It was a rather dark evening when a kid no older than fifteen shot awake, panting and holding tightly onto the bedsheets. His eyes darted through his room, revealing some sports posters and animal figures. On a desk was a rather expensive computer set-up but all these things felt a bit foreign as he looked at them. He did recognize it all but it felt as if it wasn’t his. Maybe if a friend had shown it to him once.

  He got out of bed, starting to panic a bit as he started to remember his life and that this was his stuff, but also that it wasn’t. It was as if he had two different lives in his head at once. One where he was alive in a world on the clouds and another where he was just a normal school boy in this unimaginative world.

  The longer that he looked around his dark room and saw his stuff, the more he was convinced that the cloud stuff was just a dream. A very realistic dream that for some reason seemed to make him cry when thinking back to his fake family that had been imprisoned.

  There wasn’t really a decent way to explain what was happening, feeling as if something was left behind. Although with how real it had looked, he walked to his window, and opened up the blinds. In his dream, he couldn’t create clouds but he could manipulate them. His eyes went to the sky, seeing that it was a very cloudy morning.

  A low grey light pierced the clouds which gave him the ability to see but just barely. Just like in his dream, he tried to force one of the clouds to come down towards him. At first it didn’t look like anything was happening, but before he knew it and could feel disappointed, his house got covered in a big cloud, making everything obscured.

  “I think I must still be dreaming.” He couldn’t believe his eyes and let go of the cloud. It didn’t just fly away, making whatever it touched wet as it slowly started to disappear. Just to be sure, he willed a part of the cloud to clump together to form some kind of solid cloud, big enough to lie on as he then brought it to his window. When this worked, he knew that something was up.

  “This isn’t possible. How can I have control over it?” Due to the thinking and distraction, he stopped controlling it as it slowly dissipated as well. No matter what he thought of, it just didn’t make sense. “I know that I’m real. This is my room, yet it feels as if I don’t belong here.” Just to be sure, he grabbed a coat out of his closet where his name was written inside of it. “Jones.”

  He just dropped it on the bed, closing his eyes to think back to the realistic dream. It was almost as if he had lived an entire second life, both with the name Jones. “It doesn’t make sense.” The longer he thought about it, the more frustrated he got.

  While an ability to do anything except the normal was thrilling, he also knew that it was wrong. Luckily for him, some explanation might come sooner than he expected. When walking back to the window and looking outside, he saw someone approaching the house.

  It was difficult to see who this was as the person coming closer was hiding his face under the hood of his coat. He waited a bit, seeing him look up into the windows of the house. At first the thought of a thief came to his mind before that idea went away.

  He started to wave his arms in the air as soon as he spotted Jones. With him now looking up, Jones could see that there was a woman underneath, trying to get his attention. She must be rather old as there was some gray hair already showing in between her brown hair. At first he wasn’t sure on what to do, but she clearly wanted his attention.

  After thinking about it for a couple of seconds, he opened his window, leaning out to look down at her. “Who are you?”

  She stopped waving her arms around, grabbing a small book from underneath her coat. “I’m Madison. Are you Jones?”

  “I’m Jones, yes.” It was a bit weird that she knew his name, starting to think that perhaps he shouldn’t have confirmed that. “Once again, who are you?”

  Madison was trying to quickly go to a page in her book, opening it up and pointing it towards Jones. It showed him sitting on a cloud with a city on clouds drawn in the background. “That’s you, right?”

  It was just like in his dream. It was weird seeing a drawing of it. But this also meant that something else was going on, something he couldn’t explain. “Hey! Who are you!?” He felt frustrated now, wanting to know what was going on here. “How do you know about my dream!?”

  All of this yelling to each other might wake up the neighbors and that was something she didn’t want. “I need to explain something about your dream. Can you please come down?”

  “Yeah right. I don’t know you and you expect me to come down. I can’t even get down because mother locks the front door and I can’t get out without going into her room to get the keys.” He thought that it would be smart to mention a locked door. If she was a creep or thief, she at least couldn’t get in.

  While he was smug about his actions, she couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. “Your mother? I’m sorry to say this but… How do I say this… If I’m correct, then… she might not be here anymore.”

  That made his smile disappear, feeling his heart drop for a second. He looked back at his door as if she would come in. But he knew that she was sleeping downstairs. After a couple of seconds, he ran to the door, going down the stairs. As he went, he forgot the lights but there was no time for that, going towards her room.

  There was no way that this woman could be right, how could his mother suddenly disappear like that? Once he was in front of her room, he stopped, panting and trying to think a bit more before just barging in. She knew his name, she knew of the dream, a dream he just had. She sounded genuinely sorry when talking about his mother.

  In the end, he must know if his mother was still here. He opened the door and immediately turned her light on. Her bed was empty, and on his dads side was also nothing. It was clear that the bed had been used but his parents were gone. “Mom? Dad?”

  For now there was panic in his voice, nothing but panic as he ran to the door leading to the bathroom, but he already knew the answer. Once the door was open, he saw that it was empty. Tears started to flow now, feeling his legs getting weak as he walked back to the bed. A small part of him hoped that his mother would storm inside yelling for being awake.

  When that didn’t happen, he sat down on their bed, touching the spot where his father should be sleeping. “Dad?” It was soft and sounded full of regret as there were so many things he realized that he wanted to do with them. He laid down onto the bed, starting to cry fully as he didn’t know what to do anymore, completely forgetting about the woman outside or his open window in the winter.

  As he was crying, he started to get visions back in his head about his dream, seeing himself standing in a forest. His parents imprisoned by the government of the people of the clouds. It was scary how this dream predicted losing his parents. In the end he fell back asleep from exhaustion, his body shivering from both cold and weakness.

  When Lucas woke up, he wasn’t sure where he was, feeling that his bed felt different than normal. His cover also felt weird, more light and fluffy. That’s when he managed to discern the room a bit more as his eyes got used to the dark. He was on the couch in the living room with the smell of warm chocolate piercing his nose.

  Now, he wasn’t even sure whether or not he was awake. Why was he on the couch if he fell asleep on his parents' bed? Maybe it was all a dream? Maybe his parents weren’t gone and that woman was part of it, maybe he was still asleep. He pinched his own arm, quickly stopping as it stung a bit.

  So not asleep. He got up from the couch, feeling weak still. “Mom! Are you there?” He walked towards the living room doors, seeing the blue and grey light from outside coming from underneath the door.

  The doors opened up as the woman from before carefully looked inside at Jones. She could see how all hope got sucked out of Jones, watching his shoulders drop down as he saw that I wasn’t his mother.

  He didn’t run away from the woman, going towards her and walking past her into the kitchen. The blinds were open, showing a cold winter day with no sun outside. He sniffled a bit, looking at the pot on the kitchen stove where the chocolate smell came from.

  The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.

  Madison saw him look and quickly walked to it, turning off the stove before grabbing a mug and scooping up some hot coco. She walked towards the table and pulled a chair back and put the mug down. It dirtied the table cloth but that was a concern for later. “Here, you want some?”

  Jones hesitated for a bit, but slowly came closer after looking at the mug for a bit. He came closer, sitting down and grabbing it. For now, he took anything to distract himself from the truth. “Yes please.”

  She looked at him as he sat there, wondering what was going on in his head. In order to not let him feel alone, she grabbed a mug herself and sat across from him, although she didn’t drink from it, just turning the mug slowly as she looked at the table so he wouldn’t feel uncomfortable.

  After a while and with him drinking half of his mug did he finally ask the question. “What happened to my parents?”

  While a good question, it wasn’t one she could answer, finally taking a sip herself in order to buy herself some time. “I don’t know.”

  “Then how did you know that they were gone?” He started to get more sad the longer that they talked. Not that they talked for a long time but words hurt right now.

  “Because it happened to all of us.” She tapped on her book as she pushed it towards him. “This book is my diary. I write in it when I get a dream like yours. It has been thousands of years since I got one like this.”

  “Thousands? You have to be kidding me, what are you talking about?” He stopped drinking completely, looking at the book. It didn’t look thousands of years old, in fact, it looked like one he could buy in the store right now.

  “Yes right, sorry, I haven’t done this in a long time now and I need to rediscover how to do this.” She cleared her throat, trying to find the right words.

  “My name is Madison and I’m one of the dream children, or at least was. Or am I still…? Anyway, when I was your age many many years ago I too got some kind of magical dream just like you. When I woke up, I lost my parents as well, just gone. In my dream I was some kind of oracle or something…? I don’t remember it fully anymore as human brains aren’t meant to go on for that long.”

  “Anyway, my parents were gone. That’s when a couple of days later I got another dream of a boy that also had a special dream. Although his was more brutal than mine. I figured that it was just some nightmare. That was until I saw him in real life outside a dream. This boy had a hand grown out of his chest. He had the ability to go back to a younger age whenever he died, but there would be a fully fletched hand attached to his body somewhere. If he died, he came back as a fifteen year old but his memories were intact.”

  “And so, multiple people with powers were born. All of us, unable to die due to some reason. You had hands guy, runner guy, undying guy, painter guy, me and the witch. All of us having a weird different way of living and dying.”

  “Wait, stop there. You don’t know their names or dreams? I thought you wrote them down.” He was trying to find any discrepancies in her stories and this felt like a big mistake.

  She got a bit impatient with him interrupting her but she understood. “I said that over time, we forget things. We’re not meant to go on forever with our brains and sometimes traumas get in the way. And I originally didn’t write down the dreams. When I wrote it down later to not forget it, I lost it many years later. In the end I didn’t have it anymore so what I’m telling you now is all I remember.”

  “Where was I again?” She tried to remember where she had paused her story. “I’m not sure, in the end, all of us lost our parents. Now after all those thousands of years, nothing really happened and honestly, I also forgot why it happened to us. If I’m right, then you should get to know your purpose in a couple of days.”

  Jones took another sip of his drink before thinking of something else in her story. “Wait, you’re one of them too? What’s your power then besides creeping on peoples dreams?”

  “Well, I wouldn’t call it creeping…”

  “I do, so what is it?”

  She looked at him, waiting for him to interrupt her again. When he stayed silent, she tried to continue her story. “When I sleep, I age backwards. So every second I’m awake, I get older, and when asleep, younger. It’s not easy to live a normal life when you have to sleep twelve or more hours a day. In order to not die or more, if I want to get younger, I have to sleep longer than I’m awake.”

  “So what did you people do then? Form some kind of superhero team?” He sounded excited at first before shutting up, looking down at his mug. “Wait… superheroes? How do I know what that is?”

  Madison tilted her head when he said that, the cogs in her head slowly forming the purpose that she was looking for. “Ooooh yes, now I remember. So right now you have the memories of two lives in your body. One where you live here and the other of your dream life. Your dream life did actually happen but in a different universe.”

  “The world that we’re in right now has a problem. The imagination failed to develop, making this world unable to experience fantasy like vampires, zombies, some kind of ancient horrors. That’s why we’re here, to try and give people ideas, to start the imagination of the world.”

  She sounded rather excited when she said that, having remembered her purpose. Jones on the other hand looked sad, looking down still. “I want my parents.”

  “Right, sorry. Anyway, Madison isn’t even my real name. I recently found it on a magazine and took it. I have honestly no clue what it used to be.”

  Jones got up, walking towards the pot on the stove to get some more to drink. “So what now? I start to do magic tricks until people believe in magic powers?”

  It was clear that Jones wasn’t happy about this idea. He turned back around, blowing in his warm cup while trying to understand everything that was going on.

  “I’m not sure, all I know is now that I’ve gotten you as a new dreamer, others might follow suit. So last time, I remember that not everyone knew of each other. This time I’m planning to get everyone together.”

  “To do what? What’s the point?” He was still trying to recover from his parents. “I lost my mother.”

  Madison got up and walked up to him. She couldn’t pretend to be this kid’s mother nor did she know anything about being one. “I have this place in the woods. It’s pretty well hidden. You can stay with me if you want? I have a television, games, snacks...” What she hadn’t told him was that with a long life like hers, she managed to gain some wealth. “From there on we can try to figure out how you’ll continue. How does that sound?”

  Jones looked up at her when she mentioned it all. It sounded rather nice, but it was still difficult for him to believe everything that had been happening. “I don’t know… what about my parents?”

  “Hmmm” She got up with her unfinished drink and walked towards him, putting it down. “Your parents are gone and they’re not coming back, nor can you get them back in any way. I tried myself, there’s no getting them back.”

  “But… How… Ah!” He shut up, grabbing his head as the visions of his dream came back. His mug fell onto the ground, his mind getting confused. “Ah, what is this!?”

  Before he dropped onto the ground, Madison grabbed him and kept him up. “Hey, hey, what’s going on?”

  “I keep seeing my dream, it’s getting more intrusive. I just can’t get rid of it.” He started to pull his hair out, groaning in pain. “Make it stop please!”

  “Hold on, easy.” She grabbed his hands, forcing them open and pulling them away so he couldn’t claw his eyes out. “Stop it!”

  He started to tear up again, not aware of what was going on or how to stop it. Slowly but surely, the visions started to disappear again, still remembering it all. “What’s happening?”

  “Okay, listen. What you’re seeing is your other life, your dream life. Somewhere, there’s another world in which everything you dreamt about did actually happen.” She let go of his wrists and instead tried to cool him down by rubbing his upper arms up and down, not knowing what she was doing.

  “Hah… like… like another world? As in a parallel world?” He wiped his tears away with his pajama sleeve.

  “No, not parallel. Parallel means that it’s similar to this one. The world you dreamt about is a fully different one where someone who looks like you lived in. Same name, same face, ish, but different Jones.”

  “So, does that mean that he is still there? Why do I… Why is this happening to me?” He looked her in the eyes, trying to find any form of compassion.

  While she did show compassion, she also knew that there wasn’t an easy way to help him. “Listen, your parents are gone and you’re part of something bigger now. And if I can be frank, we need to go sooner than later.”

  “Why… Why do we need to go? I don’t want to go.” He looked at the door leading towards the hallway. “I can’t just leave my parents.”

  “They’re gone, come on.” She got frustrated now, not believing that she was so difficult when it happened to her. Although she didn’t remember how she reacted all those years ago. “There will be a moment where someone will try to contact your parents. Maybe your school to ask where you are, maybe a family member. When that happens, the cops might get called and your parents will be considered missing. Then they will take you away and if that happens, I can’t help you anymore without being a suspect. And I touched things here so my DNA is all over the place now. I can’t go to jail.”

  Jones had heard about orphans and foster parents and if he wasn’t put there, he would be put with his grandparents which he also wouldn’t want. “What if I come with you?” He sounded weak and was almost whispering. “What if I’m the only one?”

  She hadn’t thought about that, looking down at the broken mug. “I… euh… I don’t think that it’s the case? I bet that you’ll have friends soon.”

  “I don’t want friends, I want my parents.” He started to cry once more, not understanding what was going on even though she already explained it, or at least most of it.

  “I know that things might be rough, but we need to go. Get some of your things and get dressed. I’ll get a car going okay?” She patted him on the shoulder before standing up straight.

  “What about the mug?” He softly gestured towards the mug and chocolate on the ground, taking a step to the side as it was slowly going towards his foot.

  “I’ll get it cleaned up, come on, get going with you.” She gave a soft slap on his arm, trying to get him going.

  “Yeah alright.” He didn’t sound happy about it but slowly made his way towards the hallway.

  As soon as he was out of the door, she grabbed the mug she had been drinking out of, pouring out the chocolate in the sink and cleaning her mug. She then put it underneath her coat before going outside into the hall and closed the door. Next, she walked outside to get the car and brought it to the front door, keeping it running as she got out to wait inside for Jones. As soon as he came downstairs, she guided him to the car before taking off with screeching tires.