Don't Wake Me Up | Chapter 1

            Bradley Carlisle had been a high-school teacher for two years. He taught a computer class, and he really enjoyed his job. He was well-liked by his students and co-workers, and he had a loving fiancée. However, there were some things about himself that he liked to keep hidden. No one but his wife-to-be knew about his dark past, and he was more than okay with that: he wanted to move on with his life. The crimes he had commit in the past were just that: in the past. He wanted to be a normal man. A good man.

            That was why he was so confused by how he’d ended up dabbling in his past habits again. Just over a week ago, he had been doing just fine in keeping everything under control, but what had started as a good deed had wound up ruining the lives of everyone he knew. His poor fiancée… He couldn’t figure out where he’d gone wrong. His action had seemed so innocent. How had this happened?

            He looked at his latest friend, who was staring back at him in terror. It was just them now, with their backs to a dead end. They were surrounded by dozens of nearly-human creatures that they could do no harm to. They were cornered. They were doomed. As they stared at each other, they blindly grabbed for each other’s hands.

            It was all over.

---

 

            November 26^th, 2018. It was a Monday. It was also a day just like any other for Bradley Carlisle… or so it seemed, until his lunch break. After the bell rung, he went down to the staff room, like he always did. A small group of his female co-workers were inside chatting, and they greeted him briefly as he entered, before returning to their discussion. Quietly, Bradley walked over to the coffee machine, a smile on his face. He was used to being the quiet type, known more for eavesdropping than actually holding decent conversation. As he poured himself a cup, he listened in to what was being said.

            “Have any of you seen the new nurse?” One of the women asked. “I heard he’s just dreamy.”

            His favorite of the girls, a black-haired math teacher named Molly Barton, scoffed before sardonically adding, “I heard he was overqualified.”

            Suddenly, Bradley found himself interested in their gossip. He was usually the first to find out when there was a new member of the staff, even if they were a janitor, but he had been completely oblivious about them having a new nurse. So, he turned to look at them, took two steps forward, and spoke. “Ladies,” he began in a friendly tone, “may I join the conversation?”

            “Sure, Brad.” Molly welcomed him. She had been a teacher for only a year, and she looked to be about twenty-eight years old, but she was definitely the friendliest of Bradley’s co-workers (at least out of the women, anyway).

            Bradley took a sip of his coffee. The computer teacher was a 5’9” man who was a bit stocky, but in a way that most people found lovable. His hair was a pale, dark brown color and was kept rather short, and he also had a somewhat thick beard. He had shaved it once, but when his fiancée saw him beardless, she half didn’t recognize him, and half demanded that he only trim from that point onward, never shave. As such, essentially, every month was No-Shave November for him. His nose was rather straight, and while that was something he was impartial about, his fiancée seemed to love it, as well as his thin eyebrows and his blue eyes, which were often described as “naturally welcoming” or “friendly”. “Who’s this nurse you’re talking about?” He inquired, expressing his curiosity further (with a touch of melodrama) by raising his left eyebrow. “I didn’t know we had a new one.”

            Molly shrugged. “I haven’t seen him myself. I heard he was a doctor two years ago, but he quit after his parents and best friend died, all within a month.”

            Bradley recoiled slightly and looked down at his mug. He hadn’t expected her to say something so depressing in response to what had been a casual question. “Geez.” He exclaimed, but made no further comments.

            “Yeah.” Molly lifted the bowl of leftover stir-fry she was holding. After putting a piece of chicken into her mouth, she talked as she chewed, saying, “God knows why he wanted to work here. If the system weren’t so broken right now�"goddamn this chicken is good�"I don’t think he would’ve even been considered. Y’know, the whole ‘was an actual medical doctor’ thing.”

            Bradley chuckled. After a beat, he asked, “Does this guy have a name?”

---

 

            He had carried his mug with him, and when he stopped in front of the nurse’s office, he took another sip of java. Then, he knocked on the door. He waited for thirty seconds, and then for another, before he knocked again, a little bit louder this time. There was still no answer, so he sighed. He was just about to turn away when the door was pulled open. Bradley then took his first long look at the new nurse.

            Most noticeable about the man, other than his height (he had to be at least 6’2”) and how slender he was, was his curly, dark brown hair. It almost seemed to have a mind of its own with how fluffy and wild it was, sticking out in any which direction. In his head, Bradley found himself comparing it to an angora rabbit, but he chose not to express his inner laughter at the similarity, lest he accidentally offend him.

            “Can I help you?” The former doctor near-interrogated. If Bradley didn’t know any better, he would’ve said the tone of his voice was quite bitter. It made sense, though, when he got a better look at the man’s face: he had a thick stubble around his lower face, and his brown eyes were half shut, surrounded by dark, bruise-colored rings. He looked like hell.

            “Hey.” Bradley opted to respond with his normal greeting, extending his left hand out toward the nurse. “Name’s Brad. Bradley Carlisle. Nice to meet you.”

            The tall man took his time in looking down at the offer of friendship, and he wasn’t any quicker in looking back up to meet Bradley’s eyes. The computer teacher merely stood in place, blinking, waiting for the near-stranger to either accept the handshake or close the door in his face. For him, awkwardness was something he brushed shoulders with in social interactions so often that he hardly even noticed it anymore. He would wait. After a few seconds of them just staring at each other, still Bradley did not move, but he did speak, hoping to coax the doctor into reacting in some way other than a staring contest. “What’s your name?”

            “Darcy.”

            “Do you have a last name?” It was a smartass question, but he asked it with a tone that suggested nothing but pure�"yet friendly�"formality, as was his way.

            Darcy let out a slightly frustrated breath, but it seemed he had a good bit of patience left in him. “Adair,” He answered. “Now can I help you with something or not?”

            Bradley thought for a moment. “Well… Technically, no. Not really.”

            “Then please leave.” Darcy grumbled.

            Shut down, Bradley finally lowered his hand. Darcy then closed the door on him. They repeated “conversations” like this for the rest of the week, every lunch hour. For the first two days, Darcy grew increasingly annoyed, to the point where, on the 28^th, he merely opened the door, poked out his head, barked “Don’t bother me anymore,” and shut the door. However, the following day, he resumed their previous pattern, and the day after that, he seemed calmer.

            On the following Monday, December 3^rd, he opened the door with a defeated sigh. “Look,” he muttered, “do you need something? If not, don’t�"”

            “Yes.”

            The former doctor looked down only a bit, discovering the shorter man’s palm to be sliced open. He gasped when he saw the blood, and mumbled the words, “Holy s**t,” under his breath before finally moving aside, allowing the computer teacher into his office. Bradley stepped inside casually, almost as if his cut hand didn’t bother him whatsoever, and Darcy closed the door. “What the hell happened?” He questioned as he stepped over to the teacher, grabbing his hand and looking at his bleeding palm.

            “Well,” Bradley tittered awkwardly, attempting to gauge Darcy’s reaction as he continued, “it’s a funny story involving a butter knife and a piece of toast.”

            “You cut yourself with a butter knife?” The doctor asked incredulously.

            “I’m a real klutz.”

            Darcy shook his head and grabbed a stool, putting it down beside Bradley. “Sit down,” he ordered before walking toward the cabinet, pulling it open to find what he’d need.

            As Bradley obeyed the ex-doctor’s order, he felt a little bad. In truth, it had not been with a butter knife that he cut himself. Really, he wasn’t even sure if it was at all possible to use a butter knife to cut flesh, at least not without something to sharpen it. It was just that he’d needed a way to get Darcy to do more than ignore him and shut the door in his face, and he had already, in his past, cut his palms way more than any reasonable human being ever should, so it had just sort of seemed like a good idea in the heat of the moment. On one hand, it had got him into the nurse’s office, and he was now privy to the fact that Darcy felt more emotions than bitter scorn for everything and everyone, but on the other, he was dripping blood all over the floor, and the man probably thought he was insane or stupid�"neither a claim of which he would feel too confident in arguing against. Really, he was just a stubborn guy; he didn’t take well to being rejected a proper introduction. Usually, he made friends with his peers easily, but Darcy had put up a challenge, and it wouldn’t have been like him not to bite.

            Darcy pulled out a medicine kit, putting in on a table near Bradley before turning to him. He again approached and looked down at his palm. “Here, stand up. You’re going to need to wash it off in the sink so I can see how deep it is.”

            “It’s not too deep.” He wasn’t sure if this was true, so he stood up and approached the nurse’s sink anyway. It stung to run the cut under warm water, but he sucked it up and grit his teeth. Once he could see where his flesh had been split, he held his hand up for the former doctor to look at.

            “That’s pretty bad.” Darcy admit. “You really did this with a butter knife?”

            “Yeah.”

            “Look, I… I mean, I don’t intend to sound overly cautious, but you might want to see a doctor about this.”

            “Well, you’re a doctor. That’s close enough, right?”

            “I’m not a doctor anymore,” Darcy grumbled while pouring alcohol onto a cotton swab. As he cleaned the cut, Bradley repeatedly twitched with every twinge of pain it caused him.

            “Why not?”

            “I quit.”

            “Why?”

            “You ask too many questions, Mr. Carlisle.”

            “Please, call me Bradley.” He offered through his teeth. “Or Brad. Whatever you prefer.”

            “Well, Bradley, I’m going to put this pad against your wound, and wrap it up with gauze.” The nurse announced. “Then you should go to the hospital.”

            “Can I ask you two more questions?” Bradley asked innocently.

            Darcy sighed. “Fine.”

            “You seem like a nice guy. Why are you so bitter?”

            The taller man shot Bradley a hard look. After a few seconds of only glaring, he finally answered the question. “I lost everyone.” He stated in a flat, vaguely-annoyed voice. “I never got to say goodbye to my parents, and my best friend died in my lap six hours before Christmas, on the first night of Hanukkah. Does that about cover it for you?”

            Bradley raised his eyebrows and pouted in mock thought, despite already having his answer. “Yeah, pretty much.”

            “And what was your other question?” Darcy hissed as he roughly wrapped the gauze around Bradley’s hand.

            “That was my second question.”

            “What?”

            “My first question was if I could ask you two more questions. That way you couldn’t say it counted as the question.” Bradley realized he was ceasing to make sense when he noticed how Darcy was staring at him with his left eyebrow raised. “Sorry, I’m rambling. I’ll go now.”

---

 

            The final bell of the day rung, and with it, Bradley sat back. His students, all chattering as they went, left the room. Once he was alone, the computer teacher stood up and gathered his things. He was about ready to leave when he had a bothersome thought. Reluctantly, he opened the second lowest drawer on his desk. There was a medium-sized book in there at the bottom of a pile of papers, bound in black leather, and he pulled it out. He had no need to keep it there. If anyone ever found it, he would be in terrible trouble. It would ruin his reputation. So, he put it in the middle of the two binders he was carrying with him in order to hide it and its cover from anyone he might pass by on the way out.

            He then stepped out of his room, closing the door behind himself and making sure it was locked before beginning to walk quickly down the hall. He had just stepped into an intersection when he slammed into someone, dropping everything in his arms onto the floor. Papers scattered everywhere, and Bradley looked down.

            “Oh, s**t,” murmured the person he’d clumsily walked into, “I’m sorry. Let me help you pick this up.”

            “Thanks.” Bradley remarked, already crouched down and picking things up. The rings on one of his binders had popped open�"just his luck�"and he was so focused on putting papers back onto them that he didn’t realize he was doing it alone until he saw that whoever had offered to help him was now standing up beside him. He recognized the long, slender legs to be those of Darcy Adair, so he quickly looked up; Darcy had picked up a few papers, but he had stood up to stare in shock at the other item he had picked up: Bradley’s little black book of dark magic.

            Panicked, Bradley leapt to his feet, looking up at Darcy with concern knit across his face. “That book isn’t anything.” He stammered a fake excuse as a piss-poor attempt to cover himself. “A student gave it to me as a joke.”

            “It’s no joke,” Darcy breathed, still gazing at the book. He had what could have been described as a look of wild hope for something forming in his eyes, but Bradley was still concerned that he was in a bad situation.

            “Look, I�"I can explain.”

            “Can we talk? In my office?”

            Chewing nervously on the corner of his lip, knowing that he was screwed, Bradley cautiously asked, “About what?”

            With a serious yet pleading look in his brown eyes, Darcy finally looked at Bradley, and answered, “About my best friend.”