My husband woke up screaming.
It was the strangest thing, just out of nowhere, one minute he's softly snoring away, and the next he's sitting upright, full blown screaming his lungs out.
I was awake still, hooked on a book I was reading and his sudden reaction caused me to scream as well, jumping and sending my book flying through the air and into the wall, where it landed with a heavy thud.
"Are you okay? What happened, that scared the hell out of me." I hope my voice is comforting and not shaking, like how my body feels.
Dave looks sheepish, and shrugs. He snuggles back into the blanket and murmurs and apology, telling me he must have been having a nightmare.
I glance at him as I turn the lamp off a little while later, sleeping sound, a small grimace on his face.
The next morning, amongst the chaos of the morning news, there was a story about a little girl who had been kidnapped at gun point, but found safely a short time later. I watched it half heartedly, while I make Dave's favorite breakfast of scrambled eggs and fried tomatoes. I remark to Dave about how incredible it was she was found and safely too.
He nods and yawns in response.
I notice the bags under his eyes, how tired he looks.
His nightmare must have knocked him round more than he thought.
He gathers his bag and when I kiss him goodbye, I notice a steak of blood on his temple. I wipe it away, unable to find a scratch or cut, any source for the bleeding.
He shrugs again, saying he must of scratched himself during the nightmare.
An early night tonight, I tell myself as I clean up the remaining breakfast dishes. And no scary movies before bed.
Dave works late, and gets home even later.
I'm asleep by the time he eventually crawls into bed, still sound asleep when he himself wakes again, and let's out another terrifying scream.
I am instantly awake, my heart hammering in my chest so loud I can't hear anything else apart from the boom boom of my own heart beat.
"Another nightmare?" I whisper to the dark room, and I can feel him shuffle, roll over to face me.
A deep sigh, embarrassed and exhausted.
"Sorry Mel, I don't know what happened. Must've been a nightmare, I don't remember it, just woke up screaming."
I pat his hand, tell him it's okay, it's fine.
Tomorrow is a new day.
Except, tomorrow isn't a new day.
It doesn't change anything.
Dave falls asleep, and he wakes screaming.
Every. Single. Night.
It's been weeks now, and I think we are both starting to go insane from lack of sleep.
We both barely sleep, our bodies aware and alert to the threat of being woken by the scream, it seems pointless to try and close our eyes when we know what's coming.
And it wasn't like we hadn't tried it all.
We've tried sleeping in separate rooms, warm milk and cinnamon before bed, we've even started using meloton for a full night's sleep, but no matter what, Dave will wake and he will scream.
Our doctor can't find anything wrong, he's sent Dave for scans and tests, they all yeild the same results - nothing.
The doctor can't find a reason for the random bleeding on Dave either, stating it's obviously superficial, and not coming from any wound on his body.
It's not coming from me, either. I'm free of scratches or grazes, no wounds to bleed.
When we are leaving the doctors office, I notice the news story playing on the TV in the waiting room.
Three teenagers, pulled alive from a car wreck that from looking at it, seemed as if it was almost impossible to survive.
Their mothers faces fill the screen, crying, sobbing a thanks to a god that was looking down over their babies, the miracle that saved them from a certain death.
We get sent home with a script for sleeping pills.
Dave is hesitant. He doesn't belive in taking meds.
His mother had an issue with prescription medication, and he spent most of his life avoiding it at all costs.
It had been difficult enough to get him to try the melotonin, even though it was natural. The sleeping pills proved another story.
I didn't want to trick him, but I really had no choice.
We were barely floating above water. Bills and debt drowning us, let alone the lack of sleep.
His work had let him go, for being unreliable on the job. He wasn't concentrating and he made silly mistakes.
I wasn't far from the same fate, my boss giving me consistent warnings over the last few weeks to get my shit together, or I'd be out the door.
I told myself I was doing the right thing. It was just one night.
One night we both desperately needed.
He never even tasted the pills. I spent ages crushing them, mixing them into a sweet milky and brown sugar concoction.
I told him I'd read about the benefits of brown sugar and sleep, and he never questioned me. I told him we would try the sleeping pills tomorrow, if he felt like it.
When I wake, it's because daylight is streaming through the window and on to my face.
I am disoriented, it takes me a moment to realise I had woken up because i had actually been asleep! I had slept through the night, in God knows how long.
I roll over, and I can hear Dave snoring softly beside me. I look at him, and he looks peaceful. There's no blood today.
I want to cry, I am so happy.
With an energy I didn't know I had, I slip out of bed leaving Dave sleeping, and tip toe down stairs to get started on a much needed breakfast feast.
I see the flashing lights straight away. The house across from ours, the house that had just been brought by a young family new to the neighborhood, was surrounded by police cars and cautioned off with crime scene tape.
I leave the egg carton on the bench, and head outside to where another neighbor, Penny is standing, smoking a cigarette.
"What a nightmare. Just can't belive something like this could happen on our little street. It's crazy."
I ask her what happened, and she looks at me sadly.
"Murdered, all of them.. Even that sweet little baby." penny's voice breaks at that, she shakes her head and wipes away tears. "Home invasion gone wrong they think, something like that. It's scary to think it could have happened to any one of us."
I think about my own night, feeling guilty for my perfect sleep while this had been happening just down the road.
When I get home, Dave is awake, standing in the kitchen cooking the breakfast I had started.
He smiles and tells me the brown sugar milk worked a treat, he had the best night sleep he had in months.
Everything was perfect, for a fortnight.
And then the pills ran out.
Dave had no idea id been using them in his milk drink each night, and without him going to the doctors to get more, I was out of options.
I gave him the sleeping pill free brown sugared milk, and prayed to a god that I'd never believed in, that he didn't really need the pills, that whatever this whole nightmare thing had been.. It was over now.
I believed that with everything I had, right up until the moment when he started screaming.
There was more blood than ever before. It covered his chest and arms. I scrambled around, desperately trying to find where on his body he was hurt, but there was no reason, no wounds, nothing.
Dave cried himself to sleep, and I took my pillow to the couch, angry at myself for getting used to sleeping again and having it whisked away, angry at the situation that was neither of our fault, but was surely ruining our life.
I did the last thing I wanted, the one thing everyone always said not to do.
I googled Dave's symptoms.
Suddenly it was if a whole new world had opened up to me.
There were blogs and chat rooms dedicated to this exact thing, the screaming, the random blood appearing seemingly out of no where.
The more I read, the more my heart began to race.
The chatroom discussed accidents, crime rates. They'd somehow worked out amongst themselves, that when they used drugs and other methods to sleep, they woke up to more carnage happening around them.
The news was flooded with crime, despicable murders, heinous robberies. Death and destruction.
On the nights they woke up screaming, the news the next day was filled with stories of survival, hope and happy endings.
I thought back to the first morning Dave had screamed. The news story about the kidnapped little girl being found.
I recalled the home invasion of our Neighbour's, on the first night that Dave and I had slept soundly.
I didn't want to think anymore.
I read more, crying softy as I did so, but it was pointless, there was nothing else of substance that could help Dave, or help me.
No one knew why this was happening, how, or even if there was any way to stop it.
No doctors could find any reasons, putting it down to psychological distress with no correlation to crime rates. It was the same experience as Dave had had at his doctors, just being sent away with scripts to fill, and other chat room members urged people to not bother wasting their money trying to find a solution with modern medicine.
My hands shook as I phoned the doctors office to make myself an appointment.
I tried to not think about what it all would mean, what I was doing.
All I thought about, was how tired I was. How much I just needed a good night's sleep.
Dave takes his brown sugared milk, his expression weary but kind. He thanks me.
Within half an hour, I'm listening to my husbands soft snoring.
Sleep comes for me quickly.
In the morning, I wake to the sunlight again.
I can smell bacon cooking, bread toasting.
Dave stands at the kitchen bench, a smile on his face.
"That milk must have really hit the spot last night. I feel great."
I smile and take my coffee from his hands gratefully.
We sit and eat breakfast together, Dave turns on the morning news. I see a local school bus has collided with a house.
I see there are no survivors.
I finish my breakfast and I ask my husband if he would like to come for a nice morning walk, which he agrees. He tells me again how refreshed he feels, and if it keeps up, he could definitely see life going back to normal.
I love my husband.
I love him so much that I would never tell him about my special ingredient in the brown sugar milk. Just as I would never tell him what I discovered about his.. 'condition'.
I love my husband because he has a kind heart, he would never Want to intentionally hurt others. Even if it wasn't something he could really control, he would keep screaming every night, if it possibly ment keeping others safe.
I love my husband, but I love my sleep, too.