There was screaming that sounded far away, and a nearby shadow urgently whispered, "It's not real." Suddenly everything dissolved and I found myself in a familiar bed with a familiar sleepy arm thrown carelessly across my shoulder, and my own left arm was under the neck of my softly snoring fiancé. I looked at Rob's watch, which glowed softly in the dark, temporarily staining the bedclothes green. 1:22 a.m. it told me. I gently slid my arm from under Rob's neck and extracted his arm from my shoulder and put on my glasses, waiting for my right leg to gain consciousness so I could swing it over the side of the bed to join the other one, and I could pull myself to the kitchen to make hot tea for myself. I was frustrated with myself. If I had the money, I would fly home right now. My best friend was frighteningly ill and I couldn't be there to comfort her. It was only 10:22 p.m. where she was; maybe I could call her? But I wouldn't know what to say. I wandered to the kitchen to put some water on the kettle and thought things over some more. I desperately wanted her to be at my wedding, be one of my bridesmaids, but she had to refuse. Things just wouldn't work that way, I guess. I picked up the phone and pressed it against my face; the cool plastic felt good on my hot skin. The dial tone felt empty and hopeless, so I pushed in the area code and the first three digits of her number to make it stop. I hesitated, but ultimately pressed the last four numbers and listened anxiously to the monotonous ringing sound. My heart jumped when I heard the click of a phone picking up and my best friend's voice saying, "Hello, this is Amy." She sounded so tired. "Hey," I said softly. "'Sme. I didn't wake you, did I?" Almost all traces of tiredness left her voice and she replied, "Oh my God! Noon!" I cringed and smiled at the use of my old nickname. "No, you didn't wake me up, don't worry." "What's going on, how are you doing?" I questioned, cradling the phone between my ear and my shoulder as I turned the tap on to put water in my kettle. "The medication," she said, and paused for a moment. "I can hardly sleep at night even though I'm dead tired all the time. But I guess I'm holding up okay. James, remember James? He's moved in with me. He's gone to bed by now--" I quickly glanced at the time on the microwave, 1:39, it blinked at me. "--But only because he starts work tomorrow at 7 instead of 8. So he can come home earlier. He calls me from his cell, like, seven times a day," I grinned at Amy's faux-annoyance, "to make sure I've taken the right pills or to give me someone to cry to if I get overly frustrated. He's been a lovely help these past few months," she trailed off and I refrained from offering her money to get James and her here. I bit back questions and suddenly she exclaimed, "June! What time is it?!" I glanced wearily at the clock again and took the kettle off the stove before it started squealing. 1:42. "Oh,... You know... 10:40 p.m....plus three times sixty,” I ventured. "Holy fuck, June! Why are you not in bed!?" she demanded. I pulled my hand through my long, brown hair and sighed, "I had a bad dream. Don't worry." I dropped a tea bag into a teacup full of steaming water and swished it around with a teaspoon, pouring some raw sugar into it, looking blankly at the brown mixture. We were silent for a while. I heard a door open and a loud yawn. I saw a pale chest, hairy legs, and squinting eyes. I giggled into the phone and said, "The zombie has risen." Robert looked at me incredulously for being on the phone at such an unholy hour, poured himself some hot water, and made tea for himself. He didn't bother saying anything. I scratched my arm awkwardly and asked, "What are you doing," to my dear Amy. "I don't know," she whispered. "You're okay?" I asked. "Yeah," she said, but her voice sounded distracted and, well, not okay. "What's going on, what's wrong?" I asked. "I'm tired, I guess." She faltered. I had never wanted to be home as badly as I did right at that moment. "Can you get James? Or do those relaxation exercises; do they work? I wish you were here, Amy, I really do." "No, I wish you were here," she corrected. I bit back a desperate plea for her to come visit me. I bet, if I tried really hard, I could save enough money to bring her and James here. For my wedding, at least. Who was I kidding? Amy needed to stay in a familiar environment. She might have a breakdown with the hustle and bustle of an airport, checking baggage and getting through security. And even if she somehow managed to get through to actually boarding the plane, she would probably be reduced to a quivering claustrophobic 3-year-old by the time the plane lifted off. Suddenly Rob grunted in the way that men do sometimes, and I remembered he was there. "Remember what I said about the Zombie?" I joked into the phone. "Rob's just sitting there staring at me. He came in a few minutes ago. Rob, what are you doing? Go back to bed." He just continued to stare. "Haha," she chuckled half-heartedly. "I remember when you first met Rob three years ago." Right before I found out how ill Amy was. I remembered it too. Mixed blessings, I supposed. "And how much I hated him, and his arrogance," I chortled back to her, well aware that Rob was paying attention, trying to guess the half of the conversation that he wasn't hearing. "You would always get so pissed, when his grade was always above yours in the biochem class you shared your freshman year in college, and come whining to me, the psycho major. And now I'm just psycho." I wished she hadn't said that last part. I said what I was thinking, "I wish you wouldn’t say that, Amy." "What," her voice was strained and high. It still sounded far away; distracted. "You don't want me to say what I am? Psycho. Psycho, psycho, psycho, psycho, psych-" I heard crying. "Amy," I tried, but no answer. I hated this. I knew she didn't do it just to hurt me, but the cuts. The pretend happiness. Carving hopeless words into her arms, and hiding it from everyone, including me. James was the only one she'd ever show. I'd known Amy since we were 7. I introduced her to James in our junior year of high school and they'd become really good friends. I knew that Amy had a thing for him from the beginning, and James knew it too, but pretended not to notice. He liked Amy but just as a friend. Besides, he had a girlfriend for junior and senior years. Amy and James grew really close, though. James saved her when I couldn't. Sometimes it made me jealous, and sometimes it made me relieved. James was so levelheaded. The only things preventing Amy from asking him to marry her were their religious differences, and a fear of hurting him. I never know what to say at times like these. "Amy," I said again, "would you like me to stay on with you?" "Yes," she choked. I could tell she was trying to be quiet; that a background noise I could only assume was an old TV sitcom with a forced laugh track was louder now. She didn't want to wake James up. I wished James would stop pretending he wasn't in love with Amy. Maybe it would make Amy's condition worse, but you never know the good it could do. Amy had been "in love" with James since day 7, if not sooner. She could be so subtle about things, though. Which is why I never knew about her destructive habits until three years ago. She’d been living with it for 4 years now, and things only seemed to get worse as the days go on.