Work Text:
She was told it was a vacation. Eight years old, Vivian is woken up by her dad. He has a look in his eyes, one she cannot explain, and she never truly will. He tells her to get her shoes on. Asks her to be quiet. Tells her it’s a surprise. That she was going with him to set up a vacation for their small family.
After spending so long in motel rooms and eating cheap food that dean had picked up. She had no idea what a vacation would entail. People in school said that her life was like their vacations. Long road trips to a new place. But unlike those kids at the school. That was her whole life. Maybe her definition— her dad’s definition was different. Maybe it was staying in the same place.
Maybe it was disney world- she mused. Sammy saw it on tv once, some advertisment he had been watching after dean had told them to go to bed, and had spent the next month talking about it. Vivian had been intrigued; had listened carefully as Sammy told her all about it. There was all kinds of things there to do, characters from their favourite tv shows. But Dad shut them both down after a while. When he finally snapped at Sammy and dean had to step in between.
Dad did that a lot, Dean promised them it was fine. But sometimes he seemed scared too. Vivian wondered if a vacation would help that. If perhaps the Happiest place on earth would bring her dad peace.
Vivian spent the night in a closet. Scared to come out. But eventually the event blew over.
They never talked about disneyland again. At least not in front of their father. He went out the next day, didn’t come back for two days, and when he did he was drunk and he all but forced the kids back on the road.
Today was different though, it was a couple weeks past their birthday and so Vivian supposed that it was time for them to finally get to do something nice. She hates the emptiness of the backseat, but she never sits in the front seat. Dean did, sometimes. But the back was safer. Was further away from her father.
—
The car ride was long, at first she was wide awake, but after a while the cars heater began to warm her enough that she fell back asleep. Which was nice, as she usually couldn’t fall asleep unless Dean was reading to her. But perhaps the quiet lull of the car allowed her to slip into a peaceful state without her usual comforts.
—-
Vivian was Five years old when it started. Her dad was out hunting, and they were staying in a new motel. Dean had locked the door at around seven. Had gotten her and Sammy ready for bed. She tried to fall asleep like she normally did, but she just couldn’t. She was scared. But scared of what? She wasn’t exactly sure at the moment. Her heart was racing and she could tell that sammy wasn’t having that problem. He was fast asleep beside her already. Dean seemed asleep too. She got up to try and see if there was something wrong. She checked under the motel beds. In the bathroom, even checked the lock on the door. She was checking the windows when dean’s voice cut through the quiet. “Vee?” He asked, he was sitting up in his bed. Sammy was sprawled out across the entirety of their shared bed. “What’s wrong?”
Vivian fiddled with her hands as if she’d been caught doing something wrong. “I cant sleep.” Dean sighed, got out of his own bed and came over to her, grabbed her hand. “Whats going on?” He asked, guiding her to sit on the side of his bed.
“I’m scared dee. I can’t stop thinking.” He maneuvered the pillows until she had some on her side, then he patted them as if telling her to lay down. Which she did. “Here, i’ve got this book from one of the teachers at school. I think you’d like it.” He leans over the edge of the bed, reaching into a bag to grab a paperback book. It’s worn and a bit crinkled from being in his bag but he opens it up to the first page and began to read. Voice quiet so he wouldn’t wake up Sammy.
“Chapter one
My Nightmare started like this…”
—-
By the time she woke up, the moon was in the middle of the sky. The car had stopped and her dad had opened the backseat. The ground was covered in snow but she got out because she could tell that it was what John wanted her to do.
“Follow me.” He said. His voice was the only sound she heard. It felt weird, not seeing him grab any bag from the back. Or not having her siblings with her. But she figured it was fine. Her dad led her far away from the car to some type of symbol painted on the ground in the snow. He guided her in before he spoke. “Stay here.” He said. He sounded angry. “Dad? What?”
“I’m not your father.” He told her. She flinched back. He must’ve been in one of his moods again. “I don’t know what you are. But i only have two children. Whatever you are— you are not my child.” Her face dropped. This wasn’t a vacation. No, it seemed her dad was mad at her. “Dad i’m sorry- what did i do wrong?” He threw something at her. Water drenched her pjs and the wind felt colder. “You stay there. You understand me?” She nodded her head numbly. He was being dramatic. He’d come back in an hour and apologize. He was probably just drunk. He didn’t mean his words. She watched him walk away. Trying to stop her body shaking and decided she could wait.
—-
She doesn’t remember much. She knew better than to disobey a direct order so she didn’t move. Even as she froze slowly.
—-
“Seriously? You honestly didn’t see that coming?” A voice asked. She wanted to open her eyes but couldn’t be bothered too. It was so cold, and she was so tired.
“I thought you said the spell would work!” A second voice argues.
“I said there was a possibility he could remember.” The first voice argues. “Is someone coming? She cannot die this way.”
“Yeah” the second voice snaps. “Unlike you, i know how to do my job properly.”
“I’m not her protector. And she’s not even human.” The first figure whispers angrily. “Now shut up, he’s coming back.” She thinks she hears footsteps but she cannot tell. She feels someone grab her right arm. Their grip is rough and they pull at the golden bracelet she had gotten from her brother. She wished she could fight back but she didn’t have the energy. Blood clotted from little wounds caused by the bracelet snapping as it was pulled off her wrist. It warmed the skin as it beaded across.
The world vanished again. Or perhaps it was her, vanishing away like the stars in the night sky.
—-
Eventually she must’ve passed out or something, because she woke up in a hospital.
The doctors kept giving her pitying glances. And the social services worker kept speaking to her as if she was a piece of glass about to break.
But john had always said that foster care was so much worse than being with family. That they’d be separated and abused in there. So she kept her mouth shut and refused to say anything at all.
—
The hospital felt lonely. The isolation that came with being by herself was only exacerbated by this being the first time in her entire life that she could remember not having one of her siblings at her side.
She felt like she was going crazy. To the point where when they mentioned getting her out to go into foster care she threw things. screamed and shouted until they sedated her because she cut her own hand open.
When she woke up she had been moved upstairs and was given medications to ‘mellow her out.’
—-
It took months before she was finally let out. And that was only when they had a placement specifically chosen for her. The walls were bare, the bed was more comfortable than the old motel ones yet it wasn’t the same. The window only opened a few inches. Not enough to get out of. There was nothing sharp, and she was referred to as a “flight risk.”
She had to take countless meds every day— yet she wasn’t even allowed to hold onto them. They were locked up by the man who had taken her in.
His name was Noah, he was outwardly religious. Had crosses in the living room and bedrooms. Had a bible he read to every night— at first he sat with her and read it, it was how he taught her how to read when she admitted she’d never really understood it back at school. Then eventually it became something expected of her too.
Noah had told her once that an angel asked him to watch over her. Though she never understood that. She believed him. If demons and ghosts were real, then so could Angels.
He never forced her to be religious. He didn’t force her to pray but she did. And eventually she heard them too. The angels began to speak to her and she could see the signs they were leaving.
When Noah asked if he could adopt her on her fourteenth birthday. She ran.
She knew how he had felt. Known how he must’ve been thinking. But the fear overwhelmed her. And besides, she had a father. And he was still alive. She had brothers and a family somewhere out there.
She stayed gone for a week. When she came back he didn’t mention adoption again, but things had already begun to change.
—-
“The girl has got to go.” A voice says.
“What? No. Az—“ a name, perhaps. She cannot tell. Whatever the word was did not sound human. Thinking about it, none of the words sounded very human, yet she understood most of them anyways. “You promised no one would get hurt.”
She could almost hear the figures grin. “We like to lie.” The man said. “Besides, i told you i needed her isolated. We’re running out of time until the show.”
What show? Like her theatre preformances? What was happening. Why couldn’t she wake up from this dream. Why did the world feel as though it was getting hotter all around her.
Her girlfriend is posed on a cross in front of her. Much alike to the Lord she prays too. theres fire all over the walls and the ceiling. She screams and hands are shaking her.
Abby wakes her from her slumber. Clarisse is shaken but wanders out of the bed and to the living room. The apartment is silent. Abby must’ve gone back to bed.
Clarisse prays until she’s certain God is no longer listening.
She stops taking her medications. Remembers the cold forest floor. Starts researching anything that sounds vaguely similar to the name she heard in her sleep.
The distance between her and Noah grows. And with it, the distance between her and God seems to grow too.
—
She stops sleeping almost entirely. Sleep had once felt like a vacation from the real world. Her therapist had often spoke about it that way. It was a place where the troubles didn’t seem to mean anything. Where everything could melt away temporarily and all that would be left is a quiet sense of peace.
Her therapist told her that her dreams were a good way to cope with her problems. Her dreams used to consist of disneyworld. With dean and Sammy. Neither of which ever aged. She stayed the same age she was when she left them. They were together in those dreams. And it was all she needed.
Even when she hated her brothers for abandoning her, she still missed them deeply.
Nowadays, anytime she fell asleep it was to a nightmare world. No more disneyland. All she dreamt of now was her girlfriend on a cross and the room on fire.
She stopped dreaming about her family. Yet this didn’t feel any better.
She didn’t know how much worse it could get.