Seven.

I jolted awake, sweating, panting, screaming. I laid there, shaking. Ever since that small collision with that stranger, I've been having the same nightmare. It always starts like it did that one day. Tommy and I, driving to the river. He'd had plans with his friends, but I wanted him to go to the river with me before he went off to college. He always put me first, and I always seemed to do the same, being as selfish as I was. We sing, and smile, and laugh. I can still hear that laugh, so big and loud. It rings in my ear even after I've woken up. "Be careful!" I can hear my mother shouting in the background, so concerned as she always was. We always made fun of her, like there was nothing to worry about. We keep driving, and everything outside of the car is fuzzy, at least in my dreams. We pull into the gravel parking lot, empty, just as it was that day. In actuality, I got in first, but in my dream, Tommy always goes first. In my dream, I never leave that one spot, standing by the car, watching, smiling while Tommy swims. Tommy laughs, splashes around. In actuality, it was my idea. I pointed out the big jumping rock. In my dream, Tommy wants to go. In actuality, I was terrified, and asked him to go first. In my dream, Tommy was scared. He begs me to go with him, saying we can jump at the same time. In actuality, I climbed to the top of the rock with Tommy, and helped him to the ledge. He wasn't scared at all. He was excited, he wanted me to be happy, and if that meant going first, he'd do it. In my dream, I walk to the ledge with Tommy, hand in hand. We jump together, screaming the whole way down, and neither of us come up from under the water. In actuality, Tommy jumped. Tommy never came up. I just stood there, silent, motionless, scared, guilty. By the time I realized what was going on, I just felt my body take over. I was screaming his name, running back down that hill, sliding on the rocks, scraping my legs. No one was there. I needed help, and no one was there, not even me. I willed myself to jump from where I was, and swam around. I didn't know where he was, if he was scared, if he could hear me, if he knew I loved him. I just knew he was gone. I barely made it back to the car when I felt my body collapse. I was shaking, sweating. That was the first time I ever drove a car, and it was to go find my parents and tell them there beloved Tommy had just disappeared in the water, all because of me, the daughter they never loved quite as much. In my dream, Tommy and I are swimming deeper and deeper, still laughing, as if there's no water. He loves me, I know it. And then, I'm standing at the edge of the water, at the car, watching Tommy jump, watching him never come up again. That's when my dream becomes more like reality as I start screaming, sweating, panicking, unable to move from that one spot. That's when I wake up, realizing that I'm never going to be able to escape that look in those eyes behind that theater. I realized that I've been trying to bury all of those memories, store them away in a box. The second I broke that box, I let it all out. I went back to my memories, I welcomed them back, sliding down that hill, like that stupid little girl who wanted to go to the river with her brother. I don't know what I expected, but this is what I have. I have a few good memories, and a lot of nightmares. I tried to lay there and think about those good memories, before it all went bad. But no matter what, the nightmares come. There's no changing it.