Her Nightmare Walks

         She exhaled and smoke curled through the air around Hale’s fingers as she stared at the gold token in her left hand. Shiny and smooth, it was clearly some kind of metal covered in gold paint to give the appearance of being real. She doubts it managed to fool anyone. Her thumb ran over the raised letters that spelled out 6 months sober. Even though it’d been a year since Avery emptied their two-bedroom apartment of alcohol, it’d only been six months since Hale had touched a drink. Six months since she last drank. Six weeks since her last therapy appointment, where she hated to admit she was making progress. Six days since her last mild anxiety attack. It was very mild compared to the ones she’d had before. Avery and her therapist would probably attribute it to stress. 

The only habit that Hale refused to kick was smoking. James had quit a couple of years ago and kept after her to follow his lead, suggesting that the nicotine patches at Wal-Mart could help tremendously. One day she’d probably give in to him. Her uncle had a pull on her and he knew it. For now, she had to keep one of her coping mechanisms. Just in case those difficult grounding exercises she practiced in therapy decide to not work when she needs them.

It was still plenty light out; that time in summer when the direct sunlight had disappeared and taken the heat of the day with it. It was Hale’s one day off of work and she ended up at an AA meeting and then the park. Will would be off soon, and then they were supposed to meet here. Avery’s birthday was in a couple of weeks and they had planning to do. Avery would probably find out about said plans, but maybe one of these years they would manage to surprise them. 

No night shift at the downtown bar that she had worked at for years. It was a bad environment to try the whole sober thing in, and it made her paranoia go through the roof being surrounded by a bunch of people in very low light. She did miss the tips though. 

Putting the cigarette to her mouth she glanced at the sound of a dog barking and took a few minutes to watch. A man was running through some tricks and now there was a full-grown German Shepherd sitting at his feet. Hale wanted a dog, but the apartment they lived in was pet-free. She let herself watch the pair, the dog doing some commands and fetching when the man threw something for him. She watched and smoked and let the park fall away from her focus. She was fairly assured that it would stay empty the way it had been, with it being a Wednesday night. This was Hale’s mistake.

A hand reached around and grabbed her still-lit cigarette from between her fingers. It happened quickly enough that by the time she had turned to find who it was, they had already stepped around the bench to stand in front of her. Her eyes focus on the man, with his dark hair, sharp angles, and nightmare smile. The face of a man who should be dead. Her breath catches as the reality of who she is seeing sets in. 

The cigarette drops from his, from Oliver’s, fingertips before he crushes it under his foot. 

She shot him—multiple times—and here he is standing in front of her somehow. Her mind blanks and her body screams at her to run. She turns to do so only to find another familiar figure sitting on the bench and blocking her route of escape. Jace, her mind supplies, a cowboy hat sitting on his head with his elbow propped up on the back of the bench and his body angled towards her. It just causes him to be more of a blockage. 

“Surprise, princess. Miss me?” He finally speaks, his voice makes her physically nauseous, makes her freeze, makes her feel trapped like a small animal. None of those coping mechanisms she learned will help her right now. None of them prepared her for this. All of them hinged on him being dead. The only response Hale has is her breathing, trying for the in the nose and out her mouth technique that is supposed to help panic. As she looks around the park she is hoping and praying to deities that don’t exist for someone else to show up.  There aren’t any people at this public park. Even the man with the German Shepherd has disappeared.

He takes a small step forward, his steps silent unlike how they used to echo off the walls in the concrete warehouse. She tries to hold onto that difference, no matter how small of one it is. Her right foot slides back on the grass, muscles in her legs as tense as a wire. He’s creeping closer to her. The back of the bench is lightly touching her spine. “What? Did you not expect to see me again?” He asks, with an obviously faked innocence. Despite Hale being almost completely still and silent Oliver still looks like he’s watching the most entertaining part of a movie. 

“How are you here?” Hale finds her voice and asks the one question she can remember how to form at the moment. The rest of her thoughts are static. Her eyes stay on Oliver. He has a black shirt, one that looks well put together, with the brand name in cursive on the left side of his chest. The font is too small for her to read. 

“Oh, you would want to know that, wouldn’t you? After all, the last time we saw each other you pulled the trigger on me. Isn’t that right, princess?” In through the nose, out through the mouth, she reminds herself, trying to keep control of her breathing as the reminder of her past actions comes from his mouth. Hale is well aware of the danger those words hold coming from him. She is well aware of what he is willing to do against someone who has never acted against him, let alone someone who fired a gun at him and left him for dead. “I survived. Isn’t that great news?”

Her brain tries to figure out how he could have survived that scenario. She shot him until the clip was empty, aiming for his chest. He was bleeding when they ran. They were miles from anything that might have resembled civilization before the blackout. She assumed they had been given the only working vehicle. How? How? How? She wants to ask for details, she needs to know, but he wouldn’t give her a straight answer. “Why are you here?”

She can sense Jace’s body mass behind her even though he hasn’t uttered a word. It makes her nerves flare more, not being able to keep an eye on both possible threats. “For a simple reunion. Three years is simply a long time, and Jace and I were in the neighborhood. ” His words sound so deceptively friendly, like they genuinely were old friends who just ran into each other. He’s being far too friendly and docile for the Oliver that she knows. He’s building up to something. Whatever it is, Hale can’t go through it. 

“I’m not telling you anything about my life. I’m not going anywhere with you.” Those are the limits she has to stick to. She can’t give him any information. She can’t go anywhere with him. Everything he knows will be used against her. Every person in her life that he knows about can be leveraged against her. She has to stick to those two limits, no matter how much it takes from her.

“Oh, but I think it would be all too easy to make you do anything I want.” Even after all these years, he can intimidate her almost effortlessly. Oliver has on blue jeans with a dark wash. On his feet, he wears solid black tennis shoes. There aren’t any visible lumps to signify a gun in his possession, but it could more than easily be out of sight. Jace sits behind her. Oliver doesn’t even need a gun. Ten feet behind Oliver stands a tree that stretches high into the sky.  Just because his words are right doesn’t mean she has to give that away. 

“This isn’t like three years ago.” Voluntarily speaking about the events of the blackout always feels like she is trying to swallow acid. “You aren’t in the same position you were three years ago.” She tries to believe her words as she says them. Things are different now. She isn’t back in that warehouse, even if her body is reacting like she is. Her own boot laces have started to become looser, her left lace is closer to a single knot than the double knot she put it in days ago. 

“I think you underestimate my power of persuasion,” he steps forward, truly trapping her body with his. It feels like every atom in her body stills with his newfound proximity. Oliver reaches down, and grabs her right arm in a light grip. The actions are familiar. His grip is light enough that she could probably pull out of it if the parts of her brain that controlled her arms would listen to her will. Her self-defense training taught her that she could get him away from her. She could grab the arm holding her, slip her foot behind his, and push. It should send him to the ground. But she can’t seem to move. All her brain can think is how bad it hurt the last time he snapped her wrist, the very same wrist he currently has in his hands. A wrist with a previous injury is easier to re-injure and he had no problem at all doing it the first time. 

He turns her wrist, examining it, and it feels like she is simply watching her body from the outside. She is urging herself to move, to pull back her arm, to hit him, to say something. “It healed up much better than I expected. I’m sure my other handiwork didn't heal up that neatly, did it?” The knowing look on his face gives away what he is referring to; the knife wound, the initials he traced into her arm, the constant reminder of his face, and the metallic smell of blood and metal. That is what breaks through her frozen haze. It’s a memory that brings up more anger than fear. It contains enough anger that she can move again. Hale takes her arm out of his grip, putting it close to her body. 

“Don’t touch me. Ever.” He’s still standing much too close for her to stand up and leave. The courage to go on the offensive is still not in her. “And I’m not telling you anything about my life.”

“Lucky for you I already know everything I could ever want to know.” And he goes on to list details about her life that no one else should know. Despair fills her as he continues to talk, listing work schedules, addresses, and other intimate details of the lives of the people she cares about. He knows too much. He knows everything. Avery, Will, and James are all in danger. They have been in danger for who knows how long. The whole time Hale had no idea. At some point, Oliver stops. Jace is the one who stops it. By that point, Hale isn’t processing Oliver’s words. They disappear and Hale isn’t even aware how she found the way to her car through the shock.