Lucid Love

"Why are the stars green?" I say, looking up at the midnight blue sky. There are millions of green dots sprawled out, as if someone spilled a bottle of glitter over the heavens.

"Stars are always green," Riley replies absentmindedly. "Why do you ask?"

"I swear stars are, like, white... and yellow. But not green." I squint at the sky. "And if stars were green, wouldn't they be pretty green? Not like this pesto-coloured stuff."

"Don't worry," Riley says in a soft voice. My heart melts at his comforting tone, the one he always uses whenever I think something is strange or out of place--because something always is.

"Yeah, it's probably nothing," I agree. I swing my legs, feeling the breeze swirl around them like a soft blanket of air. "Maybe I should be going home," I say, worried. "My mother wants me home for dinner..."

Except the sky is such a dark blue, almost black. I must already be late.

"Stop worrying, Joelle," Riley says. He puts his hand on mine. His touch is different. Sometimes it's feather light, so light that I can barely even register that he's touching me--and sometimes it's pressing down on my hand so hard that I can think of nothing else. "You have all the time there is. You can never be late," he reassures me.

I glance over the cliff edge we're sitting on, to glance at the ocean. For a split second it seems to change colour, from blue to purple, and then goes slowly back again. But he's right; I never am late. I relax my shoulders.

A little while later he leaves me. I walk home. I seem to walk slow, then fast, then not walking at all. But soon I reach my bedroom--strangely, my parents aren't home--and collapse on the bed, closing my eyes and savouring the new memories I made this evening. They play through my mind, as if I'm living through them again, as vivid as if they just happened.

*

"I want to meet him," Mom says as she hands me a carrot to chop.

"Meet who?" I ask nervously.

"Riley," she answers.

I freeze. "Why do you want to meet him?" I try to say casually.

"He's all you ever talk about." Mom takes the pot of rice and drains it. "You keep talking about your dates on a... cliff?" She frowns. "I didn't know there was a cliff nearby here, come to think of it."

"It isn't only the cliff," I say. I chop the carrot into tiny squares. "We go to other places too... places in nature."

"Well, I'm sure you can manage a date here," Mom says. She smiles at me. "Why don't you invite him over for dinner tomorrow?"

I smile back and agree, but there's a sinking feeling in my chest. For some reason I want to keep Riley a secret.

*

"I can't," Riley answers immediately.

"Why not?" I say. I pick up a stone from the river and turn it over in my hands; we're in a forest today, lush greenery surrounding us. The smell of moss and earth reaches my nose as I breath it in. I've forgotten how we got here, but I don't care. All I know is that he told me he had the perfect spot he wanted me to see--and he's right. It's perfect.

"I'm busy tonight," he answers.

"Please? My mother wants to meet you," I press him. "It's just once."

"I can't," he says. I look up at his face, straining my neck--I don't remember him being so tall. I squint my eyes but I can't make out any of his features, as if there's a mist surrounding his face.

"I have to leave," he says, getting up. His hand slips away from mine and he disappears into the trees before I can call him back.

Upset and confused, I stare at my reflection in the water. I stifle a gasp. My face is twisted, angry, dark, like a monster. My eyes glow red and then fade to a sad blue, my hair turning stringy and my mouth turned downwards.

"Riley!" I cry out. I tear my eyes away from the water. "I don't know how to get home!" I let out a sob and collapse on the ground. How could he leave me? He said we would always be together, we have always been together, ever since my fifteenth birthday...

I open my eyes. The ground underneath me is soft. I'm inside my bed, wearing my pyjamas. I stare around at my bedroom. Did I faint? Did someone find me and bring me here?

I must have. Riley must have brought me back. I smile as I slide out of bed and change into a purple hoodie, pulling my long black hair into a ponytail. He didn't leave me after all.

But he doesn't come to dinner, and he doesn't come to take me on a walk that night. Instead I'm stuck outside my house, not able to move, just waiting for him.

*

"Joelle!" I hear him call on the fourth night of waiting. He's running to me, running down the street. He looks different--blocky, almost, as if he's not really there. But I know it's him. It has to be him.

"Riley! You're here!" I say, relieved, as I jump into his arms. But I can barely feel him, as if I'm desperately clutching thin air. My mind feels fuzzy and thick. It's always like that when we're together, like he's shaking me until my vision becomes blurry and my thoughts jumbled up into one big mess.

"Almost," he whispers, his voice barely a breath of air on my ear. "And not for long."

"What do you mean?" I say with a worried whimper as I pull back. "Aren't we going anywhere tonight?"

"One last time," he promises, and takes my hand. He clasps it tightly and leads me down the street. He jumps and I jump with him, and it's as if I step through a portal which leads to another world. We're inside a cave, a cave with glowing crystals. They change colour as I turn around, not allowing his hand to leave mine.

"Where are we?" I say. "How did you do that?"

"Do what?" Riley says. He sounds puzzled.

"How did you bring me to this cave so quickly?" I cry. I snatch my hand away from his and try to look at him, to truly look at him. His face is changing, his nose growing bigger and smaller, his eyes blue one moment and brown the next.

"I can do things," he said. His voice is different too--deeper, as if layered with wisdom. "Things that--that--that you can't understand..." and then he disappears entirely, into thin air.

I gasp and cry out as the cave walls collapse, the crystals shattering into thousands of pieces. They cut into my skin, landing on me, the rocky walls colliding into me as I slide, unconscious, onto the ground.

And then I'm in my bed again, safe and sound, my skin unmarked.

*

Another A+. Another perfect essay with perfectly structured sentences. "You're so smart," Mrs. Smith remarks as she hands me the paper. "One of my smartest students. Good job!"

I crumple the paper slightly in my hand and force it into my backpack as I walk back home. If I'm so smart, why couldn't I see it sooner? If I'm so smart, how could I not tell that the person I loved wasn't real? That he was merely a... dream?

I wasted my fifteenth birthday wish. Who wishes for love, anyway? I should've specified. But I didn't, and the only love I got was from someone who wasn't real, who visited me in my dreams every night to take me somewhere new.

I still try. I still stand outside my house every day and wait for him to come back, whether dreaming or not, but he never does. And I don't think he ever will.

*

"I still want to meet him," Mom tells me a few days later. "He never did come to dinner."

I bite my lip. "There's something I have to tell you," I whisper. I cover my mouth and try not to sob. I choke as the tears break free from my eyes and run down my cheeks.

Mom's eyes widen. She sets down her pen and draws me into her arms. "What is it, darling?" she says into my hair. I clutch her tighter, relieved to feel someone's arms--real, solid arms--holding me.

"He's not real, it was all a dream," I cry.

I try to explain, I try to tell her that the night after I made my birthday wish he came into my dreams and took me away to impossible places. But she only tightens her lips and looks away. "If you broke up over a silly argument, you can tell me," she says gently.

I only shake my head. She doesn't believe me. She never will.

I think this is something I have to keep to myself.

*

He might not have been real, but he was still mine. My person to take me away to places where stress and worries didn't exist. My person to comfort me whenever things were wrong. My person to love and hold when I felt lonely.

And I'll always be grateful that I had him--even if it was just for a little while.

*

"Joelle, right?" I look up from my desk where I'm clearing up after class. There's a girl standing beside me, with frizzy blond hair and sparkling hazel eyes.

"Yeah," I say, getting up. I grin at her. There's something about her face that makes me want to break into a smile. Maybe it's the way her eyes dazzle like bright lights, or maybe it's the way her eyes crinkle at the edges when she laughs.

"I'm Zoe," she says, holding out her hand. Her grasp is firm. "Wanna go for a walk?"

I laugh along with her and stand up, shouldering my yellow backpack. "Why not?" I say. We walk out together, into the crisp evening sunshine.

Maybe now that I'm free of Riley, I can be with others. Others that are real and who I can bring with me to meet my mother. As I gaze up into the cloudless sky I give him a silent thank you. Thank you for loving me when no one else would, I whisper in my head.

And as Zoe swings her arm around my shoulders I laugh out loud because I'm feeling something I haven't truly felt in my heart for a long time--happiness.