When Your Own Dream Traps You

By: Suzie Park

    I looked up at the stars.

    “Are you sure we are going the right way, Kelly?"

    "I don't know, but I think this is the right way."

    Kelly and I had taken a walk through a forest and ended up losing track of where we were. We walked more deeper into the forest as the sky darkened, hoping to find something or someone to help us.

    "It's getting late."

    "There's a house over there. If there's anyone in there, we should ask for help and a night stay. I'm tired. Maybe we can ask for food too."

    "Okay."

    The two of us walked over to the house. The lights seemed to be on, but no sound the house made. Kelly knocked on the door.

    "Excuse me?" No one answered. She put her hand on the door to knock on it again when the door opened by her hand's weight. We looked at eachother.

    The door was unlocked.

    Inside we saw a bed, angel wing blankets and fluffy pillows. We checked around the house. Nobody was there. I sat on the bed.

    "Are you sure we can sleep here tonight?"

    "Of course! It would be a nice place to stay for the night at least." Kelly jumped on the bed after kicking off her shoes. She laid on the bed and closed her eyes. I suspiciously took off my shoes and laid beside Kelly.

    "Good night, Lila."

    "Good night."

    And then with that, we fell asleep in the bed, and without seeing the broken "WARNING, DON'T SLEEP ON THE BED" that had been laid on the floor from the owner who abandoned this house because of this bed.

    Then, magical steam rose up from the bed and swallowed us two both.

* * *

    "Mmmmm, mhmhm."

    "Wake up Lila!" I quickly sat up and looked around. We were at the airport. Or it looked like it. It was most likely a school, a school that was an airport.

    "What in the world happened?!"

    "It was probably the bed that we slept on. We didn't do anything but sleep-"

    "Wait, this place looks familiar."

    "Huh? You do? Where are we then?"

    "I-I dreamed of this place last night or tonight. I don't know what to call it." Kelly's eyes widened.

    "You've got to be kidding me."

    "No, I'm serious. Also, we are students of this school so we need to act normal. And then there is a break time so we can find someone to help us.

    "Can't make something out of nowhere if it's your dream?" I shrugged. I closed motioned on the air.

    Suddenly, a piece of candy appeared and landed in my hands. Our eyes widened.

    "Oo-kay. It's almost time for school to start."

    "But Lila, we don't have our stuff." Suddenly, a backpack appeared on their backs.

    "Let's go." Kelly sighed and followed after her.

    "Uh huh, yes yes, of course. Is everyone here?" The teacher asked.

    "That's our main teacher Mrs. Duvernay. We need to find the oneirology teacher."

    "The one, what?"

    "The oneirology teacher, Mr. Woodhouse who teaches theories of dreams. He is the only one that knows everything. Excuse me Mrs. Duvernay?"

    "Yes, what is it?"

    "What time do we have oneirology?"

    "After lunch. Now now. We need to get started. We will start attendance. Richard?"

    "Here."

    "Grenna?"

    "Here."

    Kay, then we will have to wait through math class and history class so that we can get to oneirology class.

    "Ethan?"

    "Here."

    "David W.?"

    "Absent."

    "Kelly?"

    "Oh um, here."

    "August?"

    "Here."

    When is this line ending?

    "Ivy?"

    "Here."

    "Patrick?"

    "H-here."

    "David H?

    "He's absent."

    "Lila?"

    "Here."

    "Ernesto?"

    "Mrs. Duvernay, he moved to another school."

    "Oh yes yes, I forgot to mark that. Olivia?"

    "Here."

    "Avery?"

    "Absent."

    "Felix?"

    That hit me. I twisted myself to see him sitting six feet ahead of me. Felix had beautiful round eyes and curly brown hair. He was staring at me.

    "Here."

    It's him! I made him! I remember making him look like that!

    "Okay, we need to get started. Ethan, come up and solve this first math problem that was for homework."

* * *

    "It's now time for lunch. Go to the food court and get the food you want."

    "Food court?" Kelly whispered into her ear. I nodded, embarrassed.

    "It was something I really wanted in a school." We both walked out of the line and went to the oneirology room.

    "So you finally came, Kelly and Lila." Felix said. He was with Mr. Woodhouse.

    "Yeah, Mr. Woodhouse, and Felix."

    "How did you know we were coming?" I waved my hands in Kelly's face.

    "Well, I created him to know everything so…"

    "Kay, then he would know how to get us out of here."We both waited for his answer.

    "There are three orbs around the school that were created when you came into this world. If you get at all three orbs, you may leave this world."

    "Where are they?"

    "I cannot tell you."

    "Can you help us at least?"

    "I am sorry, but you have to do it on your own. If I was allowed, I would. Instead, Felix will help you." He did a fancy bow.

    "At your service."

    "So, what if we get back to the real world?"

    "No time would be passed."

    "Okay, but do we have to keep this secret?"

    "Yes, don't ever mention that to others or it might get a little harder for you to find them."

    "Okay, thank you Mr. Woodhouse."

    "My pleasure."

    Kelly and I walked out with Felix.

    "Are you guys hungry?" Before I could say, no, Kelly ran to the food court.

    "O-okay. So, I wanted to talk to you for a while, Lila." 

    "Okay, so what?"

    "Why did you make me like this?" I blushed.

    "Umm, so, uh, yeah, so umm…"

    "Hello? I'm being serious here. Tell me why."

    "So yeah. The plot of this dream is that we basically live at this airport! There are dorms, food courts-"

    "No! Why did you make me into 'Felix'?"

    "Uh, 'cause there has to be a main character in every story? I just wanted to make a perfect main character for once. All my dreams have the main characters suffer, or have difficulty." He rolled his eyes.

    "Yeah right."

    Just then, I saw something at the corner of my eye, something shining.

    I squinted my eyes and saw that it was a yellow orb. It was on someone's bracelet, who was walking away fast.

    "Come on Felix. We have to get that orb on the person's bracelet-" Then, he grabbed my wrist.

    "Wait, we got to be careful. You know sometimes you can't control your dreams sometimes? Then that's a dray. Stray dream. That's where the orbs are placed. The one in the bracelet is probably a monster, maybe worse a devil." I gulped and nodded. Felix took the lead, acting as nothing happened.

    "Hi August. Can we talk to you for a sec?"

    "Oh, yeah. Sure." They walked with August to the storage room and closed the door. Felix and I had eye contact, and took action.

    "Oh, your bracelet looks nice. Can I try it on?" August narrowed her eyes.

    "How about no?"

    "Then we will just take a look at it." August took a step back.

    "This is mine."

    Then, she turned into this huge monster, ripping the top of the storage. People outside went running and screaming everywhere. I snapped and the people calmed down. Soon, they didn't even flinch when August, or the monster, started roaring.

    "That should keep them quiet!" I yelled over August's cries.

    "We need some weapons!" I snapped and some laser guns appeared. We grabbed two each; one in each hand. August roared louder so that the whole building trembled.

    "Distract him while I try to get the orb!"

    "No one runs away from me!" I ran behind her and Felix began to shoot the monster with his laser guns, aiming the bracelet which had gotten bigger too. Most of them she blocked with her other hand but was too distracted that she didn't notice me climbing up her back. As I got on her shoulder, August noticed me ready to shoot the bracelet.

    "No!" August smacked her shoulder, but it was too late. I jumped up from her shoulder and fired a round of lasers and the bracelet broke. August returned to a normal girl that walked away and the bracelet landed in Felix's hand which returned to normal. He separated the orb and the bracelet after he dropped his laser guns. The orb disappeared in his hands.

    "One done, two to go." I high fived him.

    "All students of Mrs. Duvernay, report to the oneirology classroom." He blinked at me.

    "We need to go. Come on." I nodded. Together we walked into Mr. Woodhouse's classroom for another exciting class.

* * *

    "Phew, finally out of class. Hey Lila, wasn't oneirology too fun?"

    "Oh, that's what I made it to be. A fun class. So this is the saying dream come true. It seems that people think Mr. Woodhouse's theory about dreams are."

    "Yeah."

    We were walking around the corner when we heard some students chatter by.

    "Did you see the new statue that was installed in the lobby today?"

    "Of course! I remember that it is a statue of a phoenix, and it has a golden crown on it!"

    "I wish I could just have the blue orb on it, so pretty!" We looked at each other.

    "Hey Ivy!" She turned around.

    "Yeah?"

    "The statue that you guys were talking about, where is it?"

    "Well, the ninth lobby on the second floor. You have to take two rights and then go forward, then go two left, then go one to the right. You can't miss it. Take an escalator over there to the second floor." Ivy pointed at the escalator.

    I pulled Kelly down the escalator and all the way to the ninth lobby. I saw the statue, probably made out of marble. I started to climb the statue.

    "Hey young lady! You shouldn't climb that!"

    "Lila, it's the vice principal!" I snapped and Mrs. Hendricks became quiet and ignored me. I tried to pull it out, but it refused to move.

    "It's stuck!"

    "Then use like, a crowbar or something!" I was about to snap when the statue moved. Kelly's face became pale.

    "Lila, get off there!" Before I could react, the statue threw me off. I hit a pillar and passed out.

    "Lila!"

    "Mhmhhmm?" I woke up, seeing the blue orb in Felix's hand. It disappeared from his hand.

    "What happened?"

    "Felix came and got the orb for us. He said that it was a devil so it was harder to defeat."

Anyway, are you okay?"

    "I'm fine, thanks to Kai. It could've been worse." He shrugged.

    "Now we have one more orb to find in order to go home!" Felix looked down.

    "Is there something you are hiding from me, Felix?" He looked away.

    "Felix please-" the bell rang.

    "I guess we'll find out later. Come on, Lila!" Kelly pulled me to the next class. I went limp and let Kelly pull me around this time.

    He's definitely hiding something.

    During class, I was called to Mr. Woodhouse's office. Not with Kelly, not with Felix, just me. He was getting a break because he didn't have a class at the time.

    "Ah, so you have come. "

    "Of course. How could I ignore your call?"

    "Mhm. Anyway, I am going to warn you, the last dray that possesses the orb, is not a dray. It was purposely set here by you. It will be the hardest fight then ever. Have you understood?" I swallowed.

    "Y-yes sir."

    "Good off you go." I walked away. Mr. Woodhouse sighed.

    "For the greatest weapon is love, and it is very dangerous. I hope you will handle it well, Lila." He said, and sure enough, he was right again.

    When class was over, we had to go to our dorms. I was getting my backpack when Felix came out of the classroom.

    "Hey Lila, can you get my backpack?"

    "Okay." I grabbed his backpack a little too hard that a red, round sphere fell out. His eyes widened and picked it up quickly.

    "F-felix, was that what I think it was?"

    "I-I can explain this."

    "Just give me the orb, Felix!"

    "Wait Lila!" Kelly pulled me back from lunging at him.

    "Let's hear him out first." I sighed and nodded.

    "What is it?" He squeezed his eyes tight, then opened them.

    "I-I like you!" I blushed. He ignored me and continued.

    "Ever since you came here, I can't take my eyes off of you. When I heard that you have to leave, I thought everything in my life was falling apart. I gathered all three orbs to hide them from you, but I lost two of them. I didn't want you to leave." His eyes changed color.

    "And you won't. Or I'll make you." He changed into a horrible-looking monster. He was the same size, but looked scary at the same time. I moved away as he shot a fireball at me. He's doing this for me? I didn't even think he would. To be honest, I didn't want to leave either. I wanted to stay with Felix too. But I couldn't stay here forever. I needed to see my friends and my family again.

    "Felix! Please stop!"

    "Promise that you will never leave and I will turn back."

    I was so afraid that he had gone mad. I ran up to him and begged that he would stop, but he pushed me away. I kept trying and trying until he got too annoyed.

    "Enough!" Felix punched me in the ribs and I flew into the air. I landed with a thump.

    "Lila!" Kelly ran to me and put me in her lap.

    "What have to become, Felix? Look at what you have done." He looked at his hands.

    "What am I doing?" He backed away from us, afraid to hurt us more. I stood up holding my stomach and walked towards him. Kelly grabbed my wrist.

    "Don't. I don't want you to get more hurt than you already are." I looked at her sadly and pulled away.

    "Please, go away. Here is the orb, please leave!" He rolled the orb to me. I ignored it as it rolled to Kelly. I looked at his fingers. The nails had become black and much longer than usual. He had sharp fangs with glowing red eyes. Wings had sprouted from his back. It would be impossible to approach him if you didn't know who he was.

    "What are you-" I put my lips against his and closed my eyes. He stopped and hugged me. Kelly was about to yell my name before she saw that I didn't want to be disturbed. At last, I saw his form returning as a normal student again. He let me go, his eyes now back to the copper brown ones I loved looking into.

    "Felix, I-"

    "No need to tell me. You can go…" he smiled.

    "But promise you will come visit me everyday in your dreams." I nodded. I waved my and a capsule with two seats appeared. The three orbs melted out of Felix's body and formed two necklaces. They had blue sapphire, red ruby, and yellow topaz pieces hanging from it.

    "Now, put the necklaces on. As long as you have them, then you can come back." I rested my head on his shoulder.

    "I'll see you tomorrow." He nodded.

    "Yeah. I will prepare something for you."

    "I can't wait." I squeezed his hand and boarded the capsule and put on my seat belt and waved to Felix. He waved back.

    "Won't you miss him?" I sighed.

    "I will, until I meet him again." I snapped, and we shot out of my dreamland.

* * *

    "I gotta go, fast!" I ran into the forest. The night was falling quick.

    "Where is it, oh there!" I ran to the house and opened the door. The regular bedroom was waiting for me. I sat down on the bed, kicked out my shoes, and laid down. I closed my eyes, squeezing my necklace light.

    Wait for me, Felix, I thought before I got sucked into the bed.

    I opened my eyes, seeing Felix in front of me in a beautiful pasture.

    "Felix, is this what you wanted to show me?"

    "No, this-" He snapped and a multitude of stars spread out before me. "-is what I wanted to show you." I gasped.

    "Felix, I don't know what to say."

    "Don't say it." He looked into my eyes.

    "I already know what you want to say." I saw the stars twinkle in the sky.

    "It's beautiful."

    "I know."

    We laid down on the grass hoping this moment will last forever.

The End