Disclaimer: this is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to people, places or events is unintentional.
Content warning: This story explores themes of internalised homophobia and mortality.
Nightmares Before Chris' Mass Chapter VII
AWAKENING
Chris stirred and turned his head.
He ached, but didn't feel any real pain. When Chris tried to move, his arms and legs responded as if he were merely waking up from a long nap rather than a two month coma.
Henry was on his right hand side, his face resting on the bed beside Chris's arm. The looked at each other, then Henry looked at the man on the other side. Chris's dad.
"Thank you," Chris whispered.
"I didn't really do anything, you know," Henry confided.
"Thanks anyway," Chris replied.
Henry stood up to leave him alone with his dad who any moment now would rouse and discover his son was awake, alert and ready to talk. Henry closed the door silently behind him; he didn't want anyone seeing Chris was awake until he was ready.
Chris's dad was at his left side; sleeping in the chair beside Chris's bed with his feet on the edge of the bed in a way he was sure the nurses would disapprove of. Now that Chris was awake, the old fear and shame loomed over him, but accepting his fear didn't mean it went away. That was the most important thing Chris learned – what all of Mr Summer's nightmare victims learned.
Accepting he was gay, Chris still felt anxiety about admitting it to others.
Dante still feared the consequences of accepting amputation and would have to live with the outcome.
Andrew's dysmorphia hadn't evaporated after admitting his body image issues.
Quinn was still scared of being bullied and treated like an easy target.
Leroy was still worried his life would be filled with prejudice and losing respect or status.
Logan still worried if his dad would be disappointed in him; would his dad's acceptance of him not studying medicine translate into pride in the alternative?
Henry was still insecure about loneliness, abandonment and failure.
Jack... ... ...
Chris lifted his dad's phone which was on the bed beside his hand:
08:19
Mon, 18th Dec.
"Dad?" Chris said. "Dad."
Chris reached out and nudged his dad's foot.
Sebastian Booth stirred, opened his eyes, blinked and then gasped with surprise and joy.
"Chris? Oh, Chris, you're awake!" his dad cried out delightedly.
Sebastian jumped to his feet so he could wrap his arms around his son and hold him. His eyes were filled with tears of joy, because he had never been a man afraid to show his feelings. Sebastian kept looking at Chris's face as if fearing it wasn't real. Chris knew what his dad was thinking.
"I'm awake, dad. It's not a dream," Chris said and he almost laughed.
"I'll get the doctor," Sebastian broke away.
Chris grabbed his hand, stalling him.
"Just wait. Dad, wait!" Chris pleaded.
The man looked at his son, his heart overflowing with love and relief.
"I need to tell you something. I really need to tell you and I need to tell you now," Chris said urgently.
Sebastain looked at his son whose face was writ with worry and listened to his voice that was filled with apprehension. Sebastian thought he knew what his son was going to say. He had hoped Chris would say it months ago.
"I'm gay, dad," Chris confessed.
It felt good to say it in reality. It wasn't really that bad now that he said it.
"Oh," Sebastian replied.
"I'm sorry," Chris added automatically.
He knew that faith could make people think and feel certain things about confessions like his.
"Bless me father for I have sinned..." Chris began to say.
"I love you, Chris," Sebastian interrupted. "I'm glad you told me. It's ok, son. It's ok."
The man knelt beside the bed, holding his son's hand and smiling warmly. Chris felt his head sink into the pillow with relief. He had been prepared to make a confession, but he hadn't been prepared for his dad to be so... dad about it. He had assumed his father's vocation would have compelled confession and contrition; perhaps it was always just Chris and his own feelings that had driven his misery.
"You can tell me anything, Chris," Sebastian said.
Chris thought about telling his dad the truth about the nightmares and where he had been trapped all this time; about knowing of the past and Mr Summer's abuse of Sebastian and his friends twenty years ago. Maybe one day Chris would tell him, but not today.
"Dad, there's someone I need to see..." Chris said.
The thing is, short of physically restraining Chris, the nursing and medical staff couldn't actually stop him from getting up and out of bed half an hour after waking from a seven week coma. They were unsettled by the fact Chris could even stand; his muscles as strong as if he had never stopped.
It didn't really make sense.
Chris knew what they didn't though. That he had been running and swimming and walking and thinking in the hypnoscape and it had imprinted on reality. Or something like that.
"His name is Jack Miller," Chris said tersely.
"I can't just go giving out patient details to a random kid who's just woken up," the nurse said again.
Chris realised he didn't actually know where Jack was in the hospital, but try as he might no-one would give him details because he wasn't family and he was himself a patient who had just recovered from a coma. He was still wearing a hospital gown.
"Chris?" Logan said.
Chris turned to see Logan and threw himself at the young man, wrapping him in a friendly hug.
"Wow, do we hug now? Are you a hugging person?" Logan asked.
"Not usually, no," Chris admitted with blushing cheeks.
Chris dragged Logan away from the nurses station and back towards his room. He didn't want anyone overhearing them. Chris's dad was on the phone to his mom, who would be rushing to see him. His dad took it on faith (so to speak) that there was something Chris needed to do.
"You faced your fear. You broke the world when you did," Chris told Logan. "Mr Summer was furious."
Logan nodded his understanding.
"I decided to tell my dad the truth," Logan replied. "Once I did that, I broke free. It didn't hang over me anymore."
"How did he take it?" Chris asked.
"Dad was happy I told him instead of spending $200,000 on a career I don't want," Logan responded.
"He took it pretty well then?" Chris asked hopefully.
"He wants to know what I plan to do instead," Logan answered honestly.
Chris looked at him expectantly.
"Oh, I don't know," Logan laughed. "Yea, that made him madder than me wanting to quit medicine."
Logan laughed again and his smile was wonderful. Chris felt embarrassed he was checking the guy out so shamelessly – was that a double negative? – and accepted he would need to work on those internal conflicts.
"You must have faced your fear too?" Logan asked.
"I finally admitted I like guys," Chris said.
"Cool!" Logan supportively.
"My dad is calling my mom and there's going to be a special mass..." Chris told his friend.
It was less than a week until Christmas. It was already a special mass. Chris looked back at the obstructive nurse who wasn't there – they had gone back to work.
"Where is he?" Chris changed the subject.
"Dante?" Logan asked. "He's on the third floor..."
"Not Dante! Jack," Chris interrupted. "I need to find him."
Logan's eyes knitted with sadness.
"Is he dead?" Chris asked.
Time was a funny thing. Time in the dream world and in reality didn't quite match. How long had passed since he said goodbye to Jack? Minutes or hours?
"It's why I came to check on you. I hoped you had gotten out before it happened," Jack answered.
"Tell me where he is, Logan," Chris said.
THE BEGINNING AND THE END
Chris stood outside the private room. It had opened twice as grieving family members left. Chris didn't know any of them, but he could tell a grieving mother and father when he saw them. Friends too. Jack had been loved.
"I think it's just Jeremy now," Logan said.
Chris didn't say anything.
"You want me to come with you?" Logan offered.
"No," Chris shook his head but wasn't sure if he'd actually spoken.
Chris walked towards the door and held the handle...
It felt strange. It was less than an hour since Chris had turned the handle on the red and green door, leaving the hypnoscape and Mr Summer's nightmare trap. Chris turned the handle and eased the door open.
A man was sitting beside the bed with his back was to the door. His head was bowed and was holding the hand of the man in the bed. Seeing him... hurt Chris... he felt tears in his eyes, his vision blurring. Chris blinked them away and wiped his face.
Jack was so small; his skin was porcelain and he looked cold, his chest was still, his body rigid, his face waxy, his mouth slack and his eyes were closed.
Chris had never seen a dead body before, but it was unsettling that he could tell life was extinct in so many different ways.
"Are you..." Chris said in a pathetic voice.
The grieving man beside the bed looked over his shoulder.
"Sorry," Chris sobbed.
Jack's husband, Jeremy, didn't recognise the kid in a hospital gown, but he recognised grief.
"Are you ok, kid?" Jeremy asked. "Do we know you?"
We? It was so sad. There wasn't a we anymore. There was no Jack & Jeremy.
"I knew Jack," Chris replied.
Jeremy just nodded.
"Can I... do you mind if I stay for a minute," Chris asked.
The nurses would ask them to leave soon, Jeremy knew. Chris sat in a chair on the opposite side of the bed. Jack was between them.
"How did you know Jack?" Jeremy asked.
"I met him here once upon a time," Chris said vaguely. "He was kind to me."
"That sounds like him," Jeremy replied affectionately.
"He told me how you met in ninth grade," Chris said.
"Did he?" Jeremy chuckled with melancholy.
"Holding hands in art class," Chris continued.
Jeremy's eyes brightened at the citation of the story. That was how they met, more or less. That was the beginning.
"He told you how we met? Did he tell you how it ended?" Jeremy asked weakly.
Chris didn't know what he meant.
"The last time we talked..." Jeremy said. "I told him I had to go and he asked me not to."
Chris sat quietly because he knew when someone had to unburden themselves.
"I was tired and I wanted a proper sleep in my bed, so... I went home..." Jeremy said.
Chris didn't say anything, he waited for the rest to come.
"When I came back, he was asleep," Jeremy continued. "And he never woke up again. I've sat... here... hoping..."
It was hard for Jeremy to say it.
Chris couldn't help but feel there was an irony to Jeremy unburdening his fear and guilt so easily. Jack would have been proud.
"I didn't know he wouldn't wake up. I never got the chance to tell him..." Jeremy lamented.
Jeremy knew there were too many things; too many things he wanted to say and now he couldn't.
"He knew you loved him," Chris said earnestly.
"I know. But I wanted to tell him," Jeremy replied miserably.
"Near the end, he told me things about you," Chris began. "He said, I reckon he'll stay with me until the end. That he'd love until the day..."
Chris couldn't say, "until the day that I die," but Jeremy understood.
"You must have been a good friend for him to say something like that," Jeremy admitted.
"His worst fear was not getting to say goodbye. Not of dying, but of not getting to tell you goodbye," Chris confided.
Just like Jermey regretted not saying a final goodbye.
"I think I'd like to be alone now," Jeremy said.
"He ran out of time to tell you all the things he wanted to say," Chris persisted. "If it had been otherwise, he wouldn't have waited so long... If it had been otherwise."
The paraphrasing of their favourite book leapt out at Jeremy, leaving him shocked, but deeply touched. Chris stood up to respect Jeremy's wishes of wanting to be alone.
"He wanted you to know..." Chris told the young man. "You were the last dream of his soul."
SUNDAY 31ST DECEMBER
THE NIGHTMARE SOCIETY
"I mean, honestly, it just sounds like we're a group of people who are difficult to get along with," Quinn commented to the group and then turned to Chris to add; "No offense, man."
The group laughed and Chris glared in good humour and the jab.
The Nightmare Society was like a self-help group for Henry, Andrew, Leroy, Chris, Quinn, Dante and Logan. They shared thoughts and feelings and ideas about everything that had happened and supported each other in the aftermath. For the group who had been stalked by Mr Summer at Halloween, the experience felt a long time ago, but for Chris, Dante and Logan less than two weeks had passed since the nightmares ended.
Dante was out of hospital and using crutches to get around. The pain was bearable, his post-op recovery had been perfect and he was waiting for a prosthetic in the new year. Dane hadn't anticipated or planned on seeing anyone again, but his brother Christo had started dating Logan who insisted he come along.
They were a cool bunch really.
Logan was still working as a medical assistant until he decided what to do instead of medicine. It was a good job that offered a good foundation for a whole host of degrees and careers. His dad was helping (pestering) him to think about his new path.
Chris had made friends of Henry and Quinn, which he knew would cause a stirring of rumours once school restarted after the holidays. Chris had come out to his mom and dad, but it didn't mean he wanted a coming out party at school. Chris had also confided in Andrew and Leroy; as heterosexuals, classmates and sportsman, they're reaction was a litmus test. They weren't really bothered.
It was strange to have gay friends. Chris had never really had a friendship group at school; he was known for being surly and distant. Chris was friendly with people at school, but didn't have friends who he hung out with. He never realised how lonely it was. Henry and Quinn were a hoot.
"Same time next week?" Dante asked as he hobbled to his foot.
Dante was calling time to the meeting.
"Or next month," Dante added. "Maybe annual meetings?"
They really hadn't made a schedule as such. The victims of Mr Summer just wanted each other to know they had a place to go to if they needed to talk. Logan had driven Dante there and planned to see Christo later so he left with Dante.
Andrew and Leroy had a New Years Eve football game to go to so off they went.
Henry and Quinn offered to show Chris how to find the best free gay porn, but he decided to pass on that.
Chris went for a walk instead, but took great care when crossing the road.
Chris entered the cemetery without really thinking about it; Jack was still on his mind and Chris wondered if there would ever be a time when he didn't think about his friend. Chris stopped at a bench and sat down. He'd make his way home soon, but the cemetery was a peaceful place where he could contemplate life.
"Do you mind if I sit?"
Chris looked up to see a young man in his mid-twenties. He was handsome and well-built with dark hair and nice eyes.
"Sure," Chris replied.
The young man sat down, but didn't say anything.
"Are you... visiting someone?" Chris asked awkwardly.
Visiting? Remembering? Showing respect?
"No. I mean, not really," the young man replied. "My dad was from West Raven, but he's gone now."
"I'm sorry to hear that," Chris offered sincerely. "When did he pass?"
"Not sure," the young man replied and chuckled at how that must have sounded. "I mean, my mum and I left when I was a baby so I don't remember him. I think he died here."
"It must be tough not knowing," Chris replied.
The young man nodded in agreement.
"I started having dreams about him," the young man said with embarrassment. "Do you think dreams have meaning?"
Chris nearly laughed.
"I think so, yea," Chris admitted.
"Me too," the young man agreed. "I'm Jason, by the way. Jason Winters."
"Chris Booth," he replied and they shook hands.
"I'm sorry if I intruded," Jason said.
"No, you didn't. I was thinking about a friend who passed recently," Chris confided.
"Oh, are you ok?" Jason asked.
Chris thought about the answer before replying. He hadn't really thought about it. After months of nightmares, struggling to accept himself, and losing his friend... was he ok?
"Yea. Yea, I'm ok," Chris replied.
"Thanks for letting me sit," Jason said as he stood up.
"I hope you find him," Chris offered. "Your dad, I mean."
"A man can dream," Jason replied amiably.
As Jason walked along the path, he looked at the gravestones and the names engraved on them: Craven, Romero, Carpenter, Rami, Cronenberg, Peele...
Names were funny things, Jason thought. Take his name: Jason Winters. Except his mom had changed it when they left West Raven to protect them from the stain of his father's surname which was a completely different season of the year.
Summer became Winter.
Well, a man can dream...
END OF CHAPTER VII
THE END!
Thank you to everyone who read this story and my stories throughout the year. I'd be delighted to hear from more readers.
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