Through the night, I toss and turn. I’m too exhausted to wake up, but I'm never asleep for long either. My body aches all over and I can’t seem to find a comfortable position. It feels like my bed is swinging from side to side. As my stomach grumbles and twists, I hear pipes groan and creak along with it, almost as if the halls of my house were the guts of some gigantic creature. The more restless and agitated I grow, the harder my bed, and the more itchy my covers. At one point, I can hear my mother come to the door to check on me. I hold still and breathe slowly, pretending to be more than just lightly snoozing. She comes to my side. It’s quiet for a while. She’s sitting in my chair, I think. She’s probably too worried to sleep much. I can’t blame her after hearing that awful rant. What was that? In my drowsy delirium, I can’t muster a single complete thought about it. Either way, it’s definitely troubling.

  I hear something. Is… is she crying? Oh, God. I clench my eyes shut, willing my body to shrink away under my covers, as if there were a drain at the foot of my bed, I a puddle of water funneling down into it.

  At some point, the sheer force of exhaustion supersedes any sense of comfort, and I finally plummet into oblivion.

  I rub at my crusty eyes. I’ve been sleeping for a long time. I unleash a long, low yawn, pushing my toes a mile away from my shoulders. My tender muscles shudder as I squeeze myself out into a human javelin. I hear my Mom say something. Whatever, I’m not going to school anyways. I roll onto my side.

  “Agh!”

  My body jolts in pain. My shoulder feels awful, like it’s covered in barbed wire. I open my eyes.

  An unfamiliar room. My stomach drops. Rough wood walls surround me. The room is dark, save for the hazy light bleeding in through the open door. My shoulder is wrapped in many layers of a light cloth, stained with the deep, dark red of dried blood.

  “Don’t move like that.” Says the woman sitting in the corner. She quickly steps to the side of the bed. There is no mistake. It’s her again. Agnis.

  “No, no, no!” I groan.

  “Is something wrong?”

  “It was a dream. Just a dream. It has to be!” I moan, but my gut is churning with the possibility that the opposite is true.

  “I told you, don’t move like that!” The woman places her hand onto my bare shoulder. Her name is Agnis. No it’s not. She doesn’t have a name. She’s not real. This is just a dream. It has to be.

  “This isn’t real! This is just a stupid dream!” I yell, batting her hand away.

  “Stop it! Calm down!” Agnis looks down at her hand, cradling it tenderly.

  Laying back onto the stiff bed, I shut my eyes. If you know you’re dreaming, then that’s just a lucid dream, right? If it’s a lucid dream, I should be able to control it. Yes! Since I know I’m dreaming, I can dream about whatever I want! I can be anyone, anywhere, and do anything I want. I focus my mind. I try to conjure up a palace in the sky, great towers of marble rising out of the clouds. Palace, palace, palace. I concentrate with all my might, but I don’t see anything. I open my eyes. The same dim chamber as before still surrounds me without any hint of marble.

  “You need to eat. Take this.” Agnis holds out a wooden bowl of some creamy substance.

  I sit up. Wordlessly glaring at her, I try to make her clothes vanish. This is my dream. I control it. You are naked. You are nude. You are …nothing happens, no matter how much I will it to.

  “Well, if you can’t do it yourself, then I’ll have to feed you.” Agnis scoops a spoonful of the solution and holds it out towards me.

  “Open your mouth.” She instructs.

  With a single swipe of my arm, I knock the spoon and bowl out of her hands. The bowl rolls across the floor, a trail of goo leading away from a puddle where most of it splattered on the floor.

  “Pak! What gisch!? Sybil!” Agnis fires off a barrage of curses, looking down at her soiled robes.

  “Aha! It’s working!” I exclaim. Yes, I’m finally controlling my dream! The unusual strength I just demonstrated is proof of it. I can do anything I want, I just need to act on it! Thinking isn’t enough, clearly. That’s why nothing was happening. I don’t need to sit here and think, all I need to do is manifest my wishes through my actions! If I want a palace in the sky, all I have to do is get up and go there! Better yet, I’m going home! I swing my legs over the side of the bed.

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  “You’ll hurt yourself! Lay down!” Agnis panics, clearly afraid of the omnipotent power I now wield. If this mere figment of my imagination wants to stop me, she’s in for a harsh reckoning.

  “I am in control now. Take off your clothes.” I command.

  “Huuuh!?” Agnis’ jaw drops.

  “Hmm. If speaking doesn’t work, then I’ll just have to do… THIS!”

  I spring forward, grabbing a fistful of her robes.

  “Stop! What are you…” Agnis’ voice evaporates, her face turning red.

  As I stand, the covers which had rested atop me slip down, falling to my feet. Agnis’ eyes dart away nervously. I glance down at myself. No pajamas. I’m naked. I’m butt-naked!

  On reflex, I cover my crotch with my other hand.

  I try to, but I can’t. Something is wrong. My other hand won’t move at all. No matter how much I force it. Why? If this is my dream, why can’t I move my arm?

  I let go of Agnis, who tumbles back onto her behind. With that hand free, I cover my crotch. The other is just… stuck. I have no power to move it. I look down at myself. I want to cover what I see, but my other arm won’t move even an inch. My naked torso stares back at me. There are burns all along it. In places, the flesh looks melted. I want it to go away, but my arm doesn’t move. There are scars and scabbed up wounds too. But that’s not what I see. When I look down at the large exposed breasts, the tender skin, and the cold, trembling muscles, there is one resounding, earsplitting truth that rings through my mind.

  This isn’t my body.

  I can’t hide it. I can’t leave it. My real body is nowhere to be found. My flesh is ravaged. My arm is paralyzed. My body is someone else’s, and someone else’s body is mine. This isn’t a dream. I’m so stupid. Of course this is real. This is nothing like a dream. What I just woke up from, my room, my sister, my mom, that was the dream. God, oh god. I’m stuck here. I’m going to die here. Someone else comes into the room, but I barely notice. The room is fuzzy and disconnected from me. All I can see is this hideous body below my neck. My heart races and my feet go numb. I fall back onto the stiff bed. I can’t breathe. Somebody is yelling something. What’s happening to me? Somebody dashes out the door. Who? I look over to see that awful woman still slumped on the floor where I left her. She glares at me with fear. She’s shouting something at me in that damned nonsense language. I can’t understand it anymore. I can’t breathe. I reach for my heaving chest, but recoil in shock, feeling swollen lumps of fat that aren’t mine. My chest is not here, only this stranger’s. The woman jumps up from the floor, berating me. She closes in on me, and the whole room closes in with her. I collapse onto the bed, a terrified corpse. I can’t see anything, just the storm of darkness in front of me. My erratic heartbeat engulfs the entire room, burying me in a pounding torrent of hammers. The woman tackles me. I can’t breathe. This isn’t the sound of fear, this is the sound of death, swallowing me whole. Nobody who hears this sound lives to tell the tale. But as I’m about to breathe my last, somewhere in the suffocating tangle of darkness, there is a different sound.

  A tiny, soft sound, like a flute being played on a distant mountain. Delicate music drifts over me. The song of a single voice. It’s a sweet, gentle voice. The voice a mother uses to soothe her baby. Like a flickering candle in a pitch-black cavern, I cling to that voice. I follow its melody with my whole being, pulled along in a hypnotic trance. I feel a warmth spreading over me. The song flows without stopping, smoothly rising and falling like the limbs of a swaying tree. Still panting, heart pounding, limbs tingling, I begin to slowly return from the brink. As my surroundings gradually return, I witness the source of the warm sensation on my chest.

  Pressing her head into my breast, Agnis lays across my heart, quietly singing. It’s a song I’ve never heard, but it feels like a lullaby. Her face is so close, still very flushed, her eyes squeezed shut in an uncharacteristically sheepish expression. My breathing slows. My heart, still racing, becomes calmer, watching her curled up beside me. I feel so very lost, so hopeless and broken, and yet… I’m not alone. My eyes water as Agnis continues to sing, stroking my arm. I have no words, so I just sniffle in between deep breaths.

  I don’t know how long we laid there. Even after my body had calmed down, we stayed like that. At one point, some girl appeared in the doorway, but, seeing the two of us, immediately left, quietly closing the door behind her. It was probably one of those doctor kids, but I didn’t really see. To be honest, I couldn’t take my eyes off of Agnis’ face. The way her blush dappled her cheekbones like a thousand tiny rose petals, that image still sticks in my mind. Before, her face had been flushed with anger, or red with embarrassment, but this shade was completely new. No, she wasn’t flustered. Any nervous tension in Agnis’ expression had now relaxed into sanguine calmness. That unassuming peace was just what I needed, and it felt so natural. It seemed like our breathing and heartbeats were synchronized as one. It was so warm, I didn’t want it to end.

  Eventually, Agnis’ humming concluded, and she opened her eyes. Suddenly face to face with those arresting indigo eyes, my cheeks were hot. They’re such a deep, dark, shade of blue that I can’t believe they’re real.

  “Sybil?” She looks directly into my eyes with a compassionate expression, “Are you better now?”

  “...What does that mean?”

  “Hm? What do you not understand?”

  “Sib-ill” I pronounce, “What is that?”

  Agnis looks at me with pity. I didn’t know she could even make such a face.

  “That’s…” She speaks in a low tone, “It’s your name.”

  Silence. She looks away.

  “...Sorry,” I sniffle, “I’m a bit lost.”

  “Don’t worry. You’ll survive.”

  Suddenly, a powerful voice explodes from the door.

  “What in the mother’s name are you DOING? Are you trying to conceive a child?”