ERIC MARLAR + CHARLIE GIVENS
MARCUS FLINT + ALICIA SPINNET PG | COMPLETE
He couldn't sleep. For the third night in a row, Eric had tossed and turned in the bed, his mind filled with a flood of convoluted dreams that made little sense. Sometimes they felt familiar, and sometimes they seemed strange and disturbing. He stared at the ceiling fan for a few moments before deciding to get up. There was no point in disturbing Charlie if he hadn't already.
Eric pulled a pair of jeans up over his boxers, and grabbed a flannel from a nearby chair before heading out of the room. He didn't bother with socks, simply sliding his bare feet into the boots that were near the front door. There was a pack of cigarettes tucked under the top step of their porch stairs, and as he sat down own the stoop, he retrieved it. Charlie wasn't a fan of his smoking habits, so he tried to keep things outside or in the garage where she'd be less likely to notice them.
It was a cool night, but nice otherwise. The sky was clear and a blanket of stars flickered down at him from between the treetops. Lighting his cigarette, Eric inhaled deeply as he looked out at the road from his house, feeling almost grateful that the streetlight was out. Dim starlight suited his thoughts better than white fluorescent. His mind drifted back to the recent series of dreams-- of beaches and a jungle, and a make-out session with Charlie when they were teenagers. Charlie was a staple fixture in a lot of those dreams, which shouldn't have been so weird, except sometimes he felt a surge of anger toward her, and sometimes he felt a sadness that he didn't understand, and all of it felt incredibly vivid and all too real, which made him even more confused.
He was so caught up in his thoughts that he barely smoked the cigarette in his hand, and didn't hear the door open behind him.
Alicia had never been a heavy sleeper, but usually, she could turn over and get herself to go back to sleep. Lately, her dreams on top of the strange feelings she’d been having and the strange things that were happening made everything a little bit harder for her to fall back to sleep.
Rolling over she felt Eric's side of the bed it had a faint warmth to it blinking as she rubbed her eyes, she pushed herself up and grabbed one of his shirts and slipped on a pair of flipflops. She could smell the cigarette smoke as she quietly opened the door. Things had been different between them lately, and she couldn't figure it out, she couldn't figure out the loss she was feeling, the pain, the anger and the confusion.
"Decided to see if it was freezing at night yet?" She asked as she wrapped an arm around him.
Eric glanced up as she moved to sit next to him. He put out the cigarette on the step before wrapping his own arm around her in return. "Couldn't sleep," he responded with a light shrug before looking out at the road again. "I'm sorry if I woke you."
Wrapping her other arm around him she looked down the street and simply nodded letting the quiet of night surround them. After a few moments, she glanced up. “Any reason you can’t sleep?”
He didn't immediately respond, other than to give her a light squeeze as she hugged him. Staring thoughtfully down the street, Eric wasn't really looking at anything in particular as he considered how to answer her.
"You ever have one of those dreams that feel so real, when you wake up you're not sure whether you're still dreaming?" With a frown, he looked down at his feet and muttered, "I sound like a crazy person."
Eyes narrowing as she looked down at the ground she nodded. “You’ve sounded crazy before,” she teased lightly. “But you don’t right now. I know what you mean, little things that feel so real you can’t tell if they happened or didn’t.”
"Something's different." He sighed deeply and looked back at Charlie. "It's not just me. It's this whole damn town. Everybody's talking about weird dreams or seeing things or hearing things that don’t make sense."
“Not to mention all the weird stuff, which is oddly familiar,” she added her voice a little down. “Something’s going on.” She agreed. “So, what were your dreams about?”
Eric's brow furrowed as he thought about the visions that came into his unconscious thoughts. "I had a sister in one. Not Laura or Lex, but someone else. She needed my help with a..." He hesitated for a beat, giving a light shake of his head before continuing, "A potion or something... Like something you might find in a children's book, or a horror movie."
Untangling himself from Charlie, Eric stood and walked down the remaining steps of the porch to the yard. He stretched before turning back to her and continuing. "I dreamed that we were on a date at a beach. Like a proper, ocean beach. There was another one with a tree in some jungly forest. It tried to eat me and you beat it up." He chuckled a bit after describing that one. It sounded so ridiculous when said out loud. How could he possibly have believed it was something real?
Frowning as he walked away she wrapped her arms around herself, the words shouldn’t make sense and her expression was confused more than anything else.
“A potion?” She whispered after a little bit. “Well, I guess we’re both dreaming of dangerous trees and monsters.” She added looking up at him with a soft smile. “I had one where I tried to save someone but everyone thought…” She let the words trail off. “They feel too real to be fake, but they’re too insane to be real.” She looked back towards the house towards where Laura’s room was before looking back to Eric.
He understood what she was feeling, even though it seemed too bizarre to be real. "It's like... This life is just wallpaper, and it's starting to peel at the edges to reveal the original color underneath." Leaning against the rail at the bottom of the steps, Eric met Charlie's gaze. "You think it's possible? That this is just... some sort of fantasy?"
Looking at Eric for a moment she looked away around, up at the mountain before looking back at him. “If it is, it’s a pretty elaborate fantasy.” Shrugging she looked around again, up at the sky, to the trees changing colors before sighing. “And if it is, where are we supposed to be? Who are we?” She couldn’t believe those words just came out of her mouth.
"The kind of people who fight monsters?" Eric offered jokingly as the corners of his mouth curled with a hint of a smile. "And British," he added, seemingly randomly. "Dunno why, but that's the impression that I get."
Laughing softly she stopped abruptly at the mention of British. “British.” She repeated. “This is going to sound even stranger, but I was talking to Elle earlier today and she switched to a British accent, she said it was because she was watching some TV show.”
His smile dropped. There were too many coincidences, too many stories overlapping for it to not be significant. Eric wasn't sure what to think. "Somehow that's more unbelievable than spells and potions. Can't see any of us being the 'Tea & Crumpets' type." He'd never been more than a few hours from Breckentale in his life. And yet even as he had the thought he knew it was somehow wrong. "Right?" he added, almost as though he was asking for reassurance.
She’d traveled the world, and that felt right but as she looked at Eric him not going far from Breckentale didn’t seem right, he’d seen the world right? Gone everywhere? “No,” Charlie said finally. “It can’t be right, because you know, you…” She stopped rubbing her eyes, maybe this whole conversation was a dream. “You do have the hobo travel around the world working weird jobs vibe.” She said with a soft smile.
"I'm not a hobo," he replied defensively. It was quick, almost a reflexive response, and in a tone that Eric had never used with Charlie. And yet it almost felt like deja vu. "I mean..." he started to speak again, less defensively, but wasn't really sure what to say.
“I was just…” Charlie said almost involuntarily taking a step back at his reaction. “Nevermind.” Her eyes narrowed as a strange sense of anger built up in her that she couldn’t exactly shake.
"I don't know why I..." Her physical reaction to him was concerning, and he dropped his arms in a passive manner. "I'm not going to hurt you," Eric said, softly. In his mind, he could hear himself telling her that he wasn't a threat. Like the echo of a memory he couldn't quite reach.
She didn’t look up at him but a wave of a memory of pain seemed to consume her mind for a moment. “I don’t think you’re going to hurt me,” she almost added something about that having already happened but Eric hadn’t ever hurt her. “What’s going on?” She said looking back up at him. “Laura’s been waking up with nightmares, we’re” she moved a hand between them unable to find the right words to finish her thought.
Eric wasn't sure how to answer. He moved a few steps closer to Charlie, reaching over to hold her hand. He glanced down the street, frowning thoughtfully for a moment. "Maybe we should have a meeting. See just how many people are having these experiences, and maybe someone will have a theory or somethin'."
Taking his hand she smiled softly. “Who?” She asked not really sure who they should talk to about it. “I could try talking to Elle, but she’s been kind of distant and Rocco’s been a bit MIA too.” A confused expression started to form. “I mean Finn.”
Rocco sounded familiar, like he'd heard that before, but Eric wasn't quite sure why since he couldn't remember having met anyone with the name. "Your siblings, my siblings... I don't know, anyone who's been having these weird feelins. Like a Town Hall or somethin'," he offered in answer to her question of who.
“A Town Hall?” She said with a raised eyebrow. “I think starting small is better, my siblings, your siblings, close friends maybe but, everyone? That might get a little messy don’t you think?”
His face changed as he considered her perspective, but then he shrugged. "If it's affecting everyone it's already pretty messy, innit?"
“But why bring every single voice into it? What’s that going to do? Cause chaos? I think we should learn what we can first before a mass meeting.” Charlie argued.
Eric was thinking of the expression, '2 heads are better than 1', but he didn't really want to argue. He felt... tired of arguing in a way that made very little sense. Suddenly, all he wanted to do was curl back into bed with her and pretend none of this was happening. "Why don't we sleep on it. We can figure out who to talk to in the morning."
Charlie frowned at the quick switch but nodded. “Yeah, sure.” She said turning to head back into the house. “I’m going to check on Laura,” Charlie announced feeling uncharacteristically hurt.
He frowned as she walked away from him, and his head dropped as he repressed the urge to sigh. Quietly, he said, "Don't be mad, 'Licia." With a blink, Eric stood upright and corrected himself in a firmer tone. "Charlie."
Stopping mid step she turned to look at him. “‘Licia?” She asked even though she’d heard the correction, her voice wasn’t angry it was curious.
He shook his head in confusion at her, not quite sure what to say. Although Eric knew that the name was wrong, he'd said it without thinking and it felt natural. "I don't know where that came from."
Nodding she felt like there was a lot of that lately. “Guess that’s just,” she paused. “Part of whatever is going on.” Charlie looked away before looking back at him. “Well, I’ll check on Laura.” She said turning to head back in, she needed to really figure out a few things.
Although it had been his suggestion to return to the house, Eric did not immediately follow Charlie back inside. She seemed mad at him, and he felt frustrated in ways he couldn't understand. He resisted the urge to punch the column holding the porch roof up, and instead moved to retrieve another cigarette. Maybe he'd actually smoke this one before going back to bed.