Fever Dreams [Disturbing Content]

Chris lay in his bed with a mountain of blankets on top of him. He had pneumonia and felt like he could die. His eyes fluttered open as consciousness gradually returned to him. He felt terrible and he could barely move, on his bed-side table was an unfinished glass of orange juice. He picked it up and sipped it, the cold liquid went down his throat and he shivered violently. He set the glass down and knocked on the wall behind his headboard. 

This was how he signaled his neighbor Mrs. Johnson. She was an extremely kind old woman and Chris regularly went over to her apartment to help her out with chores. Her husband had passed away five years ago and Chris figured that he was making her happy by keeping her company. The two had a simple system where they would just knock twice on the wall if they needed something. The second part of their system was to knock rapidly if there was an emergency. Three months ago, she had a stroke and wasn't able to reach the phone, she knocked on the wall rapidly and Chris called 911 for her. He'd saved her life once and now, in a way she's saving his. The past couple of days she'd been coming over and giving him soup to try to revitalize him. She was almost like a second grandmother to Chris, he liked her very much. That moment, Mrs. Johnson came in through Chris' unlocked door and entered the small apartment.

“Oh, Chris!” She exclaimed. “You don't look like you're getting better, would you like some more soup?” She asked.

“That would be wonderful.” Chris said. “Thank you for doing this” He added.

“Oh, anytime.” She said. “Thank you, for being a kind, considerate neighbor. It'll take about an hour to make a fresh batch of soup. Why don't you get some sleep, I'll bring it over when its done.” She said.

“Okay, I'll do that.” Chris said already beginning to nod off as Mrs. Johnson left.

He immediately began to slip into a disorienting dream. In the dream Chris was getting ready to eat a carrot. That's all the dream was, he wasn't quite asleep, he wasn't quite awake either, yet it wasn't a lucid dream. Chris was very aware of the carrot and the fact that he wanted to eat it. Yet, why couldn't he eat it? He kept waking up part way through and he could think of nothing but the carrot. His brain became obsessed with the carrot. He would close his eyes and he would be holding the carrot, he'd be lifting it to his mouth and then he'd wake up. Why couldn't he eat the carrot? His brain screamed. He closed his eyes once more and saw the carrot, orange, cone shaped, and delicious, taunting him. He wouldn't eat it, he woke up again. Eat the fucking carrot! His brain screamed as Chris finally fell asleep descending into the world of unobtainable carrots.

The dream repeated several more times and his feverish mind eventually decided to go with it. He became more and more awake and the thought of carrots slipped away from him. He awoke a while later to gentle knocking on his apartment door. It must have been Mrs. Johnson with the soup. That meant he hadn't been asleep for even an hour. He was stuck in that stupid carrot filled nightmare the whole time. He looked around his one room apartment. He didn't have much else besides his bed, he had a small television, a bookshelf with some books and a modest DVD collection, and a couple of game consoles. Aside from those, there wasn't anything that was interesting in his apartment. His mind drifted and lingered on his possessions for no apparent reason and then he remembered that Mrs. Jonson was outside his door.

“It's open.” He managed mustering as much clarity to his voice as possible.

“Chris, I made you some carrot soup.” Mrs. Johnson said entering the room setting the tray with the nearly overflowing bowl of soup on his lap.

“Oh, thank you Mrs. Johnson.” He said briefly remembering his carrot dream glancing down at the soup.

“Anytime dear, knock on the wall if you need anything.” She said, leaving.

Chris started to eat the soup and it was really good. Suddenly his carrot dream made sense, she was cooking carrots and the smell of them worked into his sub-conscious. It was still an unpleasant dream, a fever dream. He felt like he couldn't escape from it even though there was nothing inherently wrong with the dream itself. He flipped on the TV and watched some cable crime drama as he finished the rest of the soup. He set the tray and the bowl on his bedside table and got ready to drift off. He thought his fever was getting worse, he felt really hot but didn't really have the energy to mess with the blankets. He curled up in the giant blanket pile and decided to deal with it. He quickly fell asleep and descended into a much darker, twisted dream.

In the dream, Mrs. Johnson was in her apartment cleaning her kitchen. She was happily scrubbing the soup pot, washing plates, and silverware all while singing a little tune. The peaceful scene changed as his dream shifted over to her door. The door quietly opens without her knowledge and behind it is an imposing figure. The figure looked to be about seven feet tall, presumably male, he wore baggy pants and a hoodie with the hood covering his face. In his right hand was a machete which he gripped loosely with the tip of the blade touching the floor. He advanced into the small apartment and the machete made a slight scraping sound against the floor. 

Mrs. Johnson notices him and screams. The man is unfazed, even calm. He slowly approaches her and puts an enormous hand over her mouth. She panics even more and begins pounding on the wall rapidly, our emergency signal. For whatever reason, I don't respond. He pushes her into the wall with one hand, with the other he raises the machete. He looks at it contemplatively and then slowly cuts across her abdomen. Her screams are muted by his large hand. When the job was done, he let go of her head, and she collapsed like a rag doll on the floor, guts spilling out on the apartment floor. The figure turns around, holding the machete in a relaxed position again. He left the apartment leaving behind a trail of blood.

Chris woke up hyperventilating, and reached for his phone. Why was he doing that? It was a dream right? At that moment he thought he heard rapid knocking on the wall. Now he really had to know if Mrs. Johnson was okay. His heart was racing as he struggled with the number, he dialed it correctly and it began to ring. Once, twice, three times, after four times, Chris started to panic. After seven times he was about ready to hang up and call 911 when he heard her voice on the other end.

“Hello?” She asked.

“Oh! Mrs. Johnson!” Chris exclaimed, trying not to sound frightened. “I thought I heard you emergency knocking earlier and I wanted to call to see if you were okay.” He said.

“No, I wasn't doing our emergency knock Chris. You should get back to sleep, goodbye now.” She said.

Chris breathed a sigh of relief, all of the excitement had made him go from hot to cold very quickly. He was tired again, he fell asleep in hopes of escaping that awful dream. It was no use, as he closed his eyes he saw every detail again. The man opening the door. Slowly approaching poor Mrs. Johnson, cornering her and slicing her stomach open. It was horrific, the images would not leave his brain. They kept repeating over and over again. He tossed and turned trying to fall asleep, trying to expel the terrifying images from his head. It was to no avail, as the dream kept repeating it kept revealing more details. The dream would zoom in on the machete slowly moving across Mrs. Johnson's stomach. Other times it would zoom in on her face which was a bloody twisted mess of fear and agony. It would show Mrs. Johnson's feeble attempt to stop the bleeding. What terrified Chris the most was when the dream zoomed in on the figure. It was still dark but Chris could see a face, a cold, stone faced man devoid of emotion. The man had dark brown eyes that were pools of malice and yet his face maintained a very serious, calm expression. Except when gutting Mrs. Johnson. Only then, did the man's face show a slight curl of a smile. The dream continued to repeat, showing Chris the horrific scene in hundreds of different ways. Eventually some part of his brain became convinced that it was real and he was able to force himself awake. 

He finally woke up after convincing himself it was real, that was the only way to wake himself up. But it wasn't real, was it? Consciousness gradually returned to him and he looked at his television. He chuckled as he saw it was playing some horror movie where the monster gutted its victims in a similar manner to his dream. He figured it was another case of real world objects interfering with his subconscious. He laughed it off but just then he heard frantic, panicked knocking on his wall. This was followed by a sick squishing sound of a sharp object penetrating flesh. This was no dream, this was happening, he grabbed the phone and called 911. He told the responding officer that he heard his neighbor get murdered, he told them Mrs. Johnson's address and they said they'd be right over. He turned off his TV and remained perfectly still. He sat alone in his bed, covered in blankets with only the sound of his rapidly beating heart to keep him company.

A few minutes later, he heard police officers storm down his hall and open Mrs. Johnson's door. A muffled conversation came from the other apartment and the police officers left. He heard knocking on his door and he told the officers to come in.

“Are you the one who called about a murder?” The first officer asked.

“Yes I did, is Mrs. Johnson okay?” Chris asked.

“Son.” The second officer started. “She's fine, all we found in there was an old woman eating soup.”

“What?” Chris asked bewildered. “I heard her... I swear I did!” Chris exclaimed.

“We'll let you off with a warning.” The first officer said. “You're sick and we don't want to make it worse with a night in jail. Take care.” He said leading the second officer out of the apartment.

“It wasn't real...” Chris muttered.

“It's not real.” He said to himself with more conviction.

“It was not real.” He said with confidence as he lay back down.

It was all just a dream, a terrible nightmare he thought. His dream hadn't ended, he had just heard the dream somehow. He knew now that no part of it was real and was able to sleep peacefully for a few hours. That is until the dream came back. It wasn't real said his conscious mind. He slept calmly through the horrific images, Mrs. Johnson getting murdered over and over again. It didn't bother him anymore, it wasn't real. He could see the dream in thousands of different ways but it no longer affected him, it didn't exist.

He wasn't bothered when he woke up to Mrs. Johnson's scream echo through the apartment complex. He wasn't bothered by the frantic knocking on his wall. He wasn't bothered when he heard the machete slice her open. He wasn't bothered when he heard the machete scrape against the hallway leading to his door. He wasn't bothered when his door opened and the man with the machete entered. He wasn't bothered when the machete came down on his stomach. He wasn't bothered by his guts spilling out his bed. He wasn't bothered by dying either because it was all just a dream.