The Dream

by Cameron McKinney

Steam and soft music smothered every inch of the luxurious bathroom as the soothing water poured out of the showerhead onto tan blond-haired blue-eyed beauty Sherry Jamison. Sherry had a body even models would die for. She used to be a rising actress but now settles for the term "struggling actress" other than housewife. Just as fast as Sherry's career rose, it fell. Her father died and left her handicapped mother alone to fend for herself. She volunteered to enroll in a nursing home so that Sherry could continue her career as an actress and prosper, but Sherry could not bear the thought of doing that, so she gave up her acting dream. After her mother died soon after, she was left with nothing but hopes and dreams. Due to lack of shelter and funds, she married a rich handsome young man named Daniel and now lives in a mansion out in Tannersville, Ohio. Tannersville was a nice quiet secluded town where everyone knew everyone and their reputations. However, Sherry's reputation was not one to be proud of. As Sherry stepped out of the shower, she wrapped a pure white towel around her dripping body and flipped her hair to the side. She took another towel and dried her hair and then wiped the mirror and stared.

She thought to herself, "God I hate this place. I'm not welcome here and will never be. I wonder what my life would have been like if my dad hadn't died. I would have been in Hollywood making millions, meeting new guys everyday, living the good life. And now look at me, my life is worthless."

The music suddenly stopped and broke her chain of thought. She opened the door and slowly peaked out the doorway. She scanned the room and found nothing.

She said to herself, "The CD must have stopped of something. Yea, That's it. The CD stopped. What a great way to the end the day, scared shitless."

She went to the sink and turned it on. Leaning down and taking a handful of water, she washed her face, to return to a brown pair of eyes attached to a head in a pitch black ski-mask staring her back in the mirror. She screamed as the figure covered her mouth with its gloved hand and threw her to the ground, hitting her head on the bath tub. All she could do is watch as the figure pulled a commando knife out of its pocket and came down with it.

Right before it sunk in, Sherry shot up in her bed in an ice cold sweat breathing heavily. Her heart was about to jump out of her chest and her pulse was racing. She looked to her right to find her husband not home as usual, and assumed he was probably out drinking with the boys again. She just regarded it as another one of her frequent nightmares and went back to sleep since it was 2:00 AM and she had to wake up at 6:30 to make breakfast for Daniel.

Except when she woke up, Daniel still wasn't there. She decided to go ask all of her maids if they had seen Daniel come in at any time during the night or if he had left a message or note for her telling her where he was. There was no such luck, but she forgot about one maid, the one she hated the most, Olivia. She would rather die then talk to Olivia but this time she had to. So she searched all over the house for her until she found Olivia in the kitchen tidying up.

"Olivia," she said.

"What do you want?" Olivia angrily responded.

"Have you seen my husband since he left the other day?" Sherry questioned.

"No and if did why would I tell you? Whatever he does is his business, not mine," she snapped.

"Why do you hate me so much Olivia?" Sherry questioned.

"I think we both know why. You have treated your animals better than me since.," her voice dimmed.

"Since you slept with my husband!" Sherry screamed.

"He was not the whore, you were! You cheated on him with his business partner!" Olivia exclaimed.

Sherry slapped her and yelled, "Shut up! Just shut up!"

Olivia grabbed the large silver butcher knife and pulled it back to her shoulder and said, "There will come a time when I'm not your maid anymore, and when that time has come, you'd better watch your back or you might find a knife in it."

Sherry backed off and apologized. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have done that."

Olivia also apologized to Sherry for her actions. Sherry then turned around and walked out of the kitchen. It was pitch black by now and Daniel still wasn't home. Sherry was starting to fear the worst, that Daniel may never be coming home. It was night by now and time to take her daily shower. She got in and thought about the affair. She remembered that night all to well. Daniel caught her cheating with his business partner Joseph Burns, who was a very good looking kind man with a rough childhood. Most of his family just left him including his siblings. Daniel beat him so hard that day; he paralyzed him from the neck down. The Sheriff, who was just known as the Sheriff around here, couldn't pin any evidence on him to be put in jail for the incident. She figured she had done enough thinking and got out and took the towel of the rack and put it around her body. Suddenly, the music stopped. She again peaked out the door to find no one there. She walked out to check the CD player to see if anything was wrong with it. She noticed that it was in mid song when the CD player was turned off. She knew someone had turned it off. She felt hands reach around her waist and squeeze.

"Gotcha!" Daniel playfully exclaimed.

She jumped. "Where have you been? I've been worried sick about you. And now you just come waltzing in when you feel like it"

"Wow, I see you're in one of "those" moods, so I'm going to go find something to drink."

Assured it was only her husband she went back into the bathroom and dried her hair. After she was done she started walking to the door when she was met by the figure. She was speechless. She couldn't make a sound, she tried but she was in shock. The figure took her by the mouth and threw her to the ground, hitting her head on the bathtub, exactly like the dream. The person approached her and pulled out a commando knife. The person pulled the knife up to their shoulder and started to come down. SNAP! SNAP! Sherry did not know what happened; she lay there bloody and numb. It was not her blood that stained the towel, it was the attacker's. Standing over the dead body of the attacker with a silenced 1911 colt pistol was Daniel. Daniel took off the mask to find the attacker was the Sheriff.

Daniel took Sherry to the hospital where she recovered from the impact of the tub in two days. Daniel later found that the Sheriff was the brother of Joseph Burns, whom Daniel had paralyzed years earlier. Sherry had to know where Daniel had been and how he knew what was happening, she never made a sound, and she never told him about the dream.

"Daniel?" Sherry questioned.

"What?" Daniel replied.

"Where were you all this time?" Sherry asked.

"Drinking and thinking about what something meant," Daniel answered.

"How did you know what was happening?"

"Because I had the same dream."


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