I’m out. The rain pouring down around me, soaking through my clothes as I drag myself along the wet overgrowth to get away.
Reaching a clearing, exhausted, I roll onto my back, staring up at the night’s sky. Taking in the blanket of darkness that’s speckled with a glistening spray of a thousand stars.
The sight is strangely beautiful and hypnotic, almost.
Because even though every part of me hurts, I can see it, I’m alive. And I just want to lay there for a little while. To close my eyes for a few minutes and give in to the lull of sleep.
STAY AWAKE! a stern voice inside my head commands.
FOCUS!
I need to concentrate, because something’s not right.
My eyes strain to follow the trail of breath that billows out from my mouth, like a thin, white mist dancing in the dark night sky, before they settle on the plume of grey smoke.
For a second I don’t register where it’s coming from, because the air is so dense with smoke all around me, getting deep into my lungs, making me cough and splutter.
I hold my breath. Looking over towards the car, to where the tiny flames lick at the bonnet.
The car is on fire.
I need to move. I need to get as far away from here as possible.
Crawling again, scampering now across the grass in a bid to get away.
It’s too late for you… You’re already gone.
And I’m crying. Hysterical, because it’s all finally over.
But it all went so horribly wrong. I fucked up and I’ll never truly be free.
****
‘Rebecca!’
That sharp tone of voice pulls her back from her nightmares.
‘The cars on fire…’ Rebecca screams, incoherent, her body violently shaking and it takes her a few minutes to realise that it’s her voice she can hear cutting through the darkness.
‘He’s dead!’ she says before she can stop herself. Her eyes adjust to the blackness of the bedroom and she realises she’s no longer in bed. She’s standing by the window. The blinds are wide open and her fingers are curled around the window latch, as if she was trying to get out. Disorientated, she has no memory of how she got here.
But Jamie is standing at her side. His hand on her arm. ‘It’s okay,’ he reassures her, but his voice sounds emotionless, robotic almost. Because he’s done this before, a thousand times. Tried to talk her down from the terror of her nightmares. ‘No one’s dead, Rebecca. You were sleepwalking. It’s just another nightmare.’
Despite her hysterics, Rebecca catches the contemptuous tilt to his tone when he says the word another. Shaking his arm from her shoulders, she pulls away, aware that he’s had more than enough of her dramatics lately.
Breathe, Rebecca, she tells herself, trying to slow the erratic pounding of her heart. Lately her nightmares feel as if they are taunting her, coming every night now. As real and lucid as ever.
Breathe!
‘Ella? I need to check on Ella,’ Rebecca says instinctively, panic flooding through her, as the need to check her daughter’s safety consumes her.
‘Ella’s just fine. She’s sound asleep. I checked on her not even half an hour ago. Leave her to sleep. You need to get some sleep too,’ Jamie says, squeezing her arm a little too tightly.
She’s not sure if he’s giving her an order, or simply trying to reassure her, but either way she gives in to the warmth of his body next to her and allows him to guide her back to their bed.
She knows Jamie is right. Ella is fine and Rebecca should let the child sleep. She’d already disturbed Jamie enough tonight as it was. So she does as she’s told and slips back underneath the covers, pulling the blankets up around her. She’s shivering now, despite the fact that her skin is still clammy with perspiration. Grateful that the hammering inside her chest has gradually subsided.
‘They’re getting worse, Rebecca,’ Jamie says as he slides in next to her, and she hears the sharp intake of his breath. His tone stern. He’s lost patience with her.
‘You need to go and see someone. You need to get some help. What if you managed to unlock the window? What would have happened then?’
Rebecca nods, the movement concealed by the darkness, but she can’t find her words now. Because she knows Jamie is right. She is getting worse. Despite the medication the doctor gave her.
Nothing’s working.
She feels as if she’s completely losing all control. The panic attacks and the nightmares are getting worse. They had been every night since Ella had been born, she’s so sleep deprived that she’s physically exhausted by the morning.
And she’s losing Jamie now too, she can feel it. The huge void of separation that spans out between them.
Even now, as they lay together in the darkness, just inches from each other, the distance might as well be a million miles.
She feels him shuffle angrily onto his side, pounding the pillow with his fist in annoyance before pretending to fall back to sleep.
Only he isn’t asleep.
She can sense it. His body language giving him away as he lays still, rigid with resentment. Concentrating just a little too hard on his breathing. It’s stilted. But Rebecca knows that if she tries to reach out to him, he’ll feign tiredness and push her away again. Like he does most nights she reached out for him.
So instead she lies in silence, staring up at the ceiling and focusing on the thin stream of light coming in from the street outside, making its way through the gap Jamie had left when he’d pulled the curtains shut again. She tries to distract herself by following the twisted, contorted patterns as they span out across the ceiling.
But even that won’t shut the thoughts off inside her head.
Jamie’s constant rejection of her bringing out the parts of her she didn’t want to admit were still there. Making her feel so insecure and jealous all the time. Making her feel so paranoid that she’s not good enough.
Parts of her she’d thought she’d dealt with. That had been long buried.
This new perfect life was supposed to fix all of that.
Only, it wasn’t perfect at all. Unless you were on the outside and looking in.
Because that was all part of the illusion, wasn’t it? The big house, the fancy cars, the perfect little darling daughter.
The perfect couple.
But it’s all built on lies.
Rebecca had really thought that she could do this. That if she impersonated someone for long enough, eventually she’d become them.
Only she can’t seem to escape the real her.
She’s still in there. Inside of her. Hidden between the newly forming cracks, the old Rebecca is waiting to rear her ugly head again.
She’s scared.
Because she knows what she’s capable of, she knows what she’s done in the past in order to survive.
And maybe somehow Jamie senses it too. That deep down, there is something very wrong with her.
He knows he’s made a mistake and she’ll never be the woman he wanted her to be.
Chapter Fourteen
Gaslighting.
That’s what they call it, Rebecca.
The tactic when one person gains control over another by making them question their reality, their sanity.
But then you’d know all about that, wouldn’t you?
Creating realities that aren’t even real.
You’re a fucking expert at it.