?'s P.O.V.

People say nightmares only exist in your mind. But I know they don't. The dreams of fear you have in your mind are all too real.

How do I know this, you may ask? The answer is I have a gift. I can see the nightmares and fears of people when I look at them. Their fears turn black as night and rise from their hosts, taking on a distorted form. I used to battle them in the night trying to stay free from the gift, or rather curse, I possess. So many would say I am special but once I wished I wasn't. Life was hard enough without the extra emotional baggage.

But the nightmares never ceased, so I was stuck with them. On the outside, I was just a regular twelve year-old girl. On the inside I was a warrior, fighting to keep my body. The nightmares tried to take me over and use my body as a shell to take others. They only tried for me since I was the only one who can touch them. I feared them, but at the same time I hid it. Who wants to admit they're scared of just nightmares?

That was the last thought that entered my mind when a madman entered my school, changing my life forever. He murdered everyone in my classroom, while I hid behind the bookshelf. He found me, though, and as I thought I would die, I threw up my arms to shield myself. A black pulse erupted from my palms and forced him away into a heap in the corner. His eyes white with fear, he began muttering, traumatized. The police whom the principal had called came in to find the man sobbing like a child and myself curled into a ball, terrified at what I'd done. The only thing they could get out of the man was 'Keep me away from her.' which wasn't very helpful. At the time, I refused to speak about it.

Eventually, the police concluded the man had killed the people whose bodies they had found since his prints were on them, he held the murder weapon and their blood was all over him. If not for that, they would have said it was me. Instead they stuck me in an asylum where a therapist tried to talk to me. I didn't, though. Now that I knew the shadows would protect me, why tell the very people who were making me suffer?

It took awhile time, but finally I managed to communicate with the shadows. My family having abandoned me, the nightmares replaced them. My mother became the head officer's fear, an old woman whom had lived down his street as a child. My father was the therapist's fear, his sick father who died after the therapist had left home. My baby brother was the cellmate's next to mine, who had lost her baby in an accident. A mismatch family, but they would do until I escaped.

That happened two years later. With the shadows' help, who hid me, I escaped. But in escaping my hell, I let go of my family again. I have been alone since, surviving in shadow. My name I shed long ago to stay free. Occasionally, the shadows have told me I could change. Become like them, a being without pain and suffering and emotion. Yes, the seemingly harmless word that had scarred me oh-so badly. I had been tempted a few times, hence my black hair and single black hand. But I knew once I became one, there was no going back. I wanted to be sure.

So four years after the first incident, here I am. A nameless, parentless girl. Living in secret without you ever knowing she is there. But if ever you are alone at night, being haunted by your dreams, shivering in your sleep, wishing them away, if ever you should feel a hand on your skin, open your eyes to find it black as the night sky, that is me. I will smile gently, hush you, and place my black hand on your forehead. You will feel warm and drowsy before closing your eyes once more, falling into a gentle slumber, your nightmares forever forgotten until the next fear.