A soft pitter-patter of the rain gently resonated against the roof of his bedroom as low thunder hummed overhead. I turned over in his bed. My eyes were beginning to sting from staring at the small print of the book.

“Should we do anything?” I asked.

He glanced up from his book and pushed his reading glasses down to see me. “Like what? It's raining.”

“I don't know.” I sat up. There was a large bookcase packed to the brim, but very few were actually interesting. “Video games?”

“My mom says I play them too much.” He watched as I put my novel back on his shelf. He kept his eyes fixated on me.

“What?” I asked.

He shrugged before turning back to his book. He folded a piece of paper and shoved it between the pages.

Finally, I sighed. “If we aren't going to do anything, I'm going home.”

“It's raining.”

“I know but -” Before I could move, he got to his feet, but didn't say anything. “What?” He was getting weirder by the day.

“Don’t leave.” He looked up at me with a nervous smile. “I like you.”

The more he said it the more it was actually beginning to hurt. “You say that a lot. I'm starting to think it might be true.” I knew he would always say the same thing.

This time he burst into laughter. “No! Absolutely not.”

I flinched. As expected.

“It's obviously a joke.” He set his book down and dragged his feet across the white carpet. With a loud groan, he fell face first into his comforter. “Leave if you want.”

“Okay?” I waited, but he didn't add anything. “Why are you acting like this?”

“Like what?” He wouldn’t look at me.

“I dunno… You’re being weird.” And honestly, it was creeping me out. I didn’t like it.

“Because you wouldn't believe me if it were true, anyway.” His body rose as he were a corpse rising from the dead. As he approached me, his footsteps were dulled by the rapidly increasing pace of the rain. It droplet smacked the windows. “I've made it pretty obvious, haven't I? I really, really like you.”

My face felt hot. I could hear my own heartbeat thumping loudly in my eardrum. Before I could put my clammy hands out to stop him, he got closer. “What?” Was all I could think to say.

“More than a friend.” He told me.

My brain froze up. I didn't know what to say next. But my own thoughts were drawn out by a massive explosion that engulfed everything into a black void. I squeezed my eyes shut. My ears started to ring. I fell to the ground, then realized there wasn't one when I looked. There was nothing but perpetual darkness in all directions. Even still, the rain clashed flashes of light illuminating a very familiar field. One bolt lighting blood, splattered against the decayed crop.

“Wake up!”

I shot my eyes open and immediately sat up, knocking my sister's forehead against mine. “Ow.”

She pushed me down. “You really can't stop making so much fucking noise, can you?” She demanded. She pushed me back down when I tried to get up again. “Quit crying like a little girl, idiot!”

I wanted to grab her and throw her against my wall, but I restrained myself. If she did anything to me it wouldn't matter. But if I assaulted daddy's little girl again, I might not make it out of the house alive.

I turned off the alarm on my phone and sat up, rubbing my eyes. My face was wet.

“Shit.” I dried my face and got up. “What did I even dream?” Only my body was left trembling as sudden glimpses of it came to memory, but never a full picture.