‘Fear does not shut you down. It wakes you up.’

- Veronica Roth, ‘Divergen’

Chapter Twelve

Cole had told Azelie that the thing that fill your nightmares are the things that you fear. For Azelie however, this was a lie. The things that filled her nightmares where not her fears, they were her memories. For her, the things that her nightmares revolved around, well, the people her nightmares revolved around, were dead.

Would he ever figure it out that it was nightmares that kept Azelie up all night, and not her late night part time job as a stripper? Perhaps he would - he had already figured out that the position as a stripper was a lie, but that was the easy part. It was just what actually kept her up at night that he had yet to uncover.

For Azelie, the act of waking up from a nightmare was the worst part of the entire experience. In Azelie’s dreams, right at the very end, she felt peace. The peace you get when you feel no longer fell anymore, when you let go of the rail of a bridge, or the second before a train kills you. The peace of death’s icy embrace. Of course, Azelie wasn’t dying or anything, but she felt like it at the end of her dreams, and so the act of waking up from that was very unsettling. When she was woken up, she felt as if she was being pulled away from death and back into the world of the living with a huge painful kick. Her nightmares had the ability to blur what was reality from what was real. And, when Azelie woke up, she was left with her head pounding in pain, after waking herself up with her screams and cries, she wouldn’t want to be there anymore, she would want to go back to the peace she had felt, even if it was for a split second before she came tumbling back down into the sour reality that was her life. Like some kind of drug, Azelie was addicted to the feeling of feeling nothing. Of feeling like nothing mattered anymore, and that nothing ever would.

“Azelie! Wake up! Azelie!” A voice cried, pulling Azelie out of the peace her mind had been swimming in, sending her back down, crashing into reality. Her brown eyes flew open, Azelie coming face to face with her uncle who was trying to wake her up. Her body felt numb as her uncle wrapped his arms around her, hugging her tightly. “Jesus! Azelie, I thought you were being murdered!” he cried. Ted had been terrified when he was woken up by Azelie screaming out loud. He had forgotten all about her night terrors and thought that Azelie was being attacked, hence the reason why there was now a bat lying in the doorway to her room.

Azelie’s lungs took in only short shallow breaths, her heart beat pounding as her head spun. Nothing seemed real, nothing made sense. The room around Azelie continued to move, her uncle’s face just a swirl of colours. And then suddenly it stopped. Everything came to an abrupt halt and Azelie’s stomach lurched. This pulled her out of her mind, and sent her running out of her bed. She sprinted out of her room and down the hall, before running straight into the bathroom, with barely seconds to spare before her stomach emptied itself of everything she consumed at the party, along with any food she’d had before that. Pain shuttered through Azelie’s body as her stomach lurched again, causing her to throw up what little was left in her stomach. She shook slightly as somebody slowly walked up behind her, pulling her hair out of the way and quickly tying it up in a bun. She managed to stop for a minute or so, her stomach allowing her to take a short break. Azelie slowly grabbed a piece of toilet paper, wiping her mouth before flushing it down the toilet. She refused to move her body away from where she was sat, clutching her stomach, sure that she wasn’t quite finished throwing up yet.

She turned around slightly to find Ted crouching down beside her, sadness and confusion filling his brown eyes. He turned to the left slightly before picking up a glass of water and passing it to Azelie. She sent him a small smile before taking it in her shaky hand, her body still weak from the throwing up. Taking a small gulp of the cold liquid, she felt a bit better, but her stomach continued to threaten to give in once again. Then suddenly, puke rose to her throat, and Azelie quickly span back around and threw up once again in the toilet. Ted sat behind her, making sure none of her hair got in the way while rubbing her back, trying to think of things he could do to make her better. He hated seeing Azelie like this, and he hated feeling totally helpless about the entire situation. When she was done, she wiped her mouth once again, before rinsing out her mouth with the water. There was nothing left in her stomach to throw up and there was no more energy in her body to allow her to do so. She slowly lay down on the bathroom floor, only now realising that she was crying.

“Do you need anything, Azelie? Is there anything I can do?” Ted questioned as he watched her lie down, trying to think of anything that he could do that would help. She just shook her head, turning around to face him.

“I just want to sleep,” she croaked as she reached out for the glass of water, slowly sipping on the cold liquid. Ted nodded slowly as Azelie began to push herself up from the floor. Ted quickly rose to his feet before helping her up, practically carrying her from the bathroom and into her bedroom. He loved Azelie almost as if she was his daughter. He had always wanted children, and it had never happened, but he cared for Azelie as if she was his own. It was heartbreaking for him to hear her screaming out in pain each night, her own mind plotting against her.

When Azelie finally reached her bed, it didn’t take her long to fall back asleep. This time, there were no nightmares.

Rays of late summer sunshine floated through Azelie’s thin curtains, lighting up the blue walls of the room and pulling her from her slumber. She rolled over slightly with a groan, her eyes slowly fluttering opening, their colour of her eyes darker than ever. She glanced up at her alarm clock, seeing that for the first time in years, she had slept in until 9:30.

She pushed herself off her soft mattress, placing her feet onto the cold wooden floor. Azelie stood up, weakly walking over to her wardrobe before pulling out a random hoodie. She pulled the warm fabric over her head before slowly walking out of her room and making her way downstairs, the floor boards creaking with each step she took.

As she walked down stairs, the aroma of pancakes filled the air, calling to Azelie’s stomach which had begun to rumble. She followed the smell into the kitchen, where she found Ted sitting at the table. He held a cup of black coffee in one hand, a fork with a piece of a pancake in the other.

“Morning,” she croaked, finding that her throat was dryer than she had expected. Ted glanced up at her. Although he had a smile on his lips, there were dark circles around his eyes, telling Azelie that he had not slept after she had woken him up.

“Good morning,” He replied, trying to sound like his usual self, and not the worrying uncle he was. “Your breakfast is on the counter, there’s still coffee in the machine if you want some,” he added, sending a slight smile over to his niece, before looking down at his newspaper, trying to read it and keep his mind off worrying about Azelie. She slowly walked over to the counter before checking that the plate of pancakes and bacon was still hot. After placing the plate on the table, she quickly poured a cup of coffee, adding her usual milk and sugar before sitting down opposite Ted.

She began to slowly eat her breakfast, knowing that Ted was worrying about her as he did. It killed her to know that he cared for her so much, in more than just one way. She hated that he cared so much that it had kept him up. With her aunts, they would just put in a pair of ear plugs and continue to sleep without a second thought to spare about Azelie, but with Ted, he actually cared enough to run through to her room and wake her up. She also hated that he cared at all. The whole situation was entirely bitter-sweet. She loved that she, for the first time in five years, felt loved and wanted, as well as cared for my her uncle. It hadn’t been since she had lived with her grandparents that she had felt like she had a home. But she hated it as well. Caring for Azelie never ended well, she had an entire list of names to prove that theory.

“You know, you’re not in too deep in,” she spoke, sucking in a deep breath in. She placed her fork and knife beside her plate, looking up at Ted. He raised his head from the newspaper, with a perplexed look on his face.

“What?” He questioned, confused as to what she was saying.

“You’re not too deep in to send me away. I don’t want to be a worry, Ted. It’s not good-” She spoke but she was cut off.

“No, Azelie. Stop it! I’m not sending you away,” Ted spoke, realization dawning over him as he figured out what Azelie was saying.

“I don’t want you to worry! You know as well as I do, that last night was only scratching the surface of the shit that goes on in my head! Ted, don’t think about letting me down, or anything like that!” Azelie babbled. She could feel the tears rising to her eyes but she managed to keep them down. She loved Ted too much to let him worry about her. It wasn’t good for him. It never ended good for anybody who cared too much for Azelie.

“Azelie! Family sticks together! I know you’ve not had a lot of sticking together over the past five years, and I’m so sorry I wasn’t there to stop it! Jesus Christ, if I knew that you were being passed around like some kind of rag doll, then I would have tried a hell of a lot harder to get you up here! We are a family, sure there is only two of us, but that’s all we need for now! And if that was only the surface of everything that goes on in your head, then you need all the damn support you can get. I am not sending you away, nor am I planning to any time soon! Okay Azelie?” Ted practically shouted, standing up from the table. Azelie sat there, listening to every word he was saying. She saw how upset he was getting about the idea of giving Azelie up, and instantly began to regret taking the subject up.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered, her voice breaking slightly as she tried to hold on to her emotions.

“It’s okay, It’s okay. I guess you are used to people giving up on you, but I promise Azelie, I won’t give up on you until you are all happy inside,” Ted promised, walking over to her before hugging his niece, trying to push the anger that had built up inside of him away.

“And then you will toss me to the side,” Azelie joked slightly, trying to get back to the light hearted atmosphere that always seemed to fill the household. He laughed slightly, shaking his head softly.

“Only then! But until that time comes, I’m not sending you anywhere! Except maybe school,” Ted joked in reply, before looking down at his niece. “Don’t ever start that again! I will be forced to ground you or do something parental!” He smiled, his eyes crinkling at the corners.

“Like you would do anything parental! You are too immature!” Azelie replied, rolling her eyes slightly at her uncle. He unwrapped his arms from around her before going back around to his side of the table, and sitting at his chair.

“I’ll just have a nice little chat with the guy who keeps dropping you off,” Ted suggested, wiggling his eyebrows slightly before grinning evilly in Azelie’s direction. Azelie thought for a second before answering Ted.

“I might have to get you to do that actually! You might scare him away for me,” Azelie smirked, before digging into her breakfast, the light hearted feeling returning fully to the house.

Azelie spent the rest of the day resting while Ted went to work at the gallery. He had refused to let her work after she was sick the night before. She had spent the day lying around the house, watching films and reading books before finally deciding to finish the painting she had been working on all week. The paining wasn’t of anything special, it wasn’t even planned. She just couldn’t sleep one night and decided to paint at 3 in the morning. The painting was just a cluster of blues and greens, the stripes of colour resembling something that Azelie couldn’t figure out.

Looking around her room confused, she began to search for her phone, all the while wondering who the hell was calling her. The only two people who had her number was Ted and Kelly, and both had no reason to call her. Well, Kelly might be calling her to rant about something random, but Azelie was pretty sure that she had said that she was having some kind of family get together today. Eventually she found her phone under a pile of books that had been dumped in a corner. She looked at the caller ID, only to find that it was unknown. Falling deeper into an ocean of confusion, she pressed the answer button, before holding the phone up to her ear.

“Hello?” she said answering the phone, the greeting coming out as more of a question than anything else.

“Hey? Azelie, is that you?” a voice spoke in return, confusion taking over as she tried to figure out who was calling her. The voice was familiar, so it wasn’t a wrong number or something.

“Yeah... who is this?” she questioned preparing herself to hang up the phone.

“Good! I was terrified that Kelly had given me the number to some stripping sex line or something! She’s done that far too many times for me to trust her completely with number!” the voice rambled slightly, before realising that they hadn’t answered Azelie’s question. “It’s Cole, by the way,” And with that, Azelie began to wish that she had just missed the call.

“Oh,.. why do you have my number?” She questioned, regret from answering the phone now taking over. Why couldn’t she have just missed it? Couldn’t whatever he had to say wait until Monday morning

“I asked Kelly for it! She started getting all super excited about it! I have a strange feeling that she’s trying to set us up!” he laughed slightly.

“Pah, tell me something I don’t know!” Azelie said, letting out a little laugh. “Maybe if you stopped walking me home she would drop it!”

“Ha, not going to happen Azelie! Nice try thought!” he laughed as Azelie let out a little groan. “Anyway, are you free tomorrow?” he questioned

“Now saying things like that is definitely going to make Kelly think that we are dating Cole!” Azelie joked, trying to avoid answering the question.

“Stop trying to change the subject and just answer the damn question!” Cole replied, seeing right through Azelie’s plan. Azelie let out a another groan, hating how he could always seem to see right through everything Azelie said.

“Yes, I’m free tomorrow,” she answered grudgingly, knowing that there was no point in her lying about it.

“Great! I’ll pick you up around 12 if that’s okay?” Cole questioned leaving Azelie feeling very confused.

“Wait? What! Why are you picking me up?” Azelie questioned furiously. “And don’t even trying that ‘it’s a secret’ crap or I’ll tell my uncle to declare me kidnapped if I’m out for more that three hours tomorrow!” She threatened. He laughed slightly at Azelie, liking the side of her he was seeing.

“I’m guessing you are just a huge fan of secrets!” Cole joked.

“The biggest!” Azelie replied, “Now tell me where the hell you are taking me or I will suddenly become very busy tomorrow!” She added. Cole let out a sign, realising that his plan to change the subject had failed.

“Consider it phase one in my plan to find your fear,” he answered, still not giving her a straight answer.

“Okay... and what does phase one consist of?” She questioned, raising an eyebrow at him.

“Azelie Ryans, tomorrow you are jumping out a plane!”

Yay! Chapter twelve! :) Yeah.. I have nothing of importance to say today! I've replased into my Katy Perry lovin' ways... I will return to normality soon enough (Damn you part of me film *shakes fist in the air*) Going with the Katy Perry mood, today's song on the side is going to be 'Not Like the Movies'

Yes this has NOTHING to do with the chapter, but I don't care. This song is awesome and it makes me cry so yeah, cry! :)

Sorry for being weird. It's four am, and I'm can't sleep. Things might get interesting...

- Unicorn out.