then held her head in her hands. Night terrors had become part of her, almost feeling as physical as something she wore, but it was no badge of honour.
That one had been one of the worst she’d had in the last year. Usually they followed the same familiar pattern, but with subtle differences.
She sucked in a deep breath, held it until her chest ached.
Despite knowing who it was she ran from by the end of each frantic nightmare, this was the first time she’d actually seen Him – or at least some twisted version of Him.
Her hands slid down her face, wiping back tears that had begun to fall. Ice-blue coloured eyes glassed over as she eventually let the tears fall freely, staining the pale flesh of her cheeks.
A loud bang outside made her jump, bolting off the sofa, stumbling over the blanket that had fallen at her feet. A series of smaller hissing sounds then followed, erupting in a series of loud bangs, and bright lights flashed behind the curtains that she had drawn earlier.
She hugged her arms tightly around her torso and shivered. She wore a rough knit jumper, its coarseness scratching at her skin, with skinny jeans that were slack at the waist and had begun to bag at the knees. She’d lost a stone in weight in the last year, but she refused to buy new clothes.
She was startled by the cracking sound as sparks seemed to dance across the roof of her house, raining down in a night so cold it stole your breath away.
She pulled back the curtain of the nearest window and saw the bright coloured fragments scatter in the sky.
Fireworks had been let off from the house somewhere across the road, at the bottom of the drive.
She released the breath she hadn’t realised she had been holding. She caught her reflection in the cold glass. Dark circles rimmed her eyes, and what little lines she did have across her forehead had deepened.
She imagined she saw Him beside her, staring at their reflections. His eyes, seen moments before in the nightmare, still black pits.
Hollow.
That summed up how she felt.
She looked at Him, then squeezed her eyes shut. ‘Go away,’ she said. When she opened them again, she felt the fog in her mind begin to clear a little. ‘It’s just a nightmare,’ she said in the darkness.
After several moments passed she went back to the sofa and felt for her phone, her head feeling thick, disorientated. She unlocked the screen and checked the time.
18:36.
She had less than an hour before she was due to be at the annual firework display in Haverbridge. She contemplated not going, and pulled up the last text message she had sent, about to send her excuses.
She flicked on the light, and looked around the room, phone clutched in a sweaty palm. The house looked as it had done a few hours ago when she’d decided to just rest her eyes.
The night terrors took their toll on her. Rarely a week went past without being woken by them. Grabbing a short sleep here and there when she could had been her way of coping with it for many months now.
She knew it couldn’t go on like this, but no way would she ask for help.
This was something she had to overcome on her own… and she would, in her own time.
*
She headed up the stairs and put on clean clothes, dumping the sweat drenched ones in the laundry basket, before heading to the bathroom.
She stared at her reflection in the mirror of the medicine cabinet.
Her skin had taken on a grey tinge of late and her frame appeared gaunt. Others had noticed, made comments. She lowered her eyes, casting a critical eye over her stomach when she lifted her jumper.
For someone who had once taken so much pride in her appearance, even she knew her standards had slipped a little.
She could hear her colleagues’ comments in her head, whispering their concerns when they thought she couldn’t hear them.
The self-pity crept in briefly, before it was pushed aside by the resilience she was known for. Soft, kind eyes became hard once again, a steely glare cast at her reflection in the mirror.
Fuck them, she thought.
She splashed cold water on her cheeks, determined she would leave the house and at least appear to be social.
This is not me, she told herself inwardly. I am in control.
Minutes later she was sitting in her car, engine running, heaters clearing the fog from the windows, tapping out a text.
You twisted my arm. On my way.
She pressed send before she could change her mind, put the phone in her pocket, and headed down the drive, mindful of the ice on the ground that twinkled in the brightness of the headlights.
She headed out of Hexton, and on towards Haverbridge, taking the scenic route, passing another sleepy village before the road cut through open fields.
She sucked in deep breaths when her mind started to clog with the familiar uneasiness of before. When she breathed, she could see the faintness of her breath expelled like puffs of smoke from between parched lips.
She turned the heating up a little more and tried to relax her body. Tight muscles soon began to relax into the seat. She felt the ache in her jaw and realised she’d been clenching her teeth together. She swallowed hard, focusing on the stillness of the country road, where frosty skeletal trees and bushes hugged it from both sides.
This year autumn appeared to have bypassed the UK entirely, and winter seemed to have taken the Hertfordshire town of Haverbridge, where she worked, into its relentless clutches much earlier than anticipated.
The large town had a population just short of 100,000 people and was situated some thirty miles from London. Haverbridge had grown over the years, becoming a commuters’ paradise for those who worked in the capital but didn’t want the bright lights of the colourful city in their backyard at home time. They wanted to say goodnight and really mean it.
Haverbridge was beautiful, yet ugly in so many ways – not dissimilar to other towns and cities up and down the UK – but Haverbridge had a different side to it. It was exceptionally beautiful in the darker months. What made it so striking, you couldn’t easily describe; it just was.
The summer sun had long disappeared and the threat of early snowfall was a very real one.
For Claire, it was bad news. It made her fall easily into an abyss of self-loathing and bitterness, something she was prone to. The cold haunted her like a restless spirit and the chill was not good for her bones.
She glanced at the clock on the dash. She’d be a little late, but she knew Stefan would understand. She took the road leading to the motorway, and as she travelled at a steady 60mph, she looked at the road ahead, bright lights and traffic rushing past, through eyes that didn’t quite feel like her own.
One day earlier
The man glanced around the car park
