A week later, Abigail jolted awake with a gasp, her eyes flying open, her breath ragged as her fingers clawed at the soaked sheets beneath her.
The cold water that had been poured on her dripped down her face, snapping her back to the present, out of the violent grip of her nightmare.
Genevieve stood over her, an empty bowl in her hand, smirking down at Abigail as though she had done her a favor. Her expression was one of disgust, her lips curling in a cruel, satisfied smile.
"You're such a mess," Genevieve sneered, her voice sharp in the early morning silence. "Can't even wake up properly without throwing yourself around like some kind of lunatic. How pathetic."
Abigail blinked, disoriented, her body still trembling from the nightmare. The room was bright and real, yet the images from her dream clung to her mind like stubborn shadows.
"Get up," Genevieve ordered, tossing the empty bowl onto Abigail's nightstand with a clatter.
"I have decided that I can't lie around here doing nothing simply because you were foolish enough to get knocked up. I'm returning to school, but I need you to first complete all the assignments and whatever else needs to be submitted. I'll take them back with me, and I'll just email you my assignments so you can get them done," Genevieve said, but Abigail wasn't listening.
Her thoughts were still scattered and centered on her confusing dream, and her heart was yet to settle.
"Are you listening to me?" Genevieve barked when Abigail didn't stand up or pay her mind.
Abigail turned to her, her irritation flashing in her eyes before she could mask it. Genevieve gasped in disbelief when she caught it.
"Did you just glare at me? How dare you look at me that way, you worthless mute? You must think you're something now simply because you're pregnant, and he let you keep it," Genevieve said, eyeing her with anger.
Abigail inhaled deeply, telling herself that she wasn't a worthless mute and that all she had to do was tolerate Genevieve a little more and do as she wanted, and then Genevieve would leave for school and get out of her hair for a couple of months.
Keeping her eyes down, Abigail got off the bed slowly, her limbs heavy and aching. Her fingers brushed against her soaked hair as water dripped down her face like sweat.
Genevieve leaned in close, her voice a low whisper. "If I were you, I'd abort this pregnancy. That man you call your father is too cold and heartless to do anything kind or considerate for anyone. He has ulterior motives. Take it from me."
When did Genevieve begin to care about her? Abigail wondered with an inward snort, but she smiled and nodded at Genevieve as she picked up her phone and typed: [Good thing you're not me since you're too perfect to be a worthless mute like me. Thanks for your concern.]
Genevieve scowled as Abigail turned the screen to her, and she read the message.
"Whatever. Come with me," Genevieve ordered as she turned to leave the room.
Genevieve paused when her eyes caught something on the edge of the bed, and she turned again, "What's that?" She asked with a frown, pointing to the familiar stuffed panda.
Abigail's eyes widened slightly, her heart pounding with fear as Genevieve reached for it.
"Where and when did you get this?" Genevieve asked, recognizing it was Dawn's panda from years ago, which her adult friend, Lucy, had gifted her.
When they first met Dawn had clung to the stuffed panda and had refused to let her or anyone else touch it, not even her Mom. It had taken a while for Dawn to let her touch it, and over time, Dawn had told her the name of the stuffed panda was Lucy, and it was a gift from Lucy, her first best friend.
Seeing it now with her after all these years made her pause. How had it gotten into her hands again? Did she know what it was? Genevieve mused, wondering if her father was aware that she had the panda in her possession again. She doubted it.
Knowing her father, he was going to kill her if he so much as saw Abigail with the stuffed panda. She was not supposed to come in contact with anything that might trigger her memory.
Abigail tried to keep her expression neutral as she typed on her text-to-speech app instead of her regular text box. The voice came on, "I bought it. It's cute, isn't it? You can have it if you want it," she offered, knowing that Genevieve would reject it if she offered it like it was nothing special to her.
Genevieve wrinkled her nose with disgust, "Why would I want to keep such an ugly thing? I'm going to discard it," she said as she walked out with it.
Abigail frowned, wondering why Genevieve would bother to want to discard it herself, but she said nothing as she let her have it.
As attached as she was to the stuffed animal, she didn't want to beg Genevieve to let her keep it. Also, as much as the stuffed animal reminded her of Jamal, she now has something else that will always remind her of him.
The baby in her womb.
As Abigail followed Genevieve out, she glanced at the wall clock in her room. It was just one in the morning, and from all indications, Genevieve had just returned from the club.
Abigail had barely slept for two hours, and she couldn't believe that Genevieve had disturbed her sleep when she could just have emailed the assignments to her.
It was obvious that Genevieve was doing this just to frustrate her. She wished she could complain or ask Genevieve if they could wait until morning, but she knew asking her would only attract her wrath, followed by endless insults and name-calling. And then she would still have to do the said tasks. She would rather avoid all of that drama.
She was just going to get it done now so that Genevieve would leave quietly by morning.
They walked into the library, and she gestured to the empty desk where only her laptop sat. "Sit there and get to it," she said.
Abigail's brows pulled together as she stared at the empty desk, and she typed on her phone, [What am I getting to? There's nothing here.]
Genevieve glared at her, "Are you stupid? Don't you know what you're supposed to do? Check your phone or something and find out what happened in my absence and what needs to be done, then get to it. I'm going to bed. It should be ready by the time I wake up," Genevieve said before strutting away with Lucy.
With a weary sigh, Abigail went to sit at the desk. It irked her that Genevieve had woken her for this when she could have waited until morning.
As she unlocked her phone to check their department's group chat for any messages, she saw that she had an unread email, so she clicked on it.
Her lips twitched when she saw it was a broadcast email from the school inviting their nonverbal students for outreach to sensitize them on the use of text-to-speech applications for effective communication.
She sighed deeply, wishing she was in school so she could attend the outreach. She would have loved to meet and communicate with other nonverbal people and find out if they had stepsisters that tormented them, too.
As she moved through the motions of checking the departmental group chat to see if she could find any assignments or helpful information for Genevieve, her thoughts kept drifting to her nightmare.
Although she had been dreaming a lot of her younger self for weeks now, this dream had been different. It had been terrifying.
Thinking about the footsteps, the figure, the gun, the blood, and the memory of a woman's final scream calling for Dawn sent a shiver down her spine.
But even then, it wasn't the terror that made this dream different from the others. She couldn't shake the feeling that something had shifted in her dream, that she had seen something new. Something important.
She paused when she realized what had been different this time, and her phone fell off her hands.
She had not been mute in her dream.
All this time, she had believed she was born mute, as they had said, but she had spoken in her nightmare. She had been singing.
That had never happened before.
And this didn't seem to her like just a nightmare.
It was a memory.