_{dream: noun.}

_{a succession of images, thoughts, or emotions passing through the mind during sleep.}

_{nightmare: noun.}

_{a terrifying dream in which the dreamer experiences feelings of helplessness, extreme anxiety, sorrow, etc.}

_{♟ — Chancing sleep was risk taken for the sake of both sanity and structural necessity. Only so much caffeine, adrenaline, and repetitions of the spray of crimson decorating her concrete grave would keep him awake — but, there came a point, always came a point, the weight on his lids, the pool of shade under his eyes forced him into repose upon his couch.}

         _{Rest never came easy, not anymore. From the moment his world relented into black, images painted his mind, his skull with her face. A face witnessed but once, and for but a painful breath of time, yet his memory drank in every crevasse, dip, elegant brush stroke of her countenance. She’s the most beautiful girl in the entire world for me.}

         _{Incomplete memories had a habit of filling in the blanks left open like gaping wounds — the more prominent of which being the feel of her delicate hand cradled in his own. To touch her, memorize every pulse, life line, precious bone that made up the voice that spared his worry on the opposite line of a coveted phone.}

         _{Somehow, however, when dream took him, he did not dare give into searing temptation, for return to a bitter reality seemed impossible. Better to observe from a distance. Leave the masterpiece of everything that formed Maeve Donovan free of his tainted hand, as if to admire her phantom a night longer.}

         _{Every passing night, the same, agonizing request. Dance with me, Spencer. Take my hand, dance with me, let me feel you with me. Every evening, through tears restricted behind failing flood gates, a curt refusal, and a jolt awake into a cold, caustic dark.}

         _{This reverie was altered, he felt it in his bones the moment he was claimed by silence. Guilt, darker than routine, painted the walls, his very lips and sight. Hung on his mind like the final words of a poet’s ink — deadly, quiet, and black.}

                       _{When she spoke, angels quite practically weeped.}

         _{And now, in this moment? He feared he partake, too.}

_{Will you kill yourself for her?}

                                                    _Yes!

          _{In disturbed slumber, he could feel his bones, and the sinew of his heart, tremble. The gaping window of despair at the core of his being, which threatened for weeks to swallow him hole, inched eagerly to the maw of his despair. Several fears, their latin origin, the definition and discussion, had flitted through his thoughts from time to time, but none so perilously fatal than the idea that —}

                                                               _no.

        _{Vein, brittle fingers twitched almost like fallen leaves of autumn, but were found too numb to navigate. Such hollowness swelled, scalded his tongue, arranged his scattered thoughts and concentrated them into one, vile form ———— the sincere disappointment, and loss in her tone.}

         _{❝Maeve—❞  The aftermath of an earthquake, his lip shuddered, ❝— you have to understand, I thought — I did all that was possible.❞} 

               _{you could have fought.}

                                    _{you could have won.}

                                                              _{then she would be here.}

         _{❝—— I followed every rule, pandered to every demand she presented — I even crafted what I thought to be the perfect lie, all to keep you safe — all to make sure nothing like this would happen… Had I have known —❞} 

         _{Breath rubbed his lungs ragged, clawed hungrily at his throat, ❝When she asked what I was willing to do, willing to give up for you — All of it was true. If the sacrifice of my life meant you would be granted just one more day alive, I wouldn’t have even thought about —— it…❞} 

         _{Try to stand up, fail, you’re trapped. ❝— Thomas Merton.” Try again, ❝Thomas Merton — you told her that was the one thing she couldn’t take from us… You looked me in the eye, provided me with one last promise before you were stolen from me for good —❞} 

                       _{❝… … Maeve, everyday my thoughts are filled with equations, and deductions, victim profiles, and pathologies — but nothing, no one crosses my mind more than you.❞} 

                                _{❝—— I’m sorry. More sorry than I have ever been, or will ever be, for any misdoing in my entire life.❞  Breathe, not possible. ❝I would do absolutely anything — give up whatever it took — for a chance at even minutely repaying you for the harm that I’ve caused —❞} 

       _{When his eyes flew open, the heave of his breath could be mistaken for the crash of an ocean’s kiss — for all that waited in his vision was the sting of water and cold.}

                     _{Farewell sleep; exhaustion seemed more welcoming.}