Page 1 of In Somnis

CHAPTER ONE

Lennon

Some days feel like dreams you can’t wake up from.

This is one of those, except it’s a nightmare full of highways and exit signs, and I’m four days deep into it.

My fingers clamp the steering wheel of my yellow Beetle as if I can choke alertness into my body by force. It doesn’t work. Nothing does. Not the cold air blasting against my face, the stale gas-station coffee sloshing in the cup holder, or the throb in my right hip from sitting too long.

I should stop and find somewhere to sleep. Stolen hours of sleep reclined in parking lots here and there have barely touched my exhaustion.

Eight hours in a real bed.

That’s the real dream, but I’m too close now. Only two more hours, but it might not matter because every blink is getting longer and longer, and I’m worried that one of them will be just long enough for me to end up in a ditch.

“Come to me.”

Three words from my best friend, Tessa. That’s all it took for me to cram what was left of my life into two suitcases and launch myself into this road trip from hell.

White floods my vision, and my eyes snap open. Headlights blind me, and a horn screams, but not as loud as my panic as I realize I’ve drifted out of my lane. I yank the wheel right, and my Beetle’s tires screech as I swerve back into my lane. The honking truck blasts past, close enough that the displaced air rocks my entire car.

Oh my God. Oh my God.

I almost…

The thought lodges in my throat. Mom would have been so mad. Watching cancer eat her alive, holding her hand through chemo that made her too weak to lift a fork, counting pills and measuring hope in teaspoons—all of that, so I could throw it away by falling asleep behind the wheel.

Or worse, harming someone else because of my recklessness.

I drag in a breath that tastes like terror while my heart continues its attempts to escape my chest.

That’s it. I’ve found the line. I’m done gambling my life against two more hours of highway.

The irony is not lost on me. I’ve spent the last six months doing nothing but keeping someone else alive. Now that there’s no one left to keep alive but myself, I can barely manage it.

A lit-up sign in the shape of an arrow appears over the next hill from a gas station with a diner attached. I take the exit, swerving into the parking lot too fast before slamming on the brakes and throwing the car into park. Soft light fills the space, and I grab my phone from the cupholder, but when I open my “Favorites” list, I freeze.

Who is there to call? To tell about what almost happened?

Who is left to tell I almost died?

My thumb hovers above each name on the list.

Mom

Tessa

Dad Work

Spencer

No one.

They’re all dead, gone, or might as well be dead to me.

That’s the entire list.

The blank space underneath those four names is its own kind of cruelty. Most people accumulate contacts without noticing until there are too many to keep track of. I used to be like that. Group chats that never shut up, birthdays, brunches, and last-minute drinks. I thought that meant something. That noise meant closeness.