Dreams

Dreams are funny things, really. We don’t know where they come from, what they mean. Heck, we don’t remember them most of the time. We just live through them, while we’re sleeping, then awake to traffic and sunlight and the neighbor’s alarm. Then the dreams just run away. Sometimes they resurface at a word, or a scene—but mostly they’re gone. Little puffs of drug smoke curling up before the winds scatter what’s left of nicotine and THC, lost into endless ether and sunlight and stars.

Not always though. Some dreams disappear, but not like smoke. More like the fire left in the embers of a hearth, or the moon hidden in the bright light of Sol. They come back—they’re not really gone. You see it in déjà vu, in the prickles along your spine or burning at the neckline. You’ve seen that cat before, walked down those stair, had those conversations. And you know what’s going to happen next, can mouth the words they’re about to say, even though it’s all new. You’ve never met them, never been there—but you know. Have you had those?

I have. A lot, actually. I used to wake up without remembering my dreams. I think I went for over a year only remembering nightmares—those woke me up sobbing, convinced I’d lost my mother. I didn’t like those much. But those aren’t important now—they never came true. In that year without dreams, I experienced some of the most mundane, yet bizarre déjà vu experiences possible, I think. Small things, like knowing the boys were going to skin the head of their dissection cat before they did it, knowing the punishment Mr. _____ was going to give them before the words left his mouth.

There were other incidents in that year—but they usually only lasted for a few seconds. Prom night was the one I’ll always remember though. Everyone argues with me, says it happens all the time, so it wasn’t a sudden surprise that hit our town. But it was…

I was on the dance floor when it first hit me, little creeping tendrils of dread crawling along my arms and making my fingertips tingle. Didn’t notice at first, cause I was dancing with Johnny, enough to make anyone tingly. He really was wonderful. But I noticed as I stepped away, and it didn’t fade. I looked around, at all the tuxes and silk, the alcohol-stained hems where the girls had spilled their champagne while in the limo, driven by the drivers paid to ignore the underage debauchery in their back seats. But I had seen it all before somehow—the feeling had never lasted this long. It really was a waking dream for me. I kept turning around and around on the dance floor, trying to figure out who was missing, who was here. They were a blur in their pastels and black, shining wingtips and 3 inch heels. I’d never felt this sort of ripping before, a child’s fear blown up to grown up size.

Janice tried to stop me, tugging at my arm. People were looking at me, she was whispering, trying to pull me out of the center of the glowing ballroom. I tugged back, unwilling, unable to stop. I’d done this before. I’d felt this before, déjà vu in déjà vu. I’d dreamed this many times.

I stopped. When I turned, it was like there was water there instead of air, and its current was pushing against me. I shouldn’t turn, shouldn’t see Mr. _____ walking through the doors. But he was coming, I knew he was. There would be tears on his cheeks, and silence would fall over the drunks and the straight-edgers on the dance floor, till only the god-awful song-of-the-month continued to play over the speakers, the DJ oblivious to what was coming was he danced to the headphones enveloping his ears. I sank to the polished wood as Janice’s hand went limp on my arm. I was floating, the music stopping, knew about the crash and the fire and the lost before words escaped our teacher’s lips. I pulled Janice down, hugged her in my arms before she heard she’d lost her brother, braced her against it before it hit.

The tide and the tingle released me then; I could hear the world around me. And Janice clung to me and I to her, two girls very much alone, for very different reasons.

I started dreaming again that night. Though I suppose I never stopped, I just never remembered. And the prickles and tingle left. I’m okay with that. What’s good about knowing what’s coming, if you only get a moment’s notice?