October 30th, 11:42 pm

I stared at the book on Norse mythology that sat in front of me on my desk and tried not to fall asleep. It wasn’t that I found the topic boring; in fact, I found it very interesting. The sounds of Jamie moving on the other side of the room distracted me a little, and suddenly, my Calculus book was placed in front of me. “You should be studying this, Raven, it never fails to put you to sleep, and you damn well need some.”

I turned to my roommate and shook my head as I countered, “I’ve still got midterms to study for.”

Jamie frowned at me, crossing her arms briefly before suddenly pulling me out of my chair and toward my bed to sit us both on it. “Are you studying so much to pass midterms, or is it just a good excuse to avoid sleeping?” I was about to argue when she continued, “Wait, don’t reply, we both already know the answer. You’ve been sleeping little enough as it is without actively avoiding it. You need sleep, girl.”

“I’m not avoiding sleep,” I argued weakly, “I just need to study… and caffeine, a lot of caffeine, so can we drop this?”

“No way, Raven, we are not dropping this,” she said, shaking her head. “You’ve been having these nightmares for almost a month now, and I’ve let you have your space, hoping you’d get through whatever it is. Now, as your roommate and your friend, I am asking you to tell me what’s going on with you, or do I have to get the others in here too? They’ve been worried, especially Erin. You two usually talk about everything, but you’ve been shutting her out on this, too.”

Despite her early teasing about me being ‘Raven’, Erin and I had become best friends over the past two months since school started. The night that I discovered that I was gay, and she convinced me to tell her, was a turning point that had solidified our relationship and let me know that she would have my back and that I could always depend on her. So far, she was the only person in the world who knew that I was gay too. I was still trying to find my footing and adjust to that myself, and I was a little afraid of how our other friends and Lydia might react.

We were in the same biology class and usually worked on our assignments and studied together. When we weren’t doing that, we spent our spare time together talking, shopping, or just hanging out in one another’s rooms. We had formed a similar type of close friendship as that which had developed between Jamie and Kendra, and our little group often joked that Asako and Jennifer should room together so that Kendra could share a room with Jamie, and I could room with Erin.

I cringed and looked away guiltily as Jamie mentioned Erin and muttered, “You know what’s going on, Jamie, I’ve been having nightmares.” Guilt gnawed at my guts for not being able to tell even my best friend about these nightmares.

My roommate shook her head, her frown deepening. “I know that! Come on, tell me about the dreams, maybe I can help you with whatever is causing them.”

I sighed, still looking away. “You’ll think it’s stupid.”

“Dammit, Raven! I’m your friend; you don’t need to be so self-conscious around me. The only thing that I think is stupid is you shutting us all out. Now, what are these nightmares about?”

I lay back on my bed and closed my eyes, taking a deep breath to steady myself before speaking. “It always starts differently; I’ll be in class, the hallway, the dining hall, or at a party or something, usually in a group or a crowd. Then I’ll make some sort of social blunder, and everyone around me is laughing at me. And there’s always that horrible voice…” I trailed off, shuddering at the thought of that voice, harsh and grating, like crunching gravel.

“A voice?” she asked. “What does it say?”

“It’s always taunting me,” I replied as I let go of her hand to clench both my fists at my sides. “It says things like ‘You’re not one of them’, ‘They will never accept you’, and ‘You’re better off alone’, and then it starts laughing along with everyone else in the dream.”

She was silent for a time. Finally, she sighed, and I opened my eyes to see her watching me in concern. “Raven, I know I’m only a student, but I think that you could be suffering from social anxiety or possibly demophobia. It’s understandable with your sheltered background.”

“Demophobia? What’s that, a fear of demons or something?” I asked.

“That would be silly, demons don’t exist, and that wouldn’t be related to the dreams you described. Demophobia is the persistent and irrational anxiety and fear of crowds or large gatherings of people,” she explained. “Do you get extremely nervous or afraid when interacting with others? Any trouble breathing?”

The only real issue I had with socializing was being a little afraid of being caught looking at a girl who caught my interest too long or accidentally stumbling out of the closet somehow, but I thought that was getting better. The dreams never seemed to poke at those fears specifically, though, which was confusing. If these really were dreams about my subconscious fears or something, I thought that at least one would have me hitting on a girl and being shot down, saying something to out myself, or have someone call me out for being gay. These were all just generic social situations or, strangely enough, me trying to interact with boys and getting shot down.

That wasn’t what truly disturbed me, though; it was always that voice, the taunts, and the laughter. I tried to shake off the memories and shook my head in answer to Jamie’s questions. “Maybe at first, during the first week of school. I don’t think I’ve felt like that since, though, at least, not any more than any other person, and I’ve never had trouble breathing. Why would this suddenly happen now? I haven’t been having any troubles socially with you, Erin, or the others, and I was doing fine in large groups until the dreams started.”

My roommate shrugged and shook her head. “I have no clue. Maybe you’re subconsciously suppressing it, and your dreams are an outlet for it. I think you need to see a professional about this, or maybe face your fear. I know you’re not a partier, but you should come with me and the rest of the group tomorrow night to a Halloween party that one of Kendra’s friends is holding; it might help us figure out if that’s really the problem or if it’s something else.”

“I don’t know, Jamie, I really do need to study, and I don’t have a costume,” I complained.

“Erin said she’d help with a costume if I could convince you to go. Besides, it’s Friday tomorrow and you’ll have the whole weekend to study.” Seeing my resistance starting to weaken from her arguments, she pressed on. “There’ll be cute guys there, and Sarah’s apartment is on Southwest Marine Drive, about a ten-minute drive from campus. It’s near the beach, so if the crowd gets to you, just grab me or Erin, and we can take a walk to get some air. Or I heard about a really big party on the south shore of False Creek.”

I groaned at that. “False Creek? No thanks, my house is in that area.” I had been avoiding going home, or even calling much since the dreams had begun, afraid that Lydia might find my lack of sleep a good excuse to try to convince me to return home. I also had zero interest in meeting guys and having them try to pick me up.

Jamie merely nodded. “Well, then you’ll have someplace to go if you need to be alone or need a place to crash after too much drinking. It’s your house, so stop avoiding it; it won’t kill you to go there once in a while.”

“Oh yeah,” I retorted with an unladylike snort. “Lydia would just love that, me showing up drunk with a friend or five in the same condition. It would be a great reason for her to keep me home where it's ‘safe’ and she can protect me from myself.”

“We won’t go to the one there if it makes you uncomfortable; it was only a backup plan anyway. Honestly, Raven, Lydia can’t make you do anything you don’t want to do,” Jamie said, giving me a stern look. “Besides, doesn’t she just take care of the house for you now that you’re legally an adult? I know she’s probably the closest thing to a mother you know, but she doesn’t run your life anymore, you do.”

I closed my eyes and rubbed my temples in an attempt to stave off the headache that was forming. “I know that. Even though she didn’t want me to move out to go to school, she didn’t try to stop me in any way other than asking me to stay. The look on her face when I left… I feel like just being here is making me a huge disappointment to her.” I didn’t even want to think about how she might respond if I found the courage to tell her I was a lesbian.

To my surprise, I heard Jamie laugh. “Everyone feels like a disappointment to their parents when they can’t see eye to eye. I felt that way when I came here, too. It was like I wasn’t living up to what my parents wanted from me, but it was my life, not theirs, and I needed to do what was right for me. I can understand that Lydia wants to keep you safe, but you need to be free to live your life and make your own decisions and mistakes. Without that, you’re not living, you’re just existing.” I think she may have said more after that, but it was lost to me as sleep claimed me.

My sleep was plagued by yet another nightmare, and I awoke in a cold sweat. The voice from my dream lingered, unwilling to release its hold on my mind. “How much longer do you think that you can keep it up? Sooner or later, you will make a mistake, and they will all see that you are not normal. You will never be one of them.” Like nails on a chalkboard, the sound and the words threatened to drive me mad as fear clutched my heart in its icy grip.

I lay there for several minutes with my eyes closed, trying to stop shivering, control my labored breathing, and banish the voice from my thoughts. By the time I got control of myself and sat up in bed, the alarm clock showed the time to be just before seven o’clock. I gave up on any more sleep, took off the clothes that I had fallen asleep in the night before, and after I had slipped into my fluffy white bathrobe, I gathered my toiletries and shuffled off to the showers.

The shower was hot and managed to help ease some of my aches from sleeping in a strange position, while relaxing me enough that I could think about the things that my roommate had said the night before. Deep down, I didn’t believe she was right about my problem being social anxiety or demophobia. I had gotten over any anxiety or fear of social situations during the first few weeks of classes. In fact, I had felt like I was starting to become more comfortable socially and getting used to the thought of being attracted to girls just before the dreams began. Still, while I might not think she was right about the source of my problem, she could be right about getting out and having some fun.

I stepped out of the shower and, after patting myself dry and wrapping my hair in a towel, I put on my robe and returned to my room, where Jamie was sitting up in her bed. “How did you sleep?” she asked.

“Oh, it was easy,” I joked lamely, “I just closed my eyes.”

My roommate groaned at the joke. “Very funny, but you know what I meant. Did you have another nightmare?”

I sat on my bed and plugged in my hairdryer, briefly considering fibbing, before I finally gave her a nod in reply. “Yeah, I had another one, but I think I got around six hours of sleep. That’s a hell of a lot better than I’ve usually been getting lately.”

“I really think you need to see someone about these dreams, Raven. If this keeps up, you’re going to burn out before finals.” There was concern in both her voice and her eyes as she spoke.

“I’ll think about it, Jamie,” I offered in an attempt to ease her mind. Then, in a deliberate change of topic, I asked, “You mentioned a party tonight?”

Her face brightened at that. “Yeah, a friend of Kendra’s is holding it. Erin said she’d help you with a costume if you need it, once you’re both out of biology.” Then she looked at the clock and frowned. “Speaking of classes, I had better go start getting ready or I’ll be late for mine.” As she headed to the showers, I began to dry my hair and wonder just what sort of costume my best friend had in mind for me.

I was glad that Fridays were light on my class schedule. I only had my class on Norse mythology at nine o’clock, followed by a three-hour break before my one o’clock biology class with Erin. Rather than just heading back to my room between classes, I took the materials for both classes in my backpack and spent the time after my morning class in the cafeteria, reading the assigned chapters covering Odin and Valhalla while eating my lunch. Then I was off to my biology class, where we suffered through a less-than-thrilling lecture on how habitat influences a species’ biology, and how various animals have adapted to suit their climates or local ecology.

As we headed back to the dorm, Erin asked, “How did you sleep last night?”

I was tempted to answer with the same joke as before, but instead, I just did my best to give my friend a reassuring smile. “Better than I have in a while, I must have been more tired than I thought. And I must have gotten enough sleep last night if I didn’t fall asleep during that lecture.”

Erin heaved a sigh of relief. “Good, I’ve been worried that you’re working yourself too hard. You’ve been constantly staying up late studying for the past two weeks. You really need to relax a bit. Did Jamie ask you about coming to the party tonight?”

“Yeah, and she said that you would help me with a costume,” I replied.

“Yup, I found the perfect costumes for us,” she said. “I thought we could go as a matched set, and if this doesn’t get you out of your shell, nothing will.” The grin on her face as she answered made me suddenly have second thoughts about getting her ‘help’ with a costume. Only the fact that it was Halloween day and finding a decent costume would be practically impossible, and the thought that at least we would match kept me from telling her I would find something on my own. Besides, she looked so eager.

“You can’t be serious,” I stated as I looked over the costume that Erin had laid out on her bed for me. She was already changed into her own costume, a white mini dress with lace trim and white feathery wings attached to her upper back. A plastic gold halo attached to a hairband, white pumps, and white lace gloves completed the outfit. “So, this is why you suggested we get all our biology work done before getting ready for the party? So I wouldn’t have time to back out of wearing this?”

The practiced look of innocence on her face may have gone well with the costume, but I knew better. “Would I do that to my best friend?” she asked.

“Yes, you would,” was my candid response as I looked over the costume on the bed once again.

“Come on, Raven, you’ll look smoking hot in that. If anyone in our little crew has the body to pull that off, it’s you.”

“It’s funny that you used the words ‘pull that off, ’” I retorted, “because I get the feeling that if I wear that, a lot of guys at the party are going to want to do just that. That’s the last thing I want.”

“It’s fun to show off once in a while,” she pressed, “and maybe you’ll meet a girl you’ll want to pull it off for. Don’t worry, I’ll be with you the whole time unless you tell me otherwise, to make sure nothing happens that you don’t want to. You need to let loose a little, Raven. Now, hurry up so we have time to do a proper job on our makeup.”

“Fine, I’ll wear the stupid thing.” I slipped out of my clothes and began getting into the costume. First was a red and black latex bikini top, followed by a matching thong. “This isn’t a costume,” I muttered, “it's fetish gear.” Once I was into the top and the thong, I began to put on the accessories; a black mesh miniskirt with red latex trim and an attached red devil’s tail at the back, matching fingerless gloves, thigh-high fishnet stockings, a pair of red two-inch heels, and a black hairband with devil’s horns that matched the tail.

Once I had everything on, Erin whistled appreciatively. “See, I told you that you’d look good. You’re hot as hell.”

I rolled my eyes at the joke. “You’ve been waiting all day to use that joke, haven’t you? I swear that I’m leaving the party the first time that a guy asks me if I’m horny.”

“What if a girl asks? Will you leave with her or on your own?” she joked back as we applied our makeup in front of her mirror. “Just so I know what to expect,” she added with another look of false innocence.

The comment almost made me screw up applying the sparkly red eye shadow that went with the costume. “Why are you my best friend again?”

“My references were good?” She grinned at me in the mirror as she finished applying her own sparkly white eye shadow.

“If you keep this up, I won’t let you drive my car tonight,” I teased.

She shook her head. “You don’t have a choice about that. You’re supposed to be relaxing and letting loose tonight, which means that I’m the designated driver.” Since my car could only seat two, Erin and I would be going together, while Jamie, Kendra, and Jennifer would all be going with Asako in her Prius. The rest of the crew were all waiting for us when we got to the third-floor common room. Jamie was dressed as a witch, Asako as a cat, Kendra as a French maid, and Jenn’s sexy nurse costume was almost as bad as my devil outfit.

“Damn!” Jamie said with a grin. “You look good, Raven. I never thought that Erin would actually be able to convince you to wear it.” She looked in her purse and pulled out a ten-dollar bill, which she promptly handed over to Kendra. “It’s about time you and Jenn came out of your shells a bit.”

I tried not to let my eyes linger too long on Kendra’s sexy costume as she grinned back at her friend, took the money, and started dragging Jamie toward the elevator. “I told you so, Jamie. Now come on, girls, it’s time to party!”

Once we made our way out to the parking lot, we split up to get to our respective vehicles. We planned to meet back up at the parking lot exit, and then Erin and I would follow them in my car while Kendra gave Asako directions. I had decided to let Erin drive on the way there so that she would have the chance to get used to driving my car before having to do so later as the designated driver. I had let her drive the car a couple of times before, but she was still getting used to a manual transmission.

As we drove along the streets of the west side from the campus through the University endowment lands toward Marine Drive, Erin and I talked about midterms and tried to come up with plans for the weekend to give us short breaks from studying and homework. Almost ten minutes had passed when we pulled up in front of an apartment complex on Southwest Marine Drive. Kendra told us that the building overlooked the beach, but it was hard to see much in the fading light of dusk other than what was illuminated by streetlamps, or the lights of the building and the homes to either side.

Kendra pressed the intercom number for her friend’s apartment, and we all listened for a response. For a couple of minutes, the only sounds were our breathing, the beeping of the intercom, and the cries of nearby seagulls. Then the sudden crackling static of the intercom as someone picked up on the other end nearly made me jump. The sounds of music and people talking over it could be clearly heard in the background as a voice said, “Hello.”

“Hi, Sarah. It's Kendra and company,” our ginger-haired companion replied.

“Come on in, girls.” Then the door began to buzz, and Kendra reached over to open it before motioning us all inside and showing us toward the apartment.

The blonde girl who answered the door was tall and athletic-looking like Kendra, and she was dressed as a policewoman, with her honey-blonde hair tied back in a ponytail. She gave us all a big smile, “I’m glad that you and your friends could make it, Kendra.” The girl was just my type, and I had trouble looking away from her, clad in that sexy costume, as a warmth grew in my chest, and somewhat lower as well.

Introductions were quickly made, and we were all ushered inside where the party was already in full swing. There were people in pairs or groups trying to talk to one another over the music, a portion of the living room had been cleared for dancing, and the small kitchenette was crowded with people getting drinks. “It’s really crowded in here!” I yelled to be heard over the music as Sarah gave us a quick tour.

“If you need some fresh air, just go out the patio door!” she yelled back. “We’re on ground level, and it’s only a short walk to the beach!” I nodded in reply, and she continued the tour.

An hour later, I was really enjoying myself. I was nursing my third beer of the night and talking to a guy named Matt. Mostly because my friends thought I needed to socialize and said he was cute. He had short-cropped brown hair and green eyes, and he was attending UBC on a basketball scholarship. I guess he could be considered cute, if one was into guys, but I wasn’t attracted to him, or any of the guys I had met so far, which seemed to only confirm my sexuality.

At least he was fun to talk to, even if I suspected he might be trying to get into my pants. Wait, I wasn’t wearing pants, and I wasn’t sure what to call the latex thong and barely there skirt I was wearing. At least he wasn’t a jerk or throwing horrible pick-up lines at me like some of the other guys, so I figured it wouldn’t hurt to get to know him in a public setting like this and at least give the appearance of being hetero to my friends who I hadn’t come out of the closet to.

Erin was not far away, talking to one of his friends and sticking close in case I needed her to bail me out. “Are you here on a sports scholarship too?” Matt asked as he looked over my body. “You look like you’re in pretty good shape.”

I shook my head and tried not to shiver at the long appreciative look he was giving me; it made me uncomfortable having a guy appraise me like that. I wasn’t sure if it was that or the beer that was making my stomach queasy as I replied. “No, sports aren’t really my thing. I’ve been doing yoga since I was ten, and I work out sometimes, but that’s about it. The most strenuous thing I do other than that is play guitar,” I told him with a laugh.

Matt grinned at me. “Are you in a band or do you just play for fun? What kind of music do you like playing?”

“Mostly I play for fun, but being in a band would be cool,” I admitted after downing the last of my beer. “Mostly I like punk rock; The Offspring, Bikini Kill, and Green Day, that sort of stuff. I grew up listening to old-school stuff like The Ramones, and there’s a lot of good new bands on the scene now.”

“Cool,” he replied with a nod. Then he gestured at my now-empty beer bottle and offered, “Would you like me to get you another beer?”

“Uh… sure, thanks,” I replied, a bit uncertainly. Was he trying to get me drunk so he could get me into bed? He’d been nice so far. What if he was just being friendly? I wasn’t sure what he wanted, and I didn’t know the first thing about flirting between guys and girls, except for the really obvious, and terrible, pickup lines. Were there some subtle social nuances that I wasn’t picking up on?

“You are not one of them,” the voice from my nightmares taunted me. “You think you can fit in, but you can’t. You don’t know what to do, do you?”

“No,” I spoke softly as my heart raced. The voice had never bothered me when I was awake before. “This is a nightmare.”

“You’re not normal and you never will be,” the voice pressed. “Look at all these normal humans around you; they know what to do and how to react to one another. Who can help you? Your friends? They’re normal too, and soon they will tire of you. Then they will laugh at you along with everyone else.”

I gripped my head in my hands, trying to force the voice away. “It’s a dream. It’s got to be a dream,” I murmured as I clutched my head.

I didn’t even notice Matt returning with a beer in each hand. “Do you have a headache, Raven? Maybe I should get you some aspirin. I remember the first time I drank too much, my friends never let me live it down,” he said with a chuckle.

“See, he’s laughing,” the voice taunted again. “Soon they will all be laughing at your attempts to be one of them, something you’re not.”

“No! Leave me alone!” I screamed as I pushed past Matt and rushed through the crowd to the patio door. I thought I could hear Erin calling my name, but I just kept running until I was out the door and well on my way to the beach beyond. I needed to be alone.