gooseberryhigh | Every senior had the same dream last night.

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Every senior had the same dream last night.

Every senior had the same dream last night.

They are alone, walking through the woods. It feels familiar, but they’re not sure where they are. They’re coming here to meet an adult. Maybe a member of staff? Their favorite teacher? A parent or older sibling? It differs from student to student.

When they reach the sun-drenched clearing, there’s a young man waiting there, sitting on a fallen tree. He’s the most beautiful man they’ve ever seen, but upon waking they can’t describe what he looked like. All they know is that he’s dark and proud and older than them. He says STAY AWAY. He tells them GO HOME. There’s gentle certainty in his voice when he says EVERYTHING WILL BE ALRIGHT. YOU WILL BE FINE. He sounds like creaking tree branches.

HE WILL MISS YOU. BUT HE WILL ALSO BE FINE.

The young man stands and takes the student by the shoulders, turns them around, and points them out of the forest.

The senior class all wakes up at 7:13 AM exactly, feeling well rested and thinking of home.

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Leo doesn't sleep this long maybe ever. 7:13 feels like a luxury. He doesn't feel instantly guilty like he needs to spring up and immediately get to work, because everything is finished. The only thing to do today is soak up the last empty day at Gooseberry he will ever have.

For some reason this morning, that's not even bittersweet. He'd been having doubts- what would happen to him. (And should he have formed more backups, what home really meant now that he was supposed to forge his own way. The list is long.)

After the dream he'd just had, though, it all feels more centered. Any choice he makes, he'll handle. He pulls his curtain, but makes no move to get out of bed. He looks out the window at the forest surrounding them, and Leo smiles.

Edited (Creative grammar ) 2017-06-22 15:25 (UTC)

Nate's still lying in bed when he hears the other curtain slide open. It's light out, and even though it gets light early these days, it's almost definitely later than he's woken up even once in the last four years. Is this how well-rested feels? He had fallen asleep fretting about his still unpolished speech, but now... he wasn't super worried about it. He was looking forward to seeing his parents on Friday, going back to Idaho for his last real summer vacation.

Pulling open his own curtain, he looks across the cabin at the other beds. This is not a cabin full of late risers, but there was no evidence of activity from this morning. "You just get up?" he asks, slightly groggy.

At the sound of Nate's voice, Takeru peeks his head out from behind his curtain with a bright, "Good morning!"

The dream, while strange, didn't really tell Takeru anything he didn't know or believe already. He decides, though, that he'll go spend some time in his favorite spots on campus, today. Last chance to eat too much chocolate on the docks.

"Good morning." Leo automatically responds, thrashing around a little for his watch. Nate is the only person who habitually rises even earlier than he does. Maybe it's one of those mornings that just feels later than it is. He did sleep well. But no. "You just got up?" He blinks, incredulous. "Jesus. It's 7:15. I think breakfast might be over."

Or it has not even begun, but it kind of feels like it should've.

"Christ, surprised they didn't send a search party out for us," Nate says, and he throws his legs over the side of his bed. "You think maybe we were... relaxed?"

Hahaha. Ha. Haha. Ebonhides relaxing. That's hilarious.

Face buried in her pillow, blanket yanked all the way over her head, Dahlia cracks open an eye. When she pulls back the blanket and sees her curtain, it takes her a second to remember where she is. She had thought she was in the woods, then she thought she was... home? No, that's not right.

"Jesus Christ," she yawns, pulling back the blinds on her window to see the pale morning light. "Is this what being a morning person is like?"

Robin checks his phone the second he opens his eyes, his usual first move to see how much more sleep Tess is gonna let him sleep before she drags him out of bed and wakes up his entire cabin in the process. The fact that his phone says it's 7:13 does not escape him.

"Shit girl," he mutters, wiping the much needed sleep from his eyes. "Wake up crew's fallin' down on the damn job."

He rolls over on his back, his mind still sifting through the last few seconds of his dream. The trees had reminded him of home--no real reason why, since they were the same trees they had in these here mountains, and it wasn't like his dream buddy was a compound dweller. Shit, they didn't even have a southern accent. Or... any accent? He tries to remember the sound of the voice, but he can't recall it any longer, and the more he thinks on it, the quicker the little details slip from his grasp.

He pulls open his curtain and throws himself off the bed, just barely sticking the landing and definitely not almost killing himself by falling four feet.

Dimi blinks awake in that perfect, most comfortable spot in the middle of his bed. So he lays there quietly for a while, feeling a bit homesick, but still smiling about the odd dream he'd had and all the noise Robin is making.

He glances out the window, thinking of how different home is from here, before pulling back his privacy curtain and saying, "Late start, 'innit? Better run fast if you're going to get your jog in today."

Chris wakes up without a jolt. He doesn't feel the familiar exhaustion tinging the back of his mind. He hasn't felt this rested since prom night. Fumbling, he gropes for his phone to check the time. "Fuck," he says outloud. Seven is a massively late start. He doesn't even know how he slept so late. That's what's more weird to him than the dream itself. He's dreamed about the forest before. He's dreamed about the anonymous writer before. That's not weird.

He drops his phone back down and lays in bed, hearing the movement of Dimi and Robin distantly. Judging the bizarrely loud dismount from Robin's bed, this is a bit of a late start for Robin too. Chris tugs back his own privacy curtain and chucks a pillow at Robin's head. He doesn't have any advice for Robin, just this pillow.

His pillow doesn't punch.

Xavier drags his arm across his eyes when he stirs, and though he feels no need to sleep longer, he lies still for a long while, curled up into himself, sheet pulled up over his nose. His wall is plastered with more than a dozen sticky notes - reminders, doodles, messages from friends - and he just stares at them for a while, not thinking of dreams or places, but of people. Names and faces and memories made with loved ones.

After the pressure in his chest and ears subsides and he realizes that, yes, he can move, he begins to peel the notes off the wall one by one. Silent except for the occasional crumpling noise when he gets to one not worth keeping. No need to remind himself to study History, anymore.

Well. That's a better night's sleep than he's had in a while- Isaiah is a worrier, and the thought of leaving Gooseberry for good does not give him any joy- and he can't remember the last time his subconscious, or his conscious for that matter, thought that everything will be all right.

He could look the gift-horse of contentment in the mouth, or he could just sort of...lie here, enjoying it, for a few minutes. For once in his life, Isaiah chooses the latter.

Only it's sort of slowly spoiled by crumpling noises, of all things.

"If you're reading at this hour, I regret to inform you that studying is done," he tells the room softly, without emerging from the curtained burrow that is his bed.

Anuhea wakes up at 7:13, but it's pushing 7:30 before she gets out of bed. Not because she's tired — she didn't fall back asleep; she just ... didn't didn't feel like moving for a while. She stares up at the ceiling, one hand behind her head, for about fifteen minutes, thinking of nothing in particular. Letting time pass. That's all.

Freneticism has never been a fault of hers, but even so, there's a certain stillness to this morning that feels calming, grounding. By the time she opens her certain, Anuhea feels oddly ready to take on the day, and young adulthood shortly thereafter.

Congrats on throwing water balloons real good.

i can't explain why but reading this soothed me in immeasurable ways

Yes. I teared up (surprise) but also am so reassured. I am so glad our dying babies are good throwers :(

the summer of crying at work.😖

This is Very Real.
I am happy I'm in a remote office today with NO HUMAN CONTACT and thus NO ONE TO HIDE EMOTIONS AT

i can explain why: we are all our senior babies, and a dreamy dream ghost just told us we're gonna be ok.

Omggg. Thanks for throwing water balloons, everyone! :O

Also, how clear should recollections of the dream be? I'm assuming not terribly since they wake up thinking of something else? Or is that a per player call? Regardless, SO EXCITING.

They won't remember anything more detailed than what was described above, but they might recall less if you'd prefer that for some reason!

Nope, that makes sense. Just wanted to check. ♥ Thank you!

I like to think if the freshmen got this it would have been "GO HOME. NOBODY EVEN LIKES YOU GUYS."

braydyn

"WHAT THE FUCK IS EVER WRONG WITH YOU WHY ARE YOU STALKING THE SENIORS. THIS IS WHY YOU CAN'T HAVE NICE THINGS."

the sophomores would be like "oh god, you people again."

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Every senior had the same dream last night.

IC REACTIONS

Leo (and open to Ebonhide Sr Boys!)

Leo (and open to Ebonhide Sr Boys!)

Ebonhide Senior Boys

Ebonhide Senior Boys

Ebonhide Senior Boys

Dahlia (Senior Ebongals welcome!)

Robin (Senior Coppertools also welcome, he's loud)

Senior Coppertools

Re: Senior Coppertools

Xavier (& Ribbongents?)

Xavier (& Ribbongents?)

Anuhea (and open, if we're all doing this, lmao)

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