Waiting (a different time)

During the hours that I sat in the waiting room for Oncology, I studied dream interpretation. I bought several books on the subject, and while the doctors radiated my mother, I read about symbolism. The waiting room was large, so large that I could sit alone and never worry that anyone would need to sit next to me. I always sat in the section away from the TV and close to the refreshment center. I kept to myself and spoke to no one. I just read until the nurse called me to go out and pull the car around for my mother.

One Thursday, a woman sat next to me, which forced me stop reading and acknowledge her. She smiled and pointed to my book.  “Dream interpretation,” she said. “Sounds neat.”

“It can be,” I said.

We introduced ourselves and began a lengthy conversation on the symbolism of colors and numbers. 

After talking for about ten minutes, she told me that she moved her father in with her family so she could take care of him, her husband, and her three kids. Bone cancer. Even now, I still wince at the thought of it. Not as bad as pancreatic, liver, or colon cancers but bad, very hard to treat, usually fatal. He was to the point where he had to wear a neck brace all the time. It was the first time that I was ever thankful for the type of cancer my mother had.

For the next week, she brought her father at the same time I brought my mother, and we talked about dreams and cancer. I feel a bit ashamed that I can’t remember her name, especially since I remember her dreams. They were normal dreams about every day sorts of things with the exception that she was always dragging a heavy black garbage bag. About the time he reached the point where he could no longer care for himself, her father began throwing all his trash down the ravine behind his house. The hillside was strewn with black garbage bags of trash, and this woman and her husband had to clean it all up before they could sell the house. She was angry and burdened, and those feelings made her feel guilty. After talking about it, she felt better and joked that I ought to charge her for my time. 

Near the end of that week, her father’s white count was too low for him to receive more treatments. After that, I never saw her again, but one of the nurses, who overheard our conversations, commented to me that I was a sweet girl for talking to her.  Her father’s prognosis was poor, and I had likely eased her guilt about the situation. 

Of the meeting, my mother said, “God works in mysterious ways.”

I replied, “Of course He does. If He didn’t, we would all understand everything, and there would be no cancer.”

“You know I believe that everything happens for a reason,” she said.

“Yeah, well, why do you think you got cancer?”

She shrugged. “Maybe to bring you and your father closer together.”

“That’s fucked up,” I said, to which she snapped at me for cursing. “I think you got cancer because you grew up in a city before there was any regulation on what toxins industries to pump into the air, and you went to college in a town where the morning air was so filled with chemicals it was yellow.”

“And I didn’t wear sunscreen like I should,” she added. “Maybe, maybe not. Sometimes things just break.”

So I thought, Even God answers his children's questions with, "Because." It's not an answer at all, so why bother asking? 

    

   

After the three nightmares I had last night, I deserved the rom-com dream I had this morning.

            I stood in a parking lot with four friends.  We were waiting on a van to take us to a wedding.  One of the four of us was a six-foot-tall Viking goddess with flowing blond hair and piercing blue eyes.  I was short in this dream, about five two. She towered over me.  While we waited, a guy who looked like a male version of her drove up, parked, got out of his car, and started talking to her.  She told us she was going out with the guy.  The other two women began arguing with her, saying they would much rather go out with this hunk than go to a wedding.  I didn’t bother giving them my opinion, as it was obvious my tall goddess friend belonged with this guy.

***

            The wedding was over, and we were filing into a ballroom for a sit-down dinner. The friend who looked like Elaine from Seinfeld (and whom we called Elaine in the dream) was already hammered.  She passed out, and the other friend and I laid her out under one of the many white Christmas trees that were used as part of the reception decorations. (I guess it was around Christmas. The trees were scrappy and tacky.)

            A guy stood up and started giving a toast to the bride and groom.  I wasn’t paying attention to him.  There was a chef nearby who was carefully arranging food on plates before the staff delivered them to various guests, and I was fascinated by how serious he looked arranging the food.  Then my not drunk friend said, “Oh my God, [name of the guy giving the speech], you and [my name in the dream] are like the only two people on earth who read that book!”  I looked up and the guy was staring at me like he couldn’t believe it either. 

After his speech, he came over to our table and introduced himself.  He was the brother of the bride, which surprised me since she and I had been friends since college and I had spent some time during the summers at their river house.  He said he would have remembered me, so I must have come during the times he was off visiting his friends.

“Yes, I must have been," he repeated.  "I would remember you.”

“Oh no.”  I waved the thought away.  “You’d remember our other friend though.  Tall, blond, gorgeous.”

“Sure, I’d remember that, but I think you’d stick with me.  I mean, nobody has read that book but me, until you.”  (And it was something stupid, like a tell-all by Regis and Kathy Lee.)  He was giving me the cutest smile and tickling the back of my hand with his fingers.  “So, why didn’t your friend come?”

“She got a date.  Guy pulls up to the curb in front of the four of us and just asks her.”

“He didn’t ask you?”

I blinked at him.  “Well, no.  Why would he ask me when he could ask her, and she said yes?”

He shook his head and sat back so my meal could be served.  As I cut into my steak, he said, “What do you have planned after this?”

I furrowed my brow and laughed at him.  “Nothing.  Why do you ask?”

“I’d like to see you.”  Someone from the wedding party hailed him, and he had to go.  “Here.”  He took a pen from his pocket and flipped over my place card.  “Give me your number, will you?”  When I did, he slipped the pen and the card back in his pocket, stared at me for a few more seconds and then went back to the wedding party table.

“I think that guy just hit on me,” I said to my friend.

“No shit,” she said.  “When you’re done eating, we should drag Elaine’s ass home.”

We ate and drank some wine, had a little cake.  Then, I left, feeling fulfilled.     

The Bride

Picture her, a mixture of Vivian Leigh and Lynda Carter, with skin like cream, large, thickly lashed eyes, and full lips.  Sculpted into a spiraling and curling work of art, her hair rivals the most intricate of powdered wigs, but it is dark, the color of richly brewed coffee.  In the dream, I am living inside her skin.

Her gown is white, tier upon tier of antique lace, which rises high, encircling her delicate throat.  At the center, she has pinned a cameo featuring the three muses.  The sleeves, bodice, and skirt overlay are a pale blue silk with a faint sheen, and it all drapes over a hoop skirt and tulle petticoats.  Under all the fabric, her body is bare.  She wears three-inch, black button-closed boots. 

She sweats in the Caribbean summer heat, irritated that her fiancé wanted to have a Victorian themed wedding in a tropical setting.  The ceremony and reception are over, and she waits in the shade of a building awning, waving a lace fan at her painted face, and praying her new husband hurries so they can adjourn to the honeymoon suite.  She glances down at her ring, a fat hunk of emerald that matches her eyes.  She likes the ring, diamonds being overrated and over-priced.  The groom arrives, but she pays him little mind other than to take his offered arm.

She looks out across the lagoon.  There stands the collection of bamboo and grass huts that make up the honeymoon suite.  To get to it from the shore, she must cross a plank and rope bridge.  Her feet hurt.  Tired and hot, all she can think is to get in the shade and cool of the hut and get out of the dress. 

When her husband turns back to speak with straggling well-wishers, she releases him and starts across the bridge.  She makes it halfway.  A strong wind sweeps across the lagoon, and she stumbles.  Her ankle twists, and she falls against the rope railing.  In a comical way, she flips feet-over-head over the railing and takes a nosedive into the lagoon.

Here, the lagoon is already twenty or so feet deep.  She stares up at the surface of the water as she sinks.  She tugs at the dress, tries to wrench off the boots, but still sinks until she finally touches the bottom.  The bottom is smooth, almost like a concrete swimming pool but made of sugar-white sand.  She tries to push off the bottom and digs her fingers into the water as if it could be used as a rope to pull herself to the surface, to blessed air.

When her lungs fail and her blinding vision of the surface above goes dim, I pop out of her body and shoot into the sky.  My spirit spreads until I am the sky.  I am the clouds, the birds, the very sun.  I watch as the people scream, and the young husband, realizing what has happened, dives into the water.  I smile down at them, happy to be free of the dress.     

       

Elemental

            The golems – stone, steel, and fire – came for him, and he met them. 

            He swept over the plains, his toes hovering just above the dry landscape.  Arms pinwheeling, slashing, jabbing.  With one swing of his silvery gray arm, he bashed a rocky head to dust.  At the contact, veins, inset in all his visible flesh, glowed and absorbed the released spirit of his enemy.    

            His eyes narrowed, and he flung himself toward a flaming foe.  Arms grabbing fire, singeing for a moment, then a hiss of steam.  The golem was no more, and he throbbed with light.

            Pulses of blue burst from him, and steel, wrenched and mangled, fell empty and lifeless.  With a bellow, he pumped the energy he collected into a ball around himself and, with a final shout, sent it out so that it razed the very earth and the evil that walked it. 

            I felt his arms as they encircled my waist from behind.  I heard him smell my hair.  I closed my eyes and a tear slid down my cheek.  He survived.  He returned.

            “I want to give you something,” he said as he turned me in his arms and kissed me softly. 

            His eyes, the same deep greenish-blue as an angry sea, looked serious for a moment before he turned them on his left forearm.  As he ran a finger down a vein, it lit softly.  He dug his finger under it and tugged until it broke. 

            At my sharp intake of breath, he only smiled and snapped off a small section of the vein.  From it, he formed a ring, which shone blindingly for a moment and then dulled to a soft, fuzzy glow.

            As he slid the ring onto my finger, he said, “I challenge anyone who says an Elemental cannot love.”  He kissed the ring and then me.  “This ring of icy pure good will protect you and can be wielded like any weapon.”

            “Then have a symbol of my love for you,” I said and hurriedly yanked out a lock of hair. 

            From the hair, I wove an intricate braid.  Once I connected the ends, the ring shrieked and formed a colorful whorl that I slid onto his finger.  “Wear my ring of chaos and use it to smite those who would do you harm.”       

            Cheeks wet and lips trembling, we held onto all we had left in our world – each other.

Peppered

It isn't unusual for me to have weird and/or violent dreams. I awaken - heart pounding in my neck and ears, terrified. Then, I remember who I am, where I am. The world settles. I get up, pee, get back in bed, get back to sleep. Only rarely do I have dreams that leave me shivering, almost in tears.

Last night, I had one.

Thinking over it, I know I've had dreams that were more frightening, more cringe-worthy than this one, but something about it left me so scared that I woke up Fluffy. I asked him to snuggle me and whimpered. It's one of the few times I made a point to adhere to an old wives' tale that states that if you tell a dream before breakfast, it will come true. I waited until after lunch.

Dream:

Zombie apocalypse. I am wandering around my parents' neighborhood - down in the part of the loop where their house is - carrying a bloodstained baseball bat. I am a survivor. 

Fluffy is with me, as are a few other men. We have cleared the area of zombies, but they are so widespread, so pervasive, we are never safe anywhere for long. We know of a checkpoint nearby, and all but one of the men decide to drive one of the trucks that way in hopes of finding out what is happening.

The man and I stand by my parents' mailbox. The sky is gray, darkening as night approaches. A car comes up the drive from the neighbor's house, and a woman and a 6 year old child get out of it. She waves an automatic rifle and a radio.

"It doesn't look good," she says. "I hope they reach the outpost soon. From what I've heard, this area is so overpopulated, they think the only way to neutralize the situation is to nuke it. I just hope they come get us, or at least give us a chance to clear the radius."

It's dusk now, and the man has built a fire down by the hard woods at the edge of my parents' yard. I stand at the top of the yard, scanning the road, scanning how the patchy grass and moss slope at first sharply and then gently down, down to the campsite.

The child is playing, running. His mother isn't paying attention, and he picks up the rifle. The man tells him not to touch it, and the child drops it. The safety isn't on.

Bullets, rapid, everywhere. She's running to the child. They are screaming, screaming as their bodies are mutilated. I throw up my arm, as if that can protect me. Dirt, twigs, bits of moss pepper my legs, and when the pop-pop-pop stops, they are dead. Dead. Shredded,empty flesh bags - facedown in the leaves near the fire.

The man steps out from behind an oak he used as a shield. He looks at me. "My God." In the firelight, I see his Adam's apple bob. Then, I hear the moaning.

"I don't want to die," I say. "I don't want to be undead."

I awoke with tears in my throat and clawing for Fluffy's arm.  

Paradigm Shift

          In a cloak the color of Spanish moss, she follows the path through the ancient cypresses of the swamp. The only sounds are the squish of her bare feet in the mossy mud and the call of a loon. She parts the knee-high fog, which slithers behind her to cover all traces of her passing.
          She glances back, and a long coil of dark hair falls out of her hood to rest over her shoulder and against her chest. Foggy eyes wide with worry scan the wet, dim trunks and bruised skies. Bothered, she quickens her pace, dotting the hem of her cloak with the murk splashed by her feet.
          She carries a use- and age-darkened scroll and slides her hands along it as she approaches a set of vivid red stairs. She stops -- her left foot just above the bottom step -- and inhales sharply. Around her, the trees have turned to twisted spires of metal, and a thousand head-height shafts of rebar pierce the fog, each one tipped in red.
          Her nostrils flare, and she shakes her head in disbelief.  Biting her lower lip, she rushes up the stairs and straight through me.

Where the Wild Things Hunt

Foreword: I often have dreams of my shadow. He (my shadow is male) usually tries to kill or absorb me, so I generally wake from these dreams feeling panicked and at best uncomfortable. This one...well, this one was different. I was my shadow.  

          Shadow stood on the edge where the dormant grass met the rip-rap-covered bank.  In the bay, the water gently lapped against grayish rocks.  Rusty water, made less inviting by the bright sunlight.  Through oval glasses he didn’t need, he stared at the ferry as it approached the docks.  He’d been compelled to wear them, putting on the face of an intellectual.  People stereotyped glasses-wearers as geeks, nerds, and squares long before Velma began single-handedly solving mysteries for the gang.  He could play off that for the day.

          Looking to his left, Shadow recognized the teenaged boy sitting on a tripod stool in front of an easel.  He knew that the boy painted ocean scenes in watercolor, all the same shade of blue but with different concentrations of the color.  Several empty tubes of acrylic lay scattered around the boy’s feet and on the easel two cups – one for water, one for paint. 

          The boy moved the brush over the paper with inhuman speed, starting in the upper left and working his way to the lower right.  He didn’t wait for it to dry.  As soon as one was finished, he flipped the paper over the top of the pad to reveal a fresh, white sheet.  Always intrigued, Shadow walked over to stand behind him and watch as the boy transferred the world onto paper.

          “Sea, sea, sea, sea,” the boy murmured over and over as his arm jerked and hitched.

          Shadow couldn’t understand how such uncontrolled movements made something so beautiful.  The result was a surprisingly realistic rendering with exquisite detail to the tiny crests of waves.  For only a moment, he took the pad from the boy and flipped through the paintings.  As he flipped, Shadow saw the nebulous blob that marked the position of the ferry make steady progress toward the dock.

          “Sea, sea, SEA, SEA.”  The boy grew increasingly agitated.

          “Yes, I know,” Shadow said to him and returned the pad.  “It’s the only thing you see clearly.”

          “Sea,” the boy sighed and resumed painting.

    

          Shadow took the ferry to the island.  It was a small boat, and the waves were rough, but since the trip was uneventful, he tuned out for a while.  He never noticed the young woman, no more than twenty, staring at him with large blue eyes rimmed with black liner.  She longed for a hat as she fought to keep her pageboy-cut hair out of her eyes.  Eventually, she settled for holding each side of her hair in her fists. 

          Beyond the draw of a handsome face, she marveled that Shadow’s hair hardly moved.  The wind picked up only a few strands and twice saw him scratch at the stubble on his face.  Other than that, he didn’t move, and she wondered how anyone could be so still for so long.  She thought that, if he embraced her, her ear would rest just over his heart.  

 

          On the island, Shadow stared into the forest while the others set up camp.  The young woman spoke to him, and he greeted her, letting his eyes pass over her face to record it for future reference.  Her eyes, hope and good will seemed to arrow out of them, and he wondered if other things – hate, fear, lust – would also come through them, not only transparently but forcefully so.  He gave her a half-smile and a half-laugh, which she returned with a wide, guileless grin.  Clingy, he thought and walked away from her to the main tent.

          Fourteen feet-by-fourteen feet, the tent stood in a patch of evergreen needles just large enough to contain it.  Two adjacent sides had both the flaps and screens unzipped and tied open to allow easy access.  A long table and several camp chairs were already set up, along with two laptops, a scanner, and a printer.  Shadow gave the equipment the same treatment he’d given the young woman. 

          “You can try,” he said quietly and left to set up his own tent.

         

          He was up, sitting in a chair in the main tent and listening to the night.  A man’s scream cut off abruptly.  Snapping, snapping, rending, gurgling growls of satiation.  More screaming.  His lantern was on, and soon, the surviving five people clustered in the center of the tent, looking to him to know what to do.

          “Did you see it?” one horrified man asked of Shadow.  “It was eight feet tall!”

          “Furry, too?” Shadow asked, his smile haunting his face again.  He stood and turned up the lantern.  “With lower tusks, large black eyes, and a nose that’s almost comically human.”

          The man poked his head out of the flap of the tent and never had the chance to scream before the snarling thing outside batted his head off his shoulders.  His body dropped to the ground, and the young woman, beyond terror, darted to Shadow’s side.  She tucked her head under his arm and dug her fingers into his shirt.

          “What are they?”  Her skin was cold, and she quivered with the rush of adrenaline.

          “Wild,” Shadow answered.  When the beast poked its head into the tent, the young woman looked up at him, searching for an answer, for deliverance.  Shadow passed a hand over her short, soft hair and removed his glasses.  “Hungry,” he added.  As he breathed warm air onto the lenses, the beast leapt.          (2011)