Thud. Thud. Thud. A gurgling sound echoes in the air as if someone is choking on their own blood. Or vomit. My eyes snap open. I’m immediately alert, my heart beating loudly as the scene materializes in front of me. Lia is thrashing in her sleep, her feet kicking in the air, and her body is heavy like a rock being thrown to the bottom of an ocean. Both of her hands are fisted so tightly that there’s a cut on her palm from her nails and droplets of blood color the white sheets in red. But that’s not what woke me up. It was the sound. The gurgling. The choking on her own saliva.
