Dark Daze by Ava Delany Read Free Book Online

anything like this
before.” She let out a nervous giggle, not sure what else to
say.
    He smiled, rubbing his hands along her arms.
The gesture seemed so natural. As if he’d done it a hundred times.
It comforted her in a way nothing had since her mother’s death.
    Placing a finger alongside his chin, she
winked and said, “Get me some food, then I want to meet this dog of
yours.”
     
    <><><>
     
    What in the world happened?
    Ian still felt a bit shaken as Brie pulled
him across the living room toward the kitchen. She’d been sexy in
her demure red dress, but he’d never been the type to go to bed on
the first date. He’d never gone to bed…without a bed.
    It had been seriously hot though. They’d have
to do it against the wall in the future. Or perhaps across the
table.
    But the strange compulsions to do things he
hadn’t done before—like drink beer and watch football—tainted the
moment a little. He needed his mother’s gift for understanding. If
he talked to her, she might know something about the bizarre
happenings. Maybe she’d even painted something helpful already. If
she had, she would be able to give him answers, even if they didn’t
make sense yet.
    He grabbed a beer from the fridge, popped the
cap, and took a swig.
    What the hell?
    He hadn’t bought any beer in the first place.
Now there seemed to be an endless supply in his refrigerator. “What
the hell is this doing here? This whole thing is driving me
insane.” Was there a pooka plaguing him? A pan or sprite playing
tricks? He thrust the beer toward the counter. It tipped,
spilling.
    He grabbed the bottle and righted it then
stared, with widespread hands, at the beer pouring onto the floor.
Brie placed a hand on his shoulder, guiding him back a step.
    “Calm down. No need to cry over spilled
beer.” She smirked, an adorable tilting of her lips. It put him at
ease. A nod of her head drew him to the table. They sat, and she
watched him for a moment, brows furrowed. “So, tell me what’s
happening here.”
    “I don’t know. It all started earlier today.”
Before he realized it, he’d told her the whole story. Strange
behaviors, claws, black-hole eyes, child-like fears, mental health
concerns, the whole ridiculous tale. He went on for almost an hour
and she sat listening to him in silence. She never had a “you’re
crazy” look on her face. Never the frozen smile, the blank stare,
or the crease of concern on her forehead he’d kept expecting.
    When he finished, she sat back, finger to her
lips. “This explains a lot…”
    “No diagnosis of certifiable?” It still
surprised him that she hadn’t left the instant his story had begun.
Or even the second he’d asked her to leave the bar with him. “I
don’t suppose you will want to see me again. Outside of a local
psych ward anyhow.”
    She surveyed him for a moment, lips pursed,
then smiled. “You know why I got into psychiatry?”
    He shook his head. Ah, perhaps this turn of
the conversation would give him a chance to say something without
it coming out as the gibbering of an imbecile, or worse, a
loon.
    “When I was a young girl, we took a family
vacation to a lake. One day I started having strange feelings.” Her
voice dropped to a whisper, and he leaned in to hear. “On Dark
Day.”
    His breath caught in his chest. He’d tried so
hard to forget that day. To forget what happened to his mother…his
father.
    “My parents and I stood in the living room of
our cabin, set to play a board game. My brother had stormed off in
a huff because he didn’t want to play. The sky went dark.” She took
a shuddering breath. “The Dark Day experiences are not just tabloid
stories. And all the talk about the darkness being a rare solar
blackout out or a mass hallucination was wrong, because something
happened to me too.”
    Slush replaced the blood in his veins,
chilling him to the bone.
    “Mom insisted Dad go into the black to look
for him. Soon after he left, my head started to