves you and that he never wants to let you go.  You tell yourself that if you can just have that, then you can be happy.

But the days when he would simply smile and tell you whatever you wanted to hear are long gone.  Instead, he cups your cheek gently and places a soft kiss on your forehead.  He lingers there for a few moments and you are filled with an uncontrollable sense of terror as you get the feeling that it will be the last kiss he'll ever give you.

“You can stay for the night,” he whispers finally, leaning back against his pillow and pulling you tight against his chest once more.  “But this is the last time, Harley.”

You hold him close even as your heart silently breaks and your tears fall down and stain his T-shirt.  You do the best to make the moment last as long as you can make it, but with his reassuring body heat next to you, your own exhaustion is creeping up on you once again and you fall rather unwillingly into sleep.  You know full well that tomorrow will come too soon and then Davesprite will be out of your reach forever.  You have no idea what's waiting for you at the end of this excruciatingly long three-year journey, but you are frankly terrified knowing that you will now have to face it alone.  You sleep the night away peacefully, but your dreams are full of nightmares.