Emily screamed, bolting upright in bed, covered in sweat. She flung the covers off and rolled to the floor to get away from the monster attacking her. Then she realized that there was no monster. She was alone. It was not three o’clock in the morning, but rather seven a.m. The shine was shining. Sitting on the floor, panting, out of breath, Emily slowly realized that she had just had the worst dream of her life. “The whole thing, the howling, the woods, the chase, the changing from a wolf into a person—it was all a dream, a long, terrible dream,” Emily muttered to herself. She looked down and saw that she was sitting on the floor beside her bed, completely tangled up in her blankets. “Okay, Emily, first . . . get up off the floor.” She rolled to one side, then pushed herself up, tossing the blankets back onto the bed in a heap. Sitting on the edge of her bed, she tried to make sense of the crazy nightmare. She felt as if someone had been shaking her and shaking her, refusing to stop.
