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my diary and was going to take it to Dr. Brooks because she wasn’t sure my therapist knew what I was thinking about, dreaming about. The diary fell out of her bag at school. Someone found it, copied it, and posted it online. She was trying to do a good thing. Now everyone thinks I’m crazy.”
    “Not everyone.”
    Allan’s eyes narrow. “Yes! Everyone! I’m a massive joke!” His arms flail outward and then lower.
    Rubic retrieves some tissue and hands it to Allan. “Aw, bud. I’m so sorry this is happening.”
    The intensity of his feelings reminds Allan of how he felt after his parents’ deaths. Now, as the emotion builds behind his rib cage, feeling like angry, writhing snakes, he wishes to be in his mother’s arms. I can’t wait to see my mom again. If I have to die to do so, then I wish death would hurry things up. The thought is fleeting, but the feeling buries itself deep in his body. It’s a dark feeling, a secret feeling, and he knows that buried is where it must stay. It frightens Allan to acknowledge its existence, but it is evident when he’s low and feeling vulnerable to the tauntings of hopelessness.
    Allan wonders if Laura had read the whole thing. If she did, then she knows how Allan feels about Asantia. How beautiful Asantia is to him, though she is tough and weathered by hardships. Embarrassment swells inside Allan, and he wants to turn back time and wishes it was as simple as pushing the hour hand back. She will have read that Allan dreams of Asantia at least two times a week. Allan’s cheeks redden like overripe apples. She’ll learn that after the first dream, where Asantia came crashing through his window during the raging storm, he didn’t let Rubic wash the comforter where she sat for over two months.
    She’ll learn about the night Asantia rescued him from the top of a building in Dantia. He had escaped a mob by diving into the canal holding onto a glowing snail. Allan dove under the buildings and found a stairwell. With only one working mechanical leg, Allan managed to get to the top of the stairs. Then the working leg died and left him crippled on the rooftop. He felt hopeless then, lost and so tired, but there Asantia was. Her cable shot from her airship and buried itself in the wooden roof, and she came down from that ship like a guardian angel. Allan wrote in the diary how she almost glowed like a neon sign and how close her cheek came to his when she was helping him remove the mechanical legs.
    I wonder where Asantia is now. Allan wishes he could contact her so she can come rescue him from his horrible existence. He desperately wants to be somewhere else, to live a different life, to burn this one and all the trappings that keep him here and in misery.
    Rubic returns from the kitchen with pudding cups and hands one to Allan, the lid already ripped off. Allan waves it away.
    “Come on. Try and take it easy. When I get home from work we’ll eat some junk food and watch a movie. I’ll make an appointment with Dr. Brooks for tomorrow, and you can talk it out. Let’s get past Lan Darr completely, then you can work on getting over the embarrassment.”
    Allan cringes and fresh tears come to his eyes, and then he retreats to his room.
    He sleeps the day away, and when he wakes, the house is dark and silent.
    A loud car roars down the street, its sporty muffler ripping the silence to shreds. Allan gets into his wheelchair and rolls to the living room. The streetlamps outside illuminate the edges of the thick curtains. They are slightly parted and are the only source of light in the home. Allan rolls to the window and reaches for the gap in the curtains. 
    A shadow passes over the light. Allan jumps. The shadow dashes away, followed by a crash. Allan freezes and listens. “I can’t believe I’m so jumpy.” He sweeps open the curtains and looks to the front yard. He expects Jibbawk to be there, waiting, armed with razor-sharp swords, but instead sees a black cat dashing away from