Once Upon A Dream By Emily Osment Novels & Stories

“You’re the only one old enough to remember. That’s why it started with you. The dreams. The lights. The things moving under the stairs.” Moira’s knees buckled and she sat hard on the couch. She hadn’t told anyone. Not about the dreams that started two months ago—dreams where she was a little girl again, hiding under a pew while voices chanted in the chapel ruins. Or the whispers in her sleep. The name that kept slipping through her lips when she woke in cold sweat. “Watcher.” She stared at Emery. “How do you know this?” Emery reached for the sketchbook. He opened it to the first page.

"Jeremy, what are you even saying? What son? Didn't you just say I'm only his aunt?" Jeremy's face flushed in an instant. Every word he meant to say lodged in his throat. In the end, he could only glare at me before storming out. In the suddenly silent room, I noticed a piece of pine nut candy by my pillow. Jeremy must have left it there while I was unconscious. So, he still remembered. Whenever my heart felt heavy, I craved something sweet. Perhaps I'd suffered too much bitterness in the past, which was why I craved just a little sweetness, never growing tired of it.

Isolde dreamed of cousins entering her office with apologies written to specification and leaving without them, bewildered and improved. Near dawn, a sound: not the hinge. A tap—window, sill, the small patience of someone deciding to ask before entering. The chalk child stood on the drain again, hair braided into weatherproof grammar. Behind her, two more, and a mother with the look women wear when they have outlived their own patience with being patient. “Dreams?” Evelyn asked quietly.

Made victory taste like ashes. Because somewhere out there, someone was watching. Someone patient. Someone I'd never suspect. Someone with forty years of experience destroying designers like me. And they were just waiting for the right moment to strike. At breakfast, Emma noticed I looked tired. "Did you have bad dreams, Mommy?" "A little. But I'm okay." "Me too. I dreamed about the fashion show. About wearing my butterfly dress. It was a good dream." She hugged Mr. Whiskers. Both of them. The old and the new. So trusting. So innocent.

"Ever since we were kids, you've been breathing down my neck, controlling every little thing I do. Who the hell do you think you are? "I let you have your way half the time, but can you just leave me alone already? I'm exhausted. Sometimes, I think the gossip was right. No wonder you were abandoned. Who could put up with a jinx like you?" A wave of intense nausea rolled through my empty stomach, a bitter lump forming in my throat. I couldn't throw up or swallow it. The ten-year-old Diana, the 17-year-old Diana... I had spent years trying to fuse all those cherished versions of her into the woman standing before me.

He had to get the rest of her, they were seventeen now and he couldn’t wait for them to turn eighteen if he could actually do the things he wanted to her. The things they dreamed about. He had studied things purposely to please his mate, along with his brother of course. Ife sat in history class distracted by her thoughts until the subject spoke of Alpha Princess Fallon from the past. This was the same person the school was named after. The more she learnt of her the weirder her dreams became, almost like she was living out her life. The most cruel one was of the little girl snatching her heart out of her chest. On the last day, everything made sense!

Sure enough, the look in his eyes flashed confusion. "A nightmare? You haven't had one of those in years." I chewed on my lower lip causing the worry to grow evident on his features even more. I exhaled heavily as I knew he was waiting for clarification. "Not necessarily a nightmare. It was a dream where you guys were there to save me. I always dreaded waking up afterwards though. Because everytime I woke up, I realized that it was just a dream..." I felt the stinging sensation in my eyes and quickly took another deep breath.

Emily's voice was barely above a whisper, and her eyes seemed to cloud over, as if memories were rising to the surface. My mind reeled as I realized the truth: She is Rachel! I thought to myself, my heart racing with emotions. Emily's voice trembled as she continued, "And then I had this strange dream too...of me being pursued. I didn't get to see the person, but all I can remember was that he kept on pursuing me until we got to that house...and then he pushed me into it...and then he..." Her words trailed off, and I couldn't bear the thought of her reliving that nightmare. I wrapped my arms around her, holding her close. "I'm sorry," I whispered, my voice cracking with emotion.

“Did something happen?” “I…I had a nightmare.” I nod and stand back, allowing her to enter. In her sleepy, hazy mind, she did the one thing any she-wolf will do when she’s afraid – she came to her mate. “Do you want to talk about it?” I ask. “No,” she says, her voice a little hoarse, but nothing like the papery whisper in the dream. “If it helps, I had a pretty horrific dream myself,” I say and close the door, catching Oswald’s smiling face before I do. “Do you want some water or something?”

The talk about her waiting up for His Grace and asking him to reveal his face to her. After the dream that she had just had, Emily could not describe the feeling that she was having within her. She wanted to stay up and wait for His Grace, do all that she had planned to do but the dream... no... the nightmare that she just had stirred up another feeling within her.