Forgotten Fears Read Online Free PDF Page B

back. Once again, Billy tried desperately to call out, but his stitched up lips would only let him murmur. Angeline veered into the opposite lane, not realising until she heard the desperate horn of the eighteen-wheeler, which was racing towards her head on. She had tried to swerve, but the road was wet, and the eighteen-wheeler smashed into the rear corner of the car at over sixty miles an hour, sending it flipping across the highway and into the ditch on the opposite side like paper caught in the wind. As was the way with dreams, Billy experienced the crash both from inside the car and out at the same time and now, to the backdrop of shattered glass and crumpled metal, he was free to scream.
    The broken remains of the car came to rest on its roof in a ditch by the road, which was filling with water as the storm continued to rage. He could only watch on helplessly and unscathed as his bloody and bruised wife struggled to unpin herself from the wreckage. Her face was now only inches above the rising waterline. He was a disembodied passenger, part of the dream but at the same time not. His sons' name flashed in his mind, but he couldn’t bring himself to check the back seat, knowing he wouldn’t be able to cope with what he would see there. He watched as the water filled the car and covered Angeline’s face, sending her into spasms as she struggled to free herself. It was then he had been jarred awake.
    His state of confusion was broken by another sound, this time, one in the real world, a sharp rat-a-tat-tat of someone knocking on the door. He realised as he stumbled to his feet that this was the sound which had initially pulled him out of his nightmare, and for that, he was grateful. Billy jogged to the door and swung it open.
    Pale gray overalls filled his field of vision. It was only when he craned his neck that he saw the full scale of the man from Trans Energy. Rain dripped off his black hair, and his piggy eyes were harsh and staring, his skin waxy and pocked with old acne scars. The man was huge, at least six and a half feet tall and well over three hundred pounds. He filled the entire door frame. As Billy gawped, the man removed the red pencil he had been chewing on from the corner of his mouth.
    “Name’s Grant,” He said, pointing to his chest, where, indeed, his name was embroidered in a tatty red font. “Power Company sent me. You need a fix, right?”
    He had a southern drawl, Texas maybe, and something inside Billy told him to be cautious.
    “Uh yeah,” He mumbled, still trying to rid the vivid dream from his memory. “Come in.”
    The man nodded and entered, ducking under the door frame. He looked even more immense now he was inside the house. The man slipped the chewed up pencil back into his mouth and looked around the house.
    “Breakers in the basement?” He asked, staring at Billy with those harsh, probing eyes.
    “Yeah, it’s this way,” Billy said as he led the way to the kitchen. The man followed, the sound of his heavy work boots echoing on the wooden floor.
    The basement was accessed through the kitchen, and Billy stood aside and showed the man the door.
    “There it is. You want a torch?”
    The man shook his head.
    “I sniffed a cunts bicycle seat,” He said in reply as he unclipped his own much bigger, much more sturdy torch from his belt and opened the basement door.
    Billy could only stare and try to figure out if he had either misheard or imagined what Grant from Trans Energy had just said.
    The man went on as normal, as if the profanity had never left his lips, and contented himself with rolling the pencil to the opposite side of his mouth as he flicked the flashlight on and shined the beam down the steps.
    “Okay, sir,” He said. “I’ll go check things out and see if I can get you back up and running.”
    He did not refer to the other thing he had said, and Billy was beginning to wonder if he had perhaps misheard, or even imagined it. He had after all, been shocked out of