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Content warning: vomiting

When you woke up, you missed the trashcan and puked on the floor instead.

Every inch of your body hurt, and your face was strangely tight, nose clogged. Twisted up in the blankets, you felt yourself burning up with heat, sweaty and uncomfortable.

You spit the residual bile out of your mouth and collapsed on the bed, panting. Morning sunlight was streaming in through the blinds, though it was still early enough that your alarm hadn't gone off yet.

Too weak to grab for the glass of water on your nightstand, you stuck your fingers in your mouth instead and clumsily wiped your hand across your face, trying to get rid of the tightness. It was probably a ton of drool or something.

Your hand came back red. Faintly red, like the sheer cover of a lip balm.

You stared at it, then called out,

"Mom?"

But she didn't respond. Where was she? Why wasn't she coming to your room? Did something happen to her?

No, it's okay. She leaves earlier than you for her job. That's right.

You relaxed the tiniest bit after remembering, but that didn't solve the problem currently at hand. Literally.

Piling your pillows behind your head, you slowly, painfully dragged yourself up into a sitting position. Each inch of movement was agonizing, every muscle and tendon in your body screaming. Finally sitting upright, you unceremoniously plunged your hand in your water cup and wiped your face.

More red.

Some of the diluted drops ran to your mouth and - yup - that was blood.

Did you have a nosebleed in the middle of the night? You checked your sheets, but there wasn't any blood on them. Only your face and your pyjamas. If you had a nosebleed, why wasn't any of it on the bed?

You looked at your pjs closely, then unwrapped your legs from the blankets.

There was dirt smeared all over them.

Your heart skipped a beat.

What..?

Your whole body hurt too much for this. Shoving the growing horror and questions down, you made yourself stand up and hobbled over to the bathroom to take a shower.

The blood had soaked into your clothes and made them stick to your skin; tearing them off hurt. A lot. You threw the soiled clothes in a corner and stepped into the shower, sitting down under the steaming rain with a bar of soap and a washcloth.

Pink and brown water flowed from where you were sitting to the drain, eventually turning clear as you wiped yourself down. As you tried your best to wash yourself, you found the source of your aches and pains. The yellow and green of blooming bruises covered your body, reddened scrapes appearing on your feet and hands. There was grass in your hair. Many, many strands of left your scalp as you scrubbed, washing sweat and dirt away.

You crawled out of the shower and yanked your towel from the seat of the toilet, shivering from the rapidly cooling droplets dripping from your skin.

Oh. You didn't bring any new clothes to change into. Blearily, you looked to the heap of unwearable clothes, then grabbed a second towel from the closet. Wrapping one around your waist, you cloaked your shoulders with the other and staggered back to your bedroom.

You needed to dress. You needed to clean the bile on the floor. You needed to drink. You needed to eat. You needed to take medicine.

You had to dispose of your pyjamas.

Instead you collapsed onto your bed and slept.

-

Dead pine needles. Animal trails. A silver field of grass.

Blood. Pain. the image of-

You woke up around midday to the sound of the home phone going off, stomach churning, throat burning, and an acrid smell flooding your room. Cracking your eyes open, you scrunched up your nose, registering the smell. Then your stomach heaved. Oh god, you forgot to clean up your puke.

Covering your nose you dodged the mess and almost immediately fell to your butt from nausea. Leaning on the hallway wall, you listened as the phone went to voicemail.

Please leave a message after the tone - beep

"Hey, it's Jenny. Um, I tried calling your cell but it went to voicemail - I guess thats what this is too. You- you weren't in class today and I haven't seem you on campus. I guess I- um, I just wanted to call to make sure you're okay. I've got notes for today if you want them. The professor just told what we should study for the exam, I've got that too. Text me or, uh, call me back. Um, bye."

Click

You covered your face with a hand, groaning. There was too much to do, too many things to keep track of with your muddled mind.

Food first, water first. Then deal with the puke, then the clothes, and then whatever other problems you had.

After eating, and cleaning the, frankly, disgusting mess in your room, you found yourself sitting on the bathroom floor, plastic grocery bag in hand, staring at the pyjamas you had discarded. Your head was still throbbing, even after the anti-inflammatory medicine you had downed with your water.

Why did your pyjamas look like this?

You had never been a sleepwalker; rather, you tended to sleep like the dead. Maybe some occasional tossing and turning, the one time you almost fell out of bed - but never sleepwalking, just like your parents.

But the dirt and blood on them, the dirt and blood on you, the bruises and scrapes... Something had happened. You must have left the house, went to the woods. Bumped against branches and fallen logs. That explained the dirt and bruises, but what about the blood?

You couldn't cleanly explain the blood. Maybe you cracked your nose against a tree trunk? But wouldn't your nose hurt more then?

Gently, carefully, you handled the clothes and put them in the grocery bag, tying two knots. Rising to your feet, you stuffed the bag in the garbage, covering it with whatever was on top when you opened it. Then you washed your hands in the sink and sank to your elbows.

What happened last night?

Thinking as hard as you could gave nothing away. You traced the path of last evening; you had freaked out at Jenny (ouch) and then left campus to go home. You checked the windows, you had a headache. You made dinner early, you ate, you went to bed early.

You closed your eyelids tighter, trying to remember something, anything. Yellow and purple dots flashed behind your eyelids, creating mindless patterns and shapes.

You remembered sliding under the covers, sighing. You remembered scratching your stomach, rolling over to your left side. You remembered replaying a movie in your head to stop thinking about how you had treated Jenny.

Then...

Then..?

A flicker, just one millisecond of feeling - hard ground beneath you, treetops above.

You stood up straight, blinking rapidly. You had gone into the forest!

Okay. So you were sleepwalking. That wasn't normal, but it was definitely preventable. And you had found your way home, thank goodness, so now that you knew you could do something about it. Maybe put something across your door to prevent opening during the night.

Figuring it out didn't quite make you feel better. You still had the problem of feeling sick, looking beaten up, and of course, being a dick to Jenny. And exams.

That was too much to think about, however. You needed to sleep and take a day off. Or two. That was fine though.

You were going to be fine.

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