"So you just woke up screaming?" Isaac asked as him and Marley walked through the school grounds.
"Yeah."
The night before the first day back at school after a week off, Marley had woken up in the early hours of the morning. She had sat up in her bed and screamed herself awake. The weird part was, she wasn't even dreaming.
"Marley?! What's going on?" Her mum asked as she rushed through the door, Liam following close behind. Marley sat in her bed, panting and looking around.
"Are you okay?" Liam asked. Marley nodded, unsure of what happened. She hadn't had a bad dream of scary thoughts, heck she didn't even remember having any kind of dream. Just waking up to a small pain in her chest and a headache.
"Yeah... yeah I'm, I'm fine," Marley said. "Sorry I woke you."
"You should be," her mother said sourly. "Go back to sleep."
Her mother walked out of the room, but Liam stayed put. "You sure you're okay?"
"I'm fine Liam. Just a bad dream."
"I wasn't even dreaming," Marley said as they walked down the sunlit stairs. "I'm just going insane."
"Hey, stop," Isaac said gently, taking her hands and bringing her to a halt. He scanned over her face. "You look exhausted. You sure you wanna be in school today?"
"Yeah, I'll be fine," Marley said, smiling gratefully. Isaac frowned, not believing her.
"I can drive you home if you want," Isaac offered.
"It's okay," Marley said, standing on her tiptoes to peck his lips. "Thank you."
...
"Not the steadiest hand for a superb marksman," Lydia said from the other side of Allison. Marley sat on the hunters right side, peering over to look at her shaky hand that attempted to put the paintbrush to the paper. After hearing about Allison hallucinations because of the ice bath, Marley felt up to date.
The task in art class was simple; paint the picture of a fruit that was stapled to your easel. Marley's was green pear with freckles of brown. Art class was her favourite (obviously, since her aspirations evolved around painting Italy) so naturally, she was quick into her painting. Allison hadn't done a thing.
"It's been happening for the past few weeks. Since that night," Allison said. She put her paintbrush down and splashed the watered down red paint onto the white paper. A row of red dots captured Allison's sanity in a matter of seconds. Lydia stood up and ripped the paper from the easel, snapping Allison out of her daze.
"Start over," Lydia said. She noticed Marley yawning. "You okay Marley?"
"Yeah, sorry, just tired."
The girls continued to paint. Isaac sat on the other side of the classroom by himself. He would have sat with Marley, but they agreed that it was unhealthy to sit with each other every lesson, so spacing themselves out was a good thing. This was especially good for Isaac because it meant that he could see Marley. Before the two were dating, merely best friends, they would love to be in each other's company and they wouldn't have to say anything. Marley would always draw Isaac, and he would always watch her micro-expressions when she drew.
So in art, Isaac would watch her paint. But he chose not to paint the picture of a green apple, and paint a yellow and pink sunset instead.
...
"Do you really think this is gonna help?" Allison asked as her and Marley stood in front of a tree. Lydia smoothed a target over the wood and walked back to them.
"I know that if you think it's not going to help it definitely won't," Lydia said. "So get your head into it, shoot a few and see what happens."
Allison raised her bow and aimed for the tree. Her hands shook as she drew the arrow back. When she let go, it flew several feet to the right of the tree.
"Close," Marley said, unconvincingly trying to make her friend feel better. Allison shot another one, this time it flew a few feet further than the tree.
"Maybe hold the string a different way. Try the Mongolian draw," Lydia suggested. Allison and Marley looked at her strangely. "What? I read. Try it."
One last time, Allison raised her bow and readied herself. She held the bow slanted, in the advised position, and let go of the string. Yet again, it landed far from the tree. Marley sighed and looked around.
"You too Marley," Lydia said.
"What?" Marley asked.
"You've been in and out of naps all day. You need to wake up," Lydia said. "So throw your dagger at it."
Marley sighed and pulled the dagger from her bag on the floor.
"Got any suggested positions?" Marley asked sarcastically, Lydia smiling back the same way. She planted her feet and raised her hand by her head. The handle slipped out of her grasp and swung towards the tree. For a moment, Marley thought thought that she was gonna hit the target, then it bounced off the trunk and fell to the floor.
"Oh."
"Okay, um. Take a second to close your eyes and see the arrow and dagger going into the target," Lydia said, stepping out of the way for the girls to aim. Marley closed her eyes and frowned.
"All I can see is darkness," Marley said, unsure of Lydia's method. She sighed and opened her eyes as the dagger was released from her grasp. It flew and dug into the outer ring of the target. "Haha! I did it."
"Did you see that?" Allison asked.
"No, I had my eyes closed..." Marley said. She thought that she was the only one who's closed her eyes, which was more than embarrassing.
"See what?" Lydia asked.
"Wait here," Allison instructed.
"Are you serious?" Lydia said as Allison picked up her bag of arrows. Marley and Lydia were usually the ones left when the fights happened, and it was terrifying most of the times. Especially when they were unprotected. "You not gonna go with?"
"No," Marley said. "Go towards the battle? No thanks. I want to graduate."
Leaves crunched around them as Marley bent down to pick up her called dagger from under the tree. Someone was in the woods with them and she didn't know who. She stood up slowly, clutching her dagger in her hand, and prepared to throw it. A sharp whistle cut threw the air and Marley whipped around to see what it was. Isaac stood in front of Lydia, holding an arrow as stepped back in fear.
"Oh my god," Allison said, putting her bow down tentatively. "Oh my god. Lydia."
...
"And she just shot the arrow?" Isaac asked into the phone.
"Yeah, it's like she's going out of her mind," Marley said, crossing her legs that sat in her bed. After an unusual but uneventful trip to the woods, everyone went home since it was the end of the school day. "Why are you asking? You were there. Wait why were you there anyway?"
There was a pause as Isaac thought about what to say. "You've just been off lately."
"How?" Marley asked, unsure of any change to her behaviour.
"Well, you're not sleeping as much and you're always tired. You seem paranoid when we hang out and like you feel like someone's watching you," Isaac said. "And don't think I haven't noticed you going to ballet again."
When Marley has anger issues, it has stopped around the age that Liam was now, she would go to ballet to take her mind off of things. She hated dancing but it worked. It was like her anchor. Marley tried painting when she got anger outbursts, or talking to Isaac, but it never worked. Her mum put her in ballet when she was little because 'it's what all little girls do' she would say. Marley was kicked out after snapping another girls point shoe when she was nine.
"I... like ballet," Marley lied, squinting her face and pulling the phone away from her ear for a second.
"You hate ballet. You always have," Isaac said. "Look, Marley you can talk to me. Remember we had that conversation about talking to people?"
"Yeah I know. Honestly Isaac, I'm fine. I'm just behind on sleep. And for the ballet thing, it's good for my report," Marley said. This wasn't a lie. The school liked it when Marley went to ballet because it meant one less person who had to go to their therapy. And it also looked good on job applications.
"Okay," Isaac said. "But you tell me if something is happening, yeah?"
"Yep," Marley said, smiling.
"Okay, goodnight. I love you," Isaac said.
"I love you too," Marley replied, signing off by ending the phone call. She didn't exactly lie to Isaac, she just didn't tell him the whole truth. She would tell him if this got really bad, though? Right?
Right?
...
"Come in," Marley said from her desk. It was dark outside and the only light was her table lamp and fairly lights that hung on her ladder bookshelf. "Oh, hey."
"Hey," Liam said as he opened the door slowly.
"You okay? You had something to eat?" Marley asked, turning her chair to face him. Their mum was on another date with David, so the kids were left at home. She wasn't back yet which meant that she was probably staying the night at David's. This was a usual routine.
"Yeah, yeah. Um, I just wanted to talk to you," Liam said, in a softer voice than usual. Normally, he would be screaming at the top of his lungs or making rude snarky comments about Marley's new haircut (which was short and wavier).
"Okay," Marley said, standing up and sitting on the end of the bed. Liam sat next to her. He never really let down his guard, so when he did, Marley made sure to give Liam her time. No one talked for a few seconds. "Y'know you usually have to say something to have a conversation."
"It's- I've just been really stressed lately at school," Liam said. "I'm not naturally smart like you, and it takes time to study. I need that time to practice lacrosse."
"Are you failing you classes?" Marley asked.
"No, almost. It's just, all these other guys come from really rich and respected families. They pay for private tutors, and they're all so smart," Liam explained. "And the school curriculum is ten times harder than public schools."
"Well, that's why you don't go to a grammar school. I did tell you not to," Marley said, nudging his arm and hoping for a laugh. But he didn't and kept his head down. "You might not have respected relatives or rich parents. But what you do have is an insanely smart older sister that has some free time on the weekends to tutor you."
"Really?" Liam asked. "You'd do that."
"Of course."
"Thank you."
...
Marley sat at her desk again after her talk with Liam. Her hand held her head as her eyes fluttered shut every once in a while. The time had to be at least eleven o'clock and she'd been working for two hours. She had a whole essay due the next day that she hadn't had time to write in the week. More appropriately, she forgot. Marley's hand went numb as her hand writing worsened with each word. Her eyes closed for a second, but they refused to open. Her hand still moved though she couldn't feel it. The reflexes in her mind made her jerk awake just before her head fell out of her hands.
After realising that she had almost fallen asleep, Marley dropped her pen and leant back. She stretched in her chair and sighed deeply. She rubbed her eyes and looked down at her work. Frowning, she read the words that had been written in her own hand. Her eyes blinked, unsure of what she wrote. She read it again. Then again.
When is a door not a door?
...
"Okay, so what happens to a person who has a near-death experience and comes out of it seeing things?" Scott asked as they all sat around the outside bench. Marley sat next to Isaac and Allison, taking bites from her apple.
"And is unable to tell what's real or not?" Stiles added.
"And is being haunted by demonic visions of dead relatives?" Allison also added.
"They're all locked up because they're insane," Isaac said.
"Ha. Can you at least try and be helpful, please?" Stiles asked, keeping up his daily dose of arguing with Isaac.
"For half my childhood, I was locked in an freezer. So being helpful is kind of a new thing for me," Isaac said.
"We still milking that?"
"Yeah, maybe I am still milking that," Isaac argued with Stiles. Marley sighed and rolled her eyes, not noticing a dark haired girl walk up to them.
"Hi. Hi, sorry. I couldn't help overhearing what you guys were talking about. And I think I actually might know what you're talking about," she said sweetly, Marley thought she recognised her. "There's a Tibetan word for it. It's called "Bardo." It literally means 'in-between state.' The state between life and death."
"And what do they call you?" Lydia asked.
"Kira," Scott said. "She's in our history class."
"Do you mean Bardo in Tibetan Buddhism or Indian?" Marley asked after she thought to herself. She had heard the word Bardo in two different books she had read but didn't know which one Kira was using.
"Either, I guess," Kira replied, sitting next to Stiles. "But all the stuff you guys were just saying? All that happens in Bardo. There are different progressive states where you can have hallucinations. Some you see, some you just hear. And you can by visited by peaceful and wrathful deities."
"Wrathful deities? What are those?" Isaac asked.
"What do you think, Isaac?" Marley asked. "Wrathful, deities."
"Like demons," Kira said.
"Demons, why not?" Stiles said, mentally noting another supernatural creature down, Marley actual noting it down in her notebook, sure to research when she got home.
"Hold on, if there are different progressive states, then what's the last one?" Allison asked.
"Death," Kira said, a little too sweetly. "You die."
...
"It sounds like your subconscious is trying to communicate with you," Deaton said as Marley, Scott and Stiles walked into the back room. Marley only followed them because she had to pick up her grandma's cats medication. But helping a little in the way wouldn't hurt her.
"Well, how do I tell my subconscious to use a language that I actually know?" Stiles asked.
"Do you remember what the sign language was?" Marley asked. "How it looked?"
"You know sign language?" Scott asked, a little surprised.
"My uncle is autistic and can't speak. Me and my brother use sign language around him," Marley replied.
"Okay, the first one was this," Stiles said, holding his finger up and using his other to circle around it.
"That's 'when'," Marley said.
"Then there was this twice," Stiles said, putting his hands side by side and pulling one back.
"That's 'door'."
"And this is in between," Stiles said, flicking thumb under his chin. Marley's heart fell and she felt sick. It couldn't be a coincidence.
"That's it?" Marley said, Stiles nodding. "'When is a door not a door?'"
"When is a door not a door?" Stiles asked in an unsure manner. Marley stepped back and looked down, processing everything.
"When it's ajar," Scott said.
"You're kidding me. A riddle? My subconscious wants to tell me a riddle?"
Marley blanked out for the rest of the conversation. It was like her mind was racing and was unable to process what everyone was saying. She could hear people talking, but she couldn't understand any of it. She had written those exact words. 'When is a door not a door?' Maybe she was just tired. Maybe she had just heard it or seen it in something read. She hoped it was that anyway.
"Marley?" Stiles asked. "You okay?"
"Yeah- yeah I'm fine."
~~~~~
Hi besties.
I don't think I have anything to say about this chapter.
If anyone has tiktok, I have a fandoms account where I post tv shit, mainly teen wolf. It's @random_fandoms.3
Prepare yourself for the last episode of season three cause damn. You have eleven episodes to get emotionally prepared. I'm not and I'm writing it 😭
Thank you for reading, please vote.
- Niamh. Xx