Page 108 of Dream a Little Dream

He raised a hand, barely conscious of the gesture, and the doors hissed open. “You go anywhere near Wilton?”

“Yeah, I go through it,” the driver replied.

Aaron stepped on, buzzing his student card, making his way to the back of the bus. He sank into a seat, staring at his own reflection in the window, watching the lights fade and die as the bus lurched forward, taking him away from the familiar and into the depths of his past.

Wilton was a tiny, forgotten village nestled among twisting lanes, barely more than a handful of houses and the sprawling Wilton Farm, with the Ryston River running through its quiet heart. When the bus finally slowed at the lone stop, Aaron got off, feet hitting the ground with a strange finality.

“Last bus in an hour,” the driver called to him. “After that, you’re stuck till morning.”

Aaron nodded absently. Guess he wasn’t in London anymore. No. He was back here, back where it all started, or close enough. A feeling settled over him, equal parts dread and familiarity.

Home.

Dark branches stretched out like skeletal hands, twisting around him as he made his way down the empty lane to an overgrown path, where a sickly orange glow from a nearby streetlamp cast everything in an eerie, feverish light. Was it fate tonight was Halloween? Or was it just apt?

Then there, tucked just off the road, he saw the house. Almost swallowed by nature itself, with ivy creeping up its walls, trees growing too close, branches scratching the cracked windows, and the walls smeared with years of grime. It didn’t look like anyone could live there. But Aaron knew someone did. Someone who cared very little about appearances.

He remembered this place.

And it stabbed him in the jugular.

There should have been another house along the winding lane. A grand old manor, with a sweeping garden stretching endlessly into the horizon. Acres of wild, untamed land surrounding it, a perfect haven for a child’s imagination. A home and grounds that had been his kingdom. Hissanctuary. He could see it in his mind now, vivid and bright, the place where he’d spun tales of princes and knights, pirates and heroes. Back then, he’d believed in heroes. He’d wanted tobeone.

He hadn’t known then that heroes were flawed too.

But his childhood dreams had grown in the shadow of a monster’s lair. That house—his playground, his refuge—had been steeped in something far darker than his young mind could comprehend. He hadn’t known.Couldn’thave known. That beneath its worn beams and creaking floors lay the makings of horror. And now it was gone. Demolished. Wiped from the earth like a stain scrubbed clean. All that remained was a wasteland. Mounds of churned-up mud and rubble where memories still lingered, clinging to the air like ghosts. The sight of it struck Aaron with a force he hadn’t braced for, a hollow ache openingwide in his chest. It wasn’t just the house that was gone. It was the last shred of innocence he had ever known.

His throat tightened, breath catching. He clenched his fists, fingernails digging into his palms as the weight of it all bore down on him. He wanted to scream, to rage against the void where his childhood had once stood. But what good would it do? The house was gone, and so was the boy who had dreamed of heroes. In his place stood someone who knew not all stories had one.

And some villains didn’t even hide.

Thishouse, though, the one he’d been called to, had been his neighbour’s. The man inside always hovering at the edges, like a shadow never quite vanishing, blending into the periphery of Aaron’s childhood. Why hadn’t he remembered sooner? Why hadn’t the pieces clicked? Standing here now, with the house looming in front of him like a dark monolith, it all came rushing back, crashing into him in suffocating, chaotic waves and his knees buckled, legs refusing to carry him forward as if they knew what waited for him inside.

Memories clawed their way to the surface. Fragmented and distorted, but sharp enough to cut. He had been achild. Drugged into a haze and locked in a cupboard for most of the time. He couldn’t have expected to remember everything. It was too monstrous to comprehend. Yet now, as the house loomed over him, and the fragments pieced themselves together, each one a shard of glass reflecting a twisted truth, he remembered it all. The man inside that house had been there, drifting in and out of his parents’ lives with a quiet omnipresence. Watching. Whispering words burrowing deep into their minds. Words that didn’t seem to belong to anyone but had poisoned everything.

Aaron took a faltering step forward, body rebelling even as something pulled him toward the house and the name came rushing back with sickening clarity.

Drew.

The puzzle wasn’t complete yet, but the edges were there, sharp and jagged, and he could feel the picture forming. A picture he was terrified to see.

“Fuck, shit,shit.”

It all made sense now.Drewhad told him about the roses. Aaron had toldDrewabout Rahul. But why Rahul? What didhemean? What was all that about?

The answer felt close, just out of reach, tangled in Drew’s sick logic.

It’s all about the why.

Aaron’s pulse thundered, mind a whirlwind of questions spinning faster and faster until they sharpened into a singular, dangerous truth:He needed to know the why.It was why he was here. Why he’d come back to Ryston. Why he’d stalked Kenny for three years. Because hehadto know.

Even if it killed him.

It might.

Adrenaline surged, dulling the instinct to run. He couldn’t. Not now. Not when he’d come so far, and his legs carried him up the overgrown path, through the choking shadows of the skeletal trees, and to the door of the decaying house. He didn’t hesitate, slamming his fist against the lacquered wood, the force rattling his arm as the sound echoed through the silent night.

The door creaked open, and Drew stood there, smile like a predator savouring its prey. “Aaron, I’m so glad you could join us.”

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