Prom Dreams Side Story
Volume 7: Dolores Roth - “Obsession”

by QZProductions

Despite his ice cold touch, I felt myself strangely moved by the way his fingers caressed my cheek. The look in his eyes no longer appeared to be that of hunger, but of tenderness. At first, I had feared that I was nothing more to this creature than its next meal, but as I felt myself drawn ever deeper into his radiant crimson orbs, I realized --

If Dolores could have rolled her eyes any further into the back of her head, she would have probably gone blind. Seriously, "orbs"? Who wrote this, she wondered, a thirteen-year-old? She'd read dime romance novels with less ridiculous prose than this!

With a sigh, she turned the page and continued reading, though she didn't know why she still bothered. Perhaps she simply wanted to see how this melodramatic train wreck would play out, or perhaps she wanted to find some reason why this schlock was so popular with her classmates, or --

"Hey, what's that you're reading?"

Startled, Dolores looked up from her book - she always was surprised when one of her schoolmates bothered to talk to her - and saw a dark-haired boy staring curiously at her. He must have been that new student, she thought - what was his name, again? Kyle, wasn't it?

"Oh, um... this?" She folded the corner of the page she was on and closed the book. "N-Nothing, really, just some trashy vampire novel, that's all. I don't even know why I'm forcing myself to read it..."

Kyle's eyes seemed to widen slightly at the words "vampire novel". Then, he furrowed his brow nervously. "O-Oh... that bad, huh?" He redirected his gaze to the book in question. "So, uh, what's it called, then? That is, if you don't mind me asking..."

Dolores held it up for him to see. "Eternal Blood: Waning Moon." She grimaced slightly. "I honestly don't get why it's so popular - the writing is awful, and the so-called 'love story' is just... blech."

When he saw the book's cover, Kyle gulped; then, he sank slightly into his desk chair, clearly embarrassed. "...Oh." He averted his classmate's gaze. "I see..."

"Mister Mason, Miss Roth," said Mr. Neal chipperly as he passed by the two students' desks, placing graded papers from the previous day on each of them, "I believe these are yours?"

"Oh!" Said Dolores, glancing at the "100" written in the margins of her assignment. "Um, thank you, Mr. Neal -- "

...Wait, she thought - Mason? As in...?

She glanced at the book's cover once more - sure enough, the author's surname matched that of her classmate's. It didn't take long for her to put the pieces together, or for her gut to sink in mortified guilt.

"...Oh," she stammered, "oh, gosh, Kyle, I-I didn't mean to say -- "

Kyle simply laughed sheepishly. "No, no, it's okay! Really! You didn't know!" He sighed in defeat. "Looks like my secret's out, though..."

Dolores frowned. "So you really are related after all..."

"She's my Mom, yeah." He waved his hand dismissively. "To be honest, though? ...I'm not really a big fan of her books, either. They're kind of, um..."

Amused by his admission, Dolores cracked a small smile. "Girly?"

"Well, yeah, I guess you could say that."

After a short pause, Dolores began to chuckle. Then, finding humor in their awkward exchange, Kyle joined in her laughter. For a brief moment, the two shared their mirth - then, suddenly, the laughter ceased, replaced by complete and utter silence as their world stopped in its tracks.

Like a video in reverse, the flow of time began to run backwards. The papers were removed from the desk, the book was opened once more, and the dark haired boy's attention returned to the blackboard. Then, the classroom began to move again.

Kyle turned his head, glancing at the girl beside him curiously. "Hey, what's that you're reading?"

From the corner of the room, unnoticed by the players onstage, sat the master of this fabricated world. She watched intently as her puppets played out the fragments of her memories, over and over and over again, hoping in vain to glean some sense, some shred of meaning out of it all.

In her heart - or rather, the withered remains of what was once a heart - she knew she wouldn't find the validation she sought. It was the one and only time she and the boy known as Kyle Mason had ever shared the slightest of connections; their one conversation that didn't simply consist of empty pleasantries or "let me get the door for you"s. From an objective view, it was nothing out of the ordinary - two teenagers crossing paths for the briefest of moments - but to her...

The scene froze once again on the two students' laughter. From her seat by the window, the true Dolores stared at the boy, her lifeless eyes cold and weary. That innocent smile, that careless laugh - surely it was no different from the ones he would have shared with anyone else. However, something inside of her wanted to believe otherwise; that, perhaps, in another, happier lifetime, this simple moment could have blossomed into something more.

And it was this thought, more than even the burning hatred that had created this world, that made the pain in her soul unbearable.

She narrowed her eyes, her expression contorting into a malevolent grimace as her shaking fingers clenched the armrests of her chair. No matter what she did, what she became, or who she killed, she could never completely destroy the seed known as "want" that this boy, this damned boy, had planted inside of her, whether he had realized it or not. And even for all that she still coveted him - or perhaps merely the idea of being wanted by him - she would never forgive him for what he'd done to her.

Slowly, she rose from her wheelchair, a somewhat arduous task even in her new form. With limping steps, she approached the image of Kyle, bracing herself on tables and bookshelves as she did so. When she finally reached his desk, she raised a hand in the air, willing the lifeless imitation to rise along with it.

"...You..." she growled, her voice laced with barely contained rage, "how could you... how could you not have seen - how could you not have known...!?"

A pulse of dark energy emitted from Dolores' hand; then, the form of Kyle lurched forward, impaling itself in its chest on her outstretched fingers.

"You should have seen it coming... you should have noticed the signs..." She wrapped her twitching fingers clumsily around her creation's false, yet still beating heart. "You were supposed to stop them, to make everything better again..." As blood ran down her arm and stained the ground, she glared directly into the copy's eyes. "Why didn't you save me!? WHY!?"

With a squeeze of her hand, a torrent of blood spat out of the hole in the being's chest. Its expression suddenly changed into one of pain and terror, as though willed to by its creator for her own twisted satisfaction. With a pained, guttural cry, its form contorted violently as yet more blood poured from its orifices - its eyes, its nose, its mouth, and even from brand new wounds entirely. Finally, when its tattered body had bled dry, Dolores removed her hand, allowing the empty sack of flesh and bone to fall to the ground, crumpling in a heap within a shallow pool of red.

She glared at it for a moment longer, until the body and the magic that had formed it dissolved entirely. Soon after, the other players on her stage followed suit, and she was left alone in the empty world of her memories. Exhausted by the sudden, intense use of her powers, she fell to her knees, breathing heavily as she stared at her own bloodstained reflection in the pool's surface.

Then, she began to laugh. It was a labored laugh, laced with as much weariness as it was with madness; her voice cracked and screeched under the weight of her despair and ever-crumbling sanity. When she finally fell silent, she hung her head, her frenzied, tear-filled eyes fixed to the floor.

"...Just as I thought," she muttered hoarsely. "This goddamned dream just won't stay dead, will it...?"