Dwayne knew he was dreaming. That was one of his few abilities, to be completely aware that he was asleep in his own world his mind created for him. He only wished he chose when he woke up, time being different in the dream world. He opened his eyes and discovered himself confined in his school locker at Vanguard High. Dwayne was claustrophobic and afraid of just about everything. He could feel everything in his dreams and physical pain or cuts, even death would come back to him in the real world.
Sweat dripped from Dwayne's black skin causing his white shirt and black pants to stick to him. Being as tall as he was he felt crammed like sardines in a can in the locker. Panicking, he threw himself into the door hearing it dent and panted. He had smashed his head on the locker ceiling and he felt a small amount of blood trickle out of his short black buzz cut hair. He pushed and pelted the locker door with his fists now praying and screaming. It opened.
He fell to the ground and found himself in the inky, gloomy high school hallway. Usually his dreams were a place of bliss. Could this be a nightmare, he thought, forming a lump in his throat and a swirl in his tight stomach. He heard snakes hissing, almost as if they were inside him laughing at his petrified state. He was a senior but scared of the dark. His mind would create figures in the black abyss to keep him awake and alert at night.
“Wake up, wake up, wake up Dwayne,” he muttered.
It was as if his entire body was asleep and his legs were spaghetti he couldn’t move. The hissing grew louder and a silhouette the figure of a large man materialized from a liquid form to a stable body holding a chain attached to a man.
“Help,” the man choked.
Dwayne stared, horrified as the figure got closer, it reminded Dwayne of a shadow and that was what his mind called it instantly. The man began choking on sobs. Dwayne looked closer, frozen on the spot, the petrified shock causing tears to well up in his eyes. His gut ripped out at his skin and his chest was playing drums. His mind was a mustang speeding down a race track. Cobras begin to slither out of the man's mouth fighting each other to exit first.
“Jesus Christ!” Dwayne gasped.
The man's eyes were ripped out by snakes travelling out from the inside of the sockets.The man's high pitched screams echoed through the school. As if out of nowhere, snakes crawled out of the open locker Dwayne had just broke through from. Before he turned around at a full sprint the shadows once non-existent face opened and snakes tried to jump out but were restrained as if each one was another tongue. Shrilling screams came out of the cobras mouths instead of hissing.
The fire sprinklers rained blood upon him. Blood fell on his lips emitting a metalic smell and taste. He tasted the salt of his tears as he bolted through the halls trying to find an exit. His legs were burning and he heard hissing from the vents and lockers. Screams echoed in his eardrums when the shadow got closer dragging the man's now dead body along the floor. Like the shadow was a black hole, the man's flesh peeled away entering the snake infested mouth of the black figure. Soon, the man was gone, just a heap of ripped clothes lying upon the ground.
Shrieking erupted from the shadows mouth. Dwayne felt like his ears were going to split and his eardrums would crack. He screamed too, stumbling as he ran. Power was being drained from him. He moaned from the pain in his ears and tried to keep running. He ran past the gym heading towards the school's pool. Throwing open the doors he threw himself into the pool trying to fade out the noise. Surely he should have gone deaf. He wanted to go deaf, anything but that horrid noise. The sound stopped and he raised his head above the water. He scanned the room shivering. Then he saw the cobras gliding towards the pool on the wet floor.
Dwayne swan the other way splashing and gasping for air as his head went under the water then surfaced again. The snakes were already in the pool and Dwayne cursed himself for not being a better swimmer. With every stroke of his arm he screamed at himself to wake up in his head. He was almost to the edge when what felt like millions of spike pinched his ankle and pulled him under. He tried to yell for help when he was pulled under. A cobra entered his mouth and slithered down his throat. One went in each of his eye sockets, consuming the eyeball as if a meaningless obstacle.
Then Dwayne surfaced. He floated on his back in the middle of the pool. He saw nothing, his pitch black darkness and the sound of the water gently hitting his ears. He went the warm water as he slipped away from his mind. His stomach was in horrible pain as if his insides were being eaten, which they were...
Emily lay awake next to Dwayne. She stared at the empty syringes on the nightstand beside her. She turned around and panicked when the vomit was seeping out of Dwayne's mouth. She unbuckled the belt attached to his arm and straddled his stomach shaking him. Half of her new he was gone already. She gripped the syringe and threw it at the wall with a pure hatred for it. She promised herself to get clean, to never get high again.