Check out our episode here! Blue Is for Nightmares by Laurie Stolarz
Stacey is sitting in her grandma’s kitchen enjoying some egg sandwiches and admiring her amethyst ring. Noticing this, grandma gives Stacey the ring and shares how she bought it for her the day she was born and how it was always meant for her. After thanking her grandma, a chill creeps in the air and Stacey hears crying from the woods in the backyard. This is most likely her best friend Drea who always comes searching for her after a fight with her boyfriend Chad. While searching for Drea in the woods Stacey stops and realizes she has to pee really bad. Hobbling along trying not to piss herself, Stacey hears a voice that is not Drea. "Stacey... You can't hide, Stacey." She sees him across the clearing holding a bouquet of lilies, the death flower, and she is terrified. As she runs away, Stacey impales her foot on a stick, falls to the ground, and the pee finally wins out. He's behind her now, "I know your secret, Stacey." She tries to scream but her lungs get filled with dirt. Suddenly there is a loud crash of glass and the lights overhead turn on.
Sike! It's a dream!
It was a nightmare, again. Stacey wakes to pee in her bed, glass on the floor, and a concerned roommate, Drea, looking at her. It's no secret that she's been having nightmares since the beginning of the school year, but no one knows about the bedwetting side effects, not even Drea. Stacey does her best to hide her accident while Drea inspects the broken window. Turns out, Stacey, in her nightmare stupor, grabbed and threw a crystal cluster through the window. Drea, in all her DIY glory, patches up the window with her ex boyfriend (and Stacey's longtime crush) Chad's hockey jersey. After making a joke about calling Chad up for a cuddle session to keep her warm, Drea leaves the dorm room for snacks. Finally alone, Stacey cleans up her mess, the glass and the pee sheets. She is not as careful with the glass as she was with the pee sheets, and she impales her foot on a huge shard, just like with the stick in her dream. But thanks to a potato wedge and lemon juice from her witch supply drawer, Stacey is patched up good as new.
Around 4:00 am, the phone rings. Stacey answers but doesn’t recognize the unknown male caller’s voice who demands she wake Drea up and put her on the phone. Stacey, being a sensible person, denies this request so the caller hangs up. Due to the ruckus, Drea wakes up and is equally as vague about who the guy is. And then, because nobody sleeps in this dorm building, Drea and Stacey's mutual friend Amber comes by to raid their mini fridge and to perform a love spell if Stacey is willing. No love spells happen, but Stacey does perform a card reading for Drea, which she instantly regrets. The reading reconfirms her nightmares: that Chad will ask her on a date, cancel said date, and that she will receive a gift that will lead to Drea's death.
Later on at school, Stacey is struggling to stay awake during a French test. Her friend, PJ, sitting beside her is laughing, his mouth arched wide open with his green candy dyed tongue wiggling out of his mouth like an angry snake, pounding his fists on the desk in hysterics, yet no one seems to notice. Stacey can barely notice anything beyond her desperate need to pee. She tries to get permission to go to the bathroom, but her teacher, Madame LeSnore, just laughs at her while already grading the test Stacey has yet to even start. After giving her an F, Madame LeSnore folds the test into a paper airplane and flies it to Stacey. Instead of a blank test, it now reads, "YOU KILLED MAURA AND DREA WILL BE NEXT.” Stacey jumps up in terror yelling "I did not kill her!" thoroughly disturbing her classmates and teacher.
Sike! Another nightmare!
Ugh. Thankfully it was just a tiny trickle of pee this time so no one notices. Afterwards at lunch, Stacey meets up with her friends where they tease her about the freakish nightmare she had. When Stacey tries to explain what happens in her dream, vague as she can without revealing Drea’s involvement, she has a flirty moment with Chad about how maybe she shouldn't run away from her feelings. Drea is not happy to see this go down so she launches into bitch mode, telling Chad how sweet he was to send the nursery rhyme email this morning and how cute it was. Chad looks confused saying he never sent her an email and doesn't know what she's talking about. Obviously failing to get his attention, Drea switches to flirting with his roommate, Donovan. After some over the top flirting, the table discovers that Donovan has a sketch of Drea in his sketch pad. Drea suggestively offers to pose for him and the two leave the cafeteria. As they leave Chad looks on jealously with Stacey feeling dejected.
It's late when Stacey returns to her dorm room and Drea isn't back yet, so she decides this is a perfect time to collect her bed wetting casualties and run them to the laundry room. When throwing everything into the washer, she discovers that she accidentally grabbed some of Drea's stuff too, a bra and a monogrammed hankie. Stacey can feel Drea's vibrations through the bra and takes a big ol’ whiff. She smells the dirt from her dreams on the bra and freaks out. Stacey runs back to the room in fear that Drea is in trouble.
Even though Stacey is clearly distressed, Drea doesn't notice because she's pissed. Drea comes at Stacey, starting a fight because she believes that Stacey took down Chad's jersey because she likes him. Even though it's true that Stacey has feelings for Chad, she did not take the jersey and reiterates that they are just friends. Drea feels bad after this and apologizes for being such a bitch. When checking outside the window to see if the jersey fell they find a tiny gift box. Drea thinks it's a gift from Chad and Stacey is terrified it's the gift from the card reading. After a struggle over the box, they discover that it's just a cookie from the culinary club. It's at this point Stacey knows she can't keep the truth from Drea anymore.
Stacey repeatedly tries to tell Drea the truth, but she isn't having it, and just stays on the phone ignoring her. After a heated conversation with who Stacey assumes is Unknown Caller Guy, Drea hangs up the phone and looks upset. He calls back again, but Stacey answers and he refuses to respond, so she hangs up on him. Then Amber waltzes in and they discuss the cookie present more when Unknown Caller calls again, followed by more silence and hang ups. Amber and Stacey then gang up on Drea to finally spill the tea about the guy. She doesn't know his name or his phone number, he was just a wrong number turned right and they became fast friends. While Drea is telling them all this, Stacey notices a guy looking into their window which leads to Amber flashing him and making him leave.
After the guy is gone Stacey sits down with Drea and Amber and tells them the truth about her dreams and Drea’s card reading, minus the pee. When the girls appear skeptical, Stacey shares the story of the last time her nightmares went off like this, about Maura. How she had these nightmares about the little girl she used to babysit. How she did nothing about it, but then Maura went missing and was found days later, dead in a tool shed. Just like Stacey's dreams told her. Drea and Amber believe her now and are rightfully freaked out.
After performing a spell to help Stacey get clarity on the dreams, all three girls crash in the room for the night. Well, except Stacey, who sneaks off to go pick up the laundry from earlier. But it's gone missing, nowhere to be found! After a minute of panic, Stacey accepts her reality and just hopes whoever took the laundry doesn't realize the pee stuff is hers. When she returns to the dorm, the girls are up because Chad called and asked Drea out for a study date before class. While Drea prances around the room picking out an outfit, Stacey reminisces about the time during the summer when she and Chad had a moment and kissed. However, she is broken from her day dream when she notices the guy from last night is back again by the window, but he walks off.
When Drea and Amber head off to the showers, Stacey stays behind to have a good mope. Then she hears a clicking sound at the window and a voice calling out that he can see her, and her cute plaid pjs. Suddenly there is a guy in a hockey mask pressed against her window making Stacey scream. It's just Chad, hockey goalie by day and jerk by later day. After some flirting, Stacey notices that Chad is wearing the missing jersey from earlier and she tells him how someone took it from their window. He says he found it in his mailbox with a note saying "STAY AWAY FROM HER. I’M WATCHING YOU," but he thought it was a prank from the girls. He also tells Stacey that he came by to cancel his study date with Drea, that he has emergency hockey practice and won't be able to make it. Now it's official, the first part of the reading has come true.
Stacey rushes to the bathroom to fill Drea in on everything Chad told her. After assuring her that she'll keep her safe, they turn to find "I’M WATCHING YOU, DREA," written on the mirror in Drea’s pink lipstick with a present on the counter. While Drea has a panic attack, Stacey opens the present and reads the card inside. The card says FOUR MORE DAYS, and the box contains four lilies, the death flower. Afterwards, they meet up with Amber and talk in their dorm about who they think the stalker freak is and the history behind Stacey's powers. Then suddenly, Unknown Caller Guy calls again. Stacey and Amber convince Drea to put him on speaker to show that he isn't the stalker freak. He catches on really quick and is pissy about it and goes on about Drea not being faithful to their relationship, even though Drea swears that they are just friends. He also reveals that he is the stalker freak!!!!
After he hangs up, Stacey makes Drea a magical protection bottle to help her feel safe and Amber discovers that he called from the library payphone. After rushing to the library, they run into Donovan, which causes Drea to have another panic attack over the fact the stalker freak could be anyone. Right after that, they run into Chad who instantly flirts with Stacey, which throws Drea into bitch mode again, making Chad leave. The instant Chad leaves, they get a call from Stalker Freak on the payphone. He says creepy things to Drea and talks about her bra, revealing to Stacey that he's the one that took their laundry earlier, and then Drea has another panic attack. It's a little tense between Stacey and Drea after the Chad encounter, but after they have a heart to heart about how they've both been bitches to each other, all is well between them. They decide to do a spa night and girltalk the night away.
After having a dreamless night of sleep, Stacey calls out of school for the day and decides to do a purification sponge bath to help her sleep. Before going to bed, Chad is there knocking on the window to be let in. After some heavy flirting, Stacey realizes that she has to pee. After confirming that they are alone, Chad tells her that he wanted to talk to her about "us" and that he has a note for her, and it's like the ones Drea has been getting. Stacey asks him if he's the one who has been sending the notes to Drea. After being terribly vague, he repeats what's written on the note, "love is funny." He hands her 3 lilies and says to give them to Drea before he starts kissing her senseless. That's when Drea and Amber wake her up.
Surprise! Stacey didn't fully wet herself this time since her friends woke her up, but she runs to the bathroom to rinse off and cover up the little pee that did come out. When she returns to the room, Drea and Amber fill her in on how useless campus police are, how they can't do anything until something happens. Then PJ comes through the window and tells them how he overheard that another girl, Veronica, has been getting stalker letters and calls, just like Drea. So the girls decide that they have to go find and talk to Veronica, which will be hard since they don't like each other because Veronica is a bully.
On the way to the Hangman Café to find Veronica, Stacey fills the girls in on the dream she had. Amber asks a ton of questions about it, whereas Drea just asks why she even dreamed about Chad at all. After everyone in existence rolls their eyes, Veronica is spotted, and she is not happy to see or talk to them. After having to threaten to expose her for cheating on a test, Veronica finally fills them in on her stalker calls and notes and Drea tells her how she's been getting them too.
After talking to Veronica, Drea decides to spend the night at her aunt's house. Stacey tries to convince her to stay for the rest of the week past the day the lilies say she's marked for death, but Drea is determined to come back and help protect Veronica. While trying to fall asleep, Stalker Freak calls and tells Stacey that he knows about her bed wetting problem and threatens her to not interfere with his plans for Drea. After the phone call, Stacey finds her soiled sheets outside the window, left by Stalker Freak. While scrubbing the sheets in the sink, Chad calls and asks if he can come over to study for a test and to protect her from future Stalker Freak calls. When Chad arrives, they talk about the calls and go around in circles about if Chad is the one doing them. Then they make out before Stacey stops saying she can't do this to Drea.
While studying, Chad declares that they should get some fresh air and take a walk. Stacey agrees and they leave. As they are walking into the woods, Chad says nature calls and that he'll be right back. After a while Chad doesn't come back and Stacey goes searching for him. She ends up near a house-like structure and goes toward it while noticing that someone is now following her. Pain bubbles in her stomach, she has to pee, now! She sees some porta-potties nearby and waddles to them as fast as she can and ends up falling in a ditch. She realizes that it's not a ditch she tripped into, but words. Someone dug out the letters D-R-E-A into the ground. She gets up and makes it to the porta-potty, but it's locked, and someone is in there. So she waddles into the house-like structure. Someone whispers her name and she's shambling all over the structure trying to get out, but it's not working. She hears a phone ring, the voice says it's for you Stacey, answer the phone! Her bladder is ready to explode, but she makes it to the phone and answers it. "Times almost up, only 2 more lilies in our bouquet." Stacey feels him behind her and turns around. "Oh my god, it's you."
Stacey wakes up in a gasp! She's in bed, with Chad, and she wet herself again. Oh the humanity! Stacey tries everything to get him to leave, but he won't budge, not wanting to leave her while she is obviously upset. That's when Drea comes into the room. Drea drops the coffee and muffin she brought for Stacey, saying that she brought breakfast. Chad tries to quickly defuse the situation by telling her it's not what it looks like, but she just yells at him to not talk to her. She then yells at Stacey about how she could do this to her. Stacey tries to tell her nothing happened, but not even the spilled coffee on the floor believes her. Chad tries to back her up, saying that they were just studying. Drea is having none of it, saying that it's no wonder Stacey didn't pick up any of her calls last night, she was too busy she guesses. They look and see the phone buried under some clothes. Stacey tries to tell her she didn't hear it ring and Drea just screams bull shit and that Amber warned her that this would happen, and how much Stacey likes Chad. This makes Stacey flinch because she thought she hid it oh so well. Chad tries to gaslight Drea by saying it was no big deal, that it was just studying and he wanted to make sure Stalker Freak didn't call again. Drea tells him to fuck off and Chad says Stacey is his friend too and if he wants to hang out with her he can and its not like they're dating or anything anymore. Chad then leaves before getting caught by the RA. Stacey tries to talk Drea down, but Drea says friends don't shit on each other like she just did. Stacey is hurt that Drea doesn't believe her lie about nothing happening, but oh, Drea believes nothing happened just not because Stacey didn't want to. She says that there's no way Chad would want Stacey after being with her. She rips the covers off Stacey, thinking she'll discover something scandalous since Stacey still hasn't gotten out of bed, but discovers that Stacey wet the bed.
Gasp! Except not.
Stacey spends the next school day in fear of Drea telling everyone about her secret. When getting dinner, she runs into Veronica and asks if she'd like to sit with her and her friends so they can work on a strategy against Stalker Freak, but Veronica is instantly hostile, saying that she doesn't think it's serious, that Drea is the stalker and just wants to scare her away from Chad since Drea is oh so jealous of her. Stacey is still determined to protect Veronica but she just walks away. Stacey heads over to her friends table hesitantly, still worried that Drea told everyone, which becomes very clear that she at least told Amber by the fact that they are now making subtle pee jokes at Stacey. Stacey tries to reiterate that nothing happened with Chad, but Drea says she knows that. That Stacey is soooo not Chad's type and "why would he go for you when he has me?" Then Stacey says what we have been thinking this whole book, "maybe because he thinks you're a bitch." That is when Chad comes to the table. One thing leads to another and Drea tells Chad and PJ how Stacey wets the bed. Amber is horrified that Drea told them and calls her an ass. Stacey, totally humiliated, stands up and walks away.
Chad finds Stacey in the library later and tells her he thinks she's fantastic just the way she is and he likes how he is when he's around her. Then Amber shows up. Seems she and Chad were both searching for Stacey. Chad leaves for hockey practice and Amber apologizes for joking about the pee situation earlier and asks why it's happening. Stacey explains how it's because of her nightmares and she doesn't know why. They begrudgingly head back to Stacey's dorm room to plan how to protect both Drea and Veronica from Stalker Freak. They decide it's best to go to Veronica and convince her that she needs help.
Veronica wants no part of it when the girls arrive at her room and try to talk to her. Suddenly Drea spots a familiar piece of fabric sticking out of Veronica's jewelry box, it's her monogrammed hankie that Stalker Freak stole! Veronica says Drea stuffed it in her mailbox to scare her and that she's not falling for it and that they all need to leave her alone or she'll call security. Since Veronica won't play ball, they decide they'll just follow her and keep an eye on her from a distance. Later that night as they are sitting outside Veronica's dorm room, they realize it's deathly quiet inside so they break in to make sure she's okay. Turns out she left through the window. So they decide to search her room for clues. Drea gets her hankie back and they find a note in the trash saying to "mind your own business." They also discover an email from Chad saying that he saw and hid her cheat sheets for her and that she should sneak in the school to get rid of the evidence. They decide to go after Veronica to keep her safe, but Drea doesn't want to go in and they refuse to leave Drea alone, so she has a panic attack. Donovan and Chad come by, and Donovan helps Drea through the attack while Chad calls 911. Amber and Donovan ride with Drea in the ambulance, while Stacey and Chad go to school to find Veronica.
Stacey asks Chad about the email he sent to Veronica but he has no clue what she's talking about, he never sent Veronica an email. When they arrive at the classroom, it's too late, Veronica is on the ground dead, head bashed in by a planter. Stacey wakes up later the next day feeling confused. The phone is ringing and it's Chad. They talk about finding Veronica and how the cops think he did it and how he needs her to believe him, that he didn't do it. Stacey does, though she's still drained and emotional from finding Veronica dead. Amber comes by after that and they talk about how they are wigged out about Veronica dying and how classes are cancelled for the week. Stacey thinks Amber is being cold about the death, but Amber says she feels bad but doesn't need to fall apart over someone she didn't even like. Since Amber makes a valid point, she moves on and asks if Drea spent the night at the hospital. After some back and forth they realize Drea never made it back to the dorm last night, and that she's missing. Amber said she walked her to the lobby but not all the way to the dorm because she had to go talk to PJ. So now on top of them panicking over Drea, there is a cop at the door wanting to get Stacey's statement from last night. Amber freaks out and runs away through the window, not wanting to talk to the cop.
The cop, Officer Tate, walks in and talks to Stacey about everything that happened with Veronica the night before. Stacey is frazzled and only cares about Drea being missing. The cop has her call her mom and then take her to the station for her statement. The cop asks her all kinds of questions, leading her to believe that they do think it was Chad that killed Veronica. Afterwards she reiterates that Drea is missing and they need to find her. Officer Tate tells Stacey to calm down and to start from the beginning, so she does. She tells her everything from her dreams, to the calls, to the card readings, to the stolen laundry, the letters, and the lilies. They don't believe her, they think that Drea crashed with a friend since they were fighting. But even if that's the case, Officer Tate promises that she'll keep an eye out and look for Drea. Sure. That's when Stacey knows it's up to her to find Drea.
When Stacey gets back to her dorm, she decides to have a séance using scrabble tiles to ask her grandma for help. All she really gathers is that her dreams will help her find Drea. So she heads out to the forest. Before leaving, Stacey calls Officer Tate to let her know where she's going and what she's doing. As she's in the forest, Amber calls her freaking out saying she's ready to talk to the cops and that she needs Stacey there. She tries to tell her no, but Amber isn't having it, telling her to just hurry and get here before hanging up on her. Stacey just continues on her trek in the woods, ignoring Amber because Drea needs her. She then hears someone following her as she stumbles and impales her foot on a stick. Someone then whispers "Stacey? Is that you?" It's Donovan, he squats down, asking if she saw "them" and if they're gone. Stacey doesn't know what he's talking about, but he ignores her while he helps pull the stick out of her foot. Donovan tries to get Stacey to head back to the dorm saying it's not safe, but Stacey won't hear of it. So he tells her to wait here while he checks if the coast is clear. Stacey doesn't wait, she keeps going and finds the house structure from her dreams and goes inside. Stacey finds a picnic set up with a backpack next to it. She rifles through it and finds a coke can with Drea's signature lipstick mark, a half eaten bar of Drea's favorite chocolate, Drea's physics notebook, and Drea's pink bra. That's when Amber calls, demanding to know where Stacey is, and telling her that she intercepted Officer Tate, saying Stacey was going to join her. Stacey hangs up and feels the fear that no one is coming to help.
He's in the building, he's calling out for her. Donovan, Stalker Freak. He says she scared him, that he couldn't find her outside and he was worried. Stacey just looks him dead in the eye and asks where Drea is and tells him that she's not leaving without her. He tries to convince her that it's not safe and that they need to leave. She almost believes him, almost, but then she says she's not going anywhere. Then Donovan attacks her, pinning her to the wall. They struggle and fight until she's able to run away, and now... she has to pee. It clicks in her mind then. She knows where Drea is.
Stacey makes her way to the porta-potty and finds it jammed shut. She uses a rock to break it open and it works. There's Drea all taped up and crying her eyes out. As Stacey tries to unbind Drea, she jerks around and wails like a banshee making it very difficult to free her. Once she's free of the tape, Stacey tries to carry her to safety until she feels a blade pressed to her throat. Drea falls to the fetal position, rocking back and forth. She obviously needs a doctor, but the unhinged Donovan doesn't even notice. He uses the knife to make Stacey sit as he tends to Drea, saying he's sorry for tying her up, but he couldn't let her leave. He had to make her understand. He loves her and that's why he did all this. Stacey yells to him that he killed Veronica and sent her notes. He says it was just an accident, that she took his surprise and twisted it, that she wanted to scare Drea enough to leave campus so she could have a chance at Chad, so he had to stop her. He didn't want to hurt her, but she left him no choice. He's saying all this to Drea while stabbing the ground over and over again like a psycho. He even stabs himself in the knee but still keeps on going. Stacey tries to attack him with a tree branch, but he's fast. He pins her to a tree with the knife. That's when Drea finally wakes up and yells at him, distracting him long enough for Stacey to get the knife away from him. And, right on cue, the police arrive and arrest Donovan. Stacey runs to Drea, hugging the daylights out of her. Finally the nightmare has ended.
Three months later, Drea has come back to campus to testify against Donovan. No one was surprised that he was her stalker. Everyone knew how crazy he was for her, but they didn't know just how unhinged he was. So with Drea back, Stacey and friends decide to set up a going away party at the Hangman Café. Drea's going to spend the rest of the year at home, which is very understandable. She loves the surprise party and they eat junk food while reminiscing about good times until it's time for Drea to leave. Before she does, she gives Stacey her blessing to be with Chad and says that she loves them both. Afterwards a happy Stacey and Chad kiss and start their relationship.