A not so sunny day, some time after the 8th March 2024

“It was just a dream. I promise.” Dad told Lily as he fumbled a dark, velvet scrunchy over her ponytail and held out his pinky finger for her.

She caught me staring and mistook the void in my eyes for jealousy. The way that only your seven-year-old sister could interpret a vacant look.

“Daddy and me share promises” she said triumphantly, climbing onto the chair at our breakfast bar. Just a box of Cheerios separated us. Her smile was so wide it almost seemed to stretch the gaps between her teeth.

I smiled back.

- - - - -

We would tell people it started that day. The eighth of March 2024. That’s what Dad and I thought. But it could have been earlier, much earlier.

Who knows what happiness Lily had brought to people’s live; how far her powers stretched. We didn’t think about that though. Never. When we look back, we only ever focused on the darkness of her dreams. How many of her playschool workers unwittingly appeared in them, and how many of them unwittingly disappeared from their jobs. Or worse.

It wasn’t worth speculating, though we often did when it came to mum. We tell people it began on the eighth of March 2024 because that’s when we were certain, but the first time could have been then. When the mum left us.

She upped and disappeared without so much as a note when I was Lily’s age. Lily was three. Four years later and no-one has heard from her. Not me, not dad, not nanna (on mum’s side), her best friends Grace and Karen were none the wiser, and the police – well – they “haven’t found due cause for concern.”

Some days speculating about mum could consume my every thought. I couldn’t help but need to know if it was possible. Anything was possible if this was, but I needed to know more. I read about anything connected.

Did you know that Babies start dreaming at a very early age, but pinpointing the exact time can be tricky? Newborns spend about 50% of their sleep time in REM (rapid eye movement) sleep, which is the stage most closely associated with dreaming. This high percentage of REM sleep suggests that even very young infants are likely dreaming, although their dreams are likely very different from those of older children and adults, given their limited experiences and developing cognitive abilities. As they grow, their dreams become more complex as their cognitive and sensory experiences expand.

- - - - -

Anyway, we both ate our Cheerios. On my side of the box, as always, things were calm and reasoned. I never put more than four loops on a spoon, no fewer than three. Accompanied by just the right amount of milk to wash them down, not too much that might risk overflow onto my chin or blouse.

South of the box, Lily had no routine. Sometimes there must have been fourteen plus Cheerios on her one little spoon, other times it would be nothing but milk. But she seemed unfazed, unknowing, unaware. It’s a miracle that despite all the slurps and spillages onto the counter, she had a relentless ability to walk away from breakfast each day looking cleaner (and I do mean both her face and her clothes) than she did when she sat down.

- - - - -

“It's 08:02 girls. Get moving.” came Dad's customary shout from the bathroom as he combed his hair.

08:05 was when the school bus would stop outside little Bobby Hawke’s house, just over the road from us. Little Bobby was actually a year older than me. And he wasn’t exactly little.

“Eight-oh-three now” I sighed, grabbing mine and Lily’s book bags, heading for the door. We said our usual goodbyes and see you laters to dad.

Sunshine gleaming through the trees, we cross the road.

Still at 08:03 (I told you it was literally just a stone's throw away), Bobby was milling around like normal as we arrived at the bus-stop. A couple of other kids from the street joined us at the same time too; Max and Rosie Dymaline. None of us really talked in or out of school. Max might have been the year above Lily. I had no idea about Rosie. Between the five of us we shared familiar nods and half smiles as our earphones played often different, yet sometimes the same, music.

08:05. We’re still waiting. Nothing new there to be honest.

08:07. Still nothing.

08:10. “We didn’t miss it, did we?”  I was thinking about getting to class in time to read the end of the Krissy Blair book I’d been working my way through. Reading on the bus makes me feel sick.

“Definitely not. I’ve been out here since 07:50.”

“Cool, thanks.”

I was still thinking about the book when Bobby’s mum came running out onto her porch and beckoned for him to go inside. In fact, she yelled at us all to ask if our parents were home, and for us to go back and tell them to put on the local news.  There was something in the tone of her voice which meant I didn’t feel the need to question it for a second.

I grabbed Lily by the wrist and scooted across our front lawn. We made it inside just as daddy was putting his jacket on. I explained what Mrs Hawke had told us to do.

With a "I don't have time for this" frustration, and a "Why aren't you on the way to school?" he trudged into the living room. Reluctantly curious, the three of us stood in front of the TV.

I brought up the guide.

“Channel 601.”

“I know.”

6 – 0 – 1 – Enter.

The picture changed.

08:12 on the Local News.

My vision narrowed like that time I got the BCG vaccine injection at school and almost fainted. Everything felt slow and the news reporter’s voice sounded like it was underwater.

- - - - -

08:13

Dad and I stood just stood there. I was in disbelief. I’d hesitate to guess he was no different.

I tried to shake it off, but my body and mind is still somewhat comatose, and I’m forced to remember back to moments before I started eating my Cheerios. I overheard her talking to him. Her little, mousey voice describing it; her words running faster than her brain could keep up with.

“The school bus – the driver was a different man – with a beard and sunglasses – it wasn’t Mr Kennedy – and he was bad – he was driving over people – and laughing like this, mwahaha–”

Dad had cut her off. For no reason other than to be a good dad and to make sure we weren’t going to be late for school.

“It was just a dream. I promise.”

- - - - -

I turned off the TV.

I think Dad went to say something, but I don’t think he could find the right words. Or maybe I was just stuck and oblivious, my mind only on Lily.

“I did that? With my dream? Didn’t I?”  an innocence in her voice, the type of innocence you can only see and feel when it’s your seven-year-old, motherless sister.

- - - - -

So, that was the day we tell people it started.

Eighth of March 2024.

8 fatalities. 27 further casualties.

The day my sweet, little sister – deep-purple scrunchy wearing Lily O’Mahony - smiled so wide that she knocked the vacant look off my face and replaced it with permanent, unadulterated fear.

She did that with her dream. And she loved it.