Part III - 4: A Little Help From Your Friends.

Dr. Cain informed my school I could return the following Monday. I had avoided Suzi and Joey the entire time I had been out of school, but on Monday, it was impossible to do so anymore.

"Hi," Joey said in a soft voice as I sat down next to him on the bus to school.

"Hi," was all I could manage. I shuddered as I realized I was going to start crying again if I didn't get a hold of myself.

"Is your voice changing again?" Joey asked.

"No," I replied. "I'm just kinda hoarse from... " I stopped. I had screamed that morning almost as long as the first night I had my nightmare. I knew I would be seeing Joey and Suzi that day, and I was very... scared about that.

"You still having that dream?" Joey said, almost a whisper.

I nodded as my tears started to flow down my cheeks. We sat there in silence for most of the ride, but I finally put on a fake smile and said, "I guess you haven't had much action lately, have ya?"

To my surprise, he turned a little pale, but then put on a fake grin himself and said, "Yeah, I guess not."

After that, I couldn't get rid of a feeling of even more tension between us. It was obvious what I said upset him, but I didn't violate his privacy, mainly because I knew any kind of shock would make me go to pieces.

We didn't say anything else for the rest of the trip, and apart from a few words with Suzi before our first class, I didn't say another word until we were all sitting together at lunch.

"I guess I scared you guys pretty bad. I'm sorry."

The silence remained between us. I started to feel there was something else wrong. Suzi and Joey kept glancing at each other.

Joey finally said, "It wouldn't have been so bad if you would have talked to us. I mean, I've talked to your mom more than you the past two weeks."

"I cried myself to sleep every night last week, and," Suzi started. She didn't continue. She was going to start crying on her lunch if she had.

"It's been really hard on her too. Last week, we skipped a couple of classes because she was so upset... and... " Joey faltered.

I felt the tension sky rocket. Suzi was staring at Joey, looking surprised. Then she looked at me, and we accidentally made eye contact.

"Oh, shit!" Joey said when he saw it.

"Timmy, we wanted to tell you, but we had to tell you in private. And you wouldn't ta... "

I got up and as made my way through the tables as fast as I could. My eyes full of tears, my heart broken in half. They had done it. They had gone all the way. All the way, without me. Without me.

I walked as fast as I could to the exit, not even hesitating to make the guard not only open the door and allow me to leave, but under no circumstances let Joey or Suzi to follow me.

I was sobbing up all two flights of stairs, and even had trouble opening the door to our room. They had done it in here. On the couch. The small stain of blood from Suzi almost blended in with the pattern of the old flower-patterned couch.

I put my hand up to it, about to touch it, then pulled my hand away. I sat down next to it and just let myself sink into my grief. I almost didn't hear Suzi knocking urgently on the door.

"Timmy! Help Joey! Please Timmy! He's in trouble!"

I looked up and saw her teary face through the window. I saw she was truly afraid for Joey, so I nodded and felt for his mind.

I found him being taken to the principal's office by one of the male teachers. After the woman guarding the door wouldn't let them leave, Joey did the only thing he could think of. He told Suzi to get to me no matter what happened, then turned around and tackled the unsuspecting woman.

I reached out and made the teacher holding Joey let him go, then had him forget what had taken place. It only took Joey a moment to realize what had happened, then he turned and raced to the stairs.

Suzi had let herself in by then, and sat down next to me. I didn't look at her, and pulled my hand away when she took it into hers. Joey reached the door out of breath a second later, then stood there relieved that I was okay. He stayed in the doorway, letting Suzi talk to me first.

"Tim, we didn't mean for it to happen. It just... happened. Last Thursday I couldn't take it anymore. You wouldn't see us, you wouldn't even talk to us. We both were miserable... Joey was holding me while I was crying, and... well, I needed him more than I ever needed anyone before."

"You had sex. Without me. Without ME." I sobbed. "How could you. How could either of you. I LOVE YOU!" I started heaving out the really heavy sobs, and wound up choking on one.

"Joey, close the door and put something over the window too." Suzi said as she held me to her chest.

"Why?" I managed to sputter out.

"Tim, Joey and I didn't have sex. We made love. Now were going to make love to you. Both of us."

I lurched away from her as if she was full of electric current. "NO!" I said, terrified.

The shock on their faces was no match to the horror on mine. I turned away from them and put my face into the arm of the couch and started to sob again. I had used up most of my tears, so I was mostly making the 'waa' sounds.

"Tim," Suzi said softly as she rubbed my back. "If you really love us, then tell us. Why did you try and kill yourself?" Her voice started to break up saying, "Why are you scared of us?"

I looked up at her, then at Joey who was kneeling beside the couch next to me. "I'm not scared of you," I said glancing back and forth between them. "I'm afraid of me."

"Shit. I knew it." Joey said, a little disgusted. "Tim, you're acting like a fuckin' baby," he said angrily.

"Joey, don't be so mean!" Suzi begged.

"Well somebody needs make him face this. Why is it that only I see that?"

"Fuck you, Joey." I said.

"That's it!" Joey said standing up. "Tim, either you are going to tell us about that dream, or I'm going to... I don't know what. But you wont like it."

"NO! Don't you understand! I wake up every morning, SCREAMING! Every time I close my eyes I see it! When I look at you, all I can think of is... " I shuddered again.

"Tim, show us your dream. Joey is right. If you can't face it yourself, let the three of us face it."

"Yeah, Tim. The three of us."

"But... But... "

Suzi looked straight in my eyes, and somehow triggered that familiar feeling. She made me feel better, and I knew they were right. They at least had the right to know.

"Are you sure you want to see it? I could just tell you, I think."

"Suz and I talked about this before. If you have to live through this thing every night, we can live through it at least once."

"Okay, I guess. We better all sit down on the couch."

"Scoot over. You should be in the center," Joey said.

Suzi took my hand in hers, and Joey followed her example and took my other one. Out of habit, we all closed our eyes at the same time, putting a momentary smile on our faces. I was starting to shake as I linked up to them and prepared to share my memory of the dream. As I started playing my memory in my mind, I somehow triggered the real thing. I never intended for them to experience the real dream, just my reconstruction of it. But once it started, I was trapped in the dream. And so were they.

The dream was exactly the same as it had been the past two weeks. I was completely lost in the dream, but my mind kept feeding the experience to Joey and Suzi. As usual, I was screaming when it ended. Joey and Suzi we obviously upset, but they didn't scream.

Suzi hugged me as we both cried into each other's shoulders. Joey was trying to comfort us both, and said to me, "I'm sorry Tim. I didn't know. I didn't know."

Once Suzi and I recovered, I did feel better. I even smiled once. We started talking about the dream.

"I wish I never had found that memory in Katie's mind," Suzi said. "It caused all of this."

"Maybe, but it probably would have happened sooner or later anyway," I said.

"Why wouldn't you talk to us?" Joey blurted out.

"I... I wanted... I guess I wanted to protect you from me. I didn't want you around me to get... you know."

"What? Fucked? Oh. Now I see why you had a spaz attack when we wanted to love ya."

"I can't help but believe that it was more than a dream. I think it was real. I mean, that it was from the future. I'm destined to become my own slave, and turn you two into slaves too."

"Well, it wasn't the future you know," Joey said.

"No, I don't know."

Suzi said, "I understand. Joey is right. In the dream, I was a virgin. Remember?"

I blinked at those words. It had hurt when she said that, but then I realized what it meant. They were right. It was only a dream. It couldn't have been the future, and I was even sitting on the proof. I spread my legs and stared at he blood stain. Confused, Joey and Suzi followed my gaze, then they knew I had gotten their point.

"I can't believe it," I said slowly.

"What?" Suzi said.

"The two worst things that ever happened in my life just... canceled each other out. If you two hadn't done it without me, I would never have stopped believing in that dream. I can't believe it!" I said happily as I looked at Suzi.

Her face lit up. "Does this mean you're okay now?"

"I think so. Well, I'm better anyway." I wrapped my arms around her and hugged her tight. She gave me a peck on the cheek before I let her go.