The Dream

A woman Living the day-to-day grind finds herself at the mercy of a forbidden dream.

When you slap on a smile, you spend your day feeling it slip. Each hour is agonizing, waiting for it to fall, holding on for all that you have; only to feel a fraction of that façade fall away. When all you want to do is hide the demons you carry until safely tucked away in the confines of your home, the worst thing is the feeling of someone seeing the shadows peek from underneath the veil. The sheer horror of someone catching a glimpse of the true you is beyond words. It’s those people, the ones who hide their true selves from the general public- they are the people who will survive most anything. They’ll survive everything except their own memories, and the pain that comes with them.

The ideas and hopes we all keep to ourselves are the sort that ought not to be discussed aloud. Hope is a fragile thing, held together with the threads of promises and the tendrils of silent prayer. Some dreams should stay exactly as they are as they are nearly as fragile as hope. They should never be spoke aloud, because once you do, nothing can ever live up to the piece of reality you have brought into existence. The reality of them is sometimes far too painful and complex to allow dreams and ideas fully function in our lives. Sure, we all want that one perfect place, perfect time, imperfect person; but some people just cannot be lucky enough to have that.

It was one of those sweltering, stifling August nights in Cincinnati; the kind where even the air conditioner can’t keep up with the humidity. The only options that remain on those nights are cold drinks, cold showers, and filling a room with fans. All of that effort and energy was put forth to just fall asleep. It’s the convergence of those three damned  river valleys- most people don’t know that Cincinnati has three, all right there on top of one another. Makes for god-awful humidity. Makes for God-awful everything. The city itself being dreary and dirty doesn’t help matters anywhere.

            Tonight was just one of those nights, again. These nights make you want to go sleep in a walk-in freezer in the pizza place down the street. I spent the whole day gunning around town, stopping in nearly every one of the “Seven Hills” to meet all my new clients. It’s the personal touch that makes the difference, you know. A long day gets longer and longer the more overtime I work. I finally get off, clothes soaked several times with sweat, and drive to my high-rise apartment. I’m damn exhausted and hot, and very definitely frazzled. The A/C in my tiny, barely functional car needed a recharge, and I didn’t have the money or time to spare. Maybe next payday. Maybe in two paychecks when we get paid an extra time (three times in one month!) Or after tax season. It can wait through winter.

There is no such thing as a filling dinner that is COLD. So, hot dinner, more sweat. There’s a theory in my building that the more spices and the spicier the food, the more your mouth will melt and the less you can tell that it’s actually hot. Hence, the smell of 4 different kinds of regional cooking scented through the vents. Even in a building this new, it’s hot as the fourth level of hell. You’d think the air conditioning would work with as much money as I pay, but nope. And the windows don’t open. I guess the long flight down is too much of a temptation here.

Anyway, I had just finished the last mango-carrot ice pop, my favorite. I’m at least pretending to be food conscious. Let’s all pretend that we enjoy eating whole wheat and all vegetables and barely any meat, shall we? What crazy person decided to try eating chia seeds to see if they were good, let alone eat them often enough to find a nutritional boost? That’s just a masochist, right there. All of the things I never would have even tried to eat are now in my regular diet. All of this mess because some idiot thought it’d be fun to eat something diabolical and found it worth eating. Maybe I can pull in some extra cash by eating odd things? That’s a thought for a later time.

I had washed my long, thick hair in the coldest setting the shower had, and twisted it into a rope-like braid. The braid became a huge knot on top of my head, just to keep it out of the way. The air around me, even after that cold shower, felt thick and heavy, like I was walking through a gel instead. This is pretty common in the summer months, but no matter how common, it still sucks. I had placed three brand-spanking-new fans in my bedroom, in addition to the ceiling fan that was always going in there. It was a veritable wind tunnel, and I loved it. For a brief moment, you couldn’t even hear yourself think; you could only feel the air moving around you. There is something absolutely wonderful about being surrounded by cool air after a hot, humid, hellacious day.

            I had changed my sheets before the shower, and left the covers down so that they would be icy cold on my skin. I’d managed to keep the cat off of my clean, cold bed and out of my room; a minor miracle considering she knew she was as good as my child. She is just too warm to sleep with, and lord knows a woman living by herself has to sleep at least a little. So, now the little fur-ball is pouting on her own bed in my living room. As soon as I turned off the lights, and put in my earbuds, I was ready to slide into that deliciously cold bed. Lord, but it felt good! I slipped right off to sleep in my chilled, wind-filled room, comforted by the conditions others would consider frigid and insufferably loud. Mama always said I was temperature sensitive; I could sleep through a tornado if it was cool enough.

            I was standing in a sunny lavender kitchen, filled with evening light from a wall of windows. There was the scent of rosemary, thyme, lemon, and meat- obviously a chicken was roasting somewhere in the house. The pleasant weight of a child on my hip- the right one, the one I always cocked out- and tiny hands grabbing my curls made me smile. Warm and soft, and smelling of magic and love, she was right there with me. With ever-changing hair color and golden eyes that were as bright as the sun, she was very much like myself, with perhaps less prominent features, a slightly darker skin tone, and some features that I would kill for, but aren’t mine.
            The sounds of birds calling to each other, cattle lowing and horses nickering allowed me to believe I was in that peaceful, slow world that only exists in small towns. I was in a well-loved, semi-modern farmhouse. It was spacious, and amazingly clean (I have never been one for cleaning, just ask my maid.) The floors shone with love and wax, and the light from the windows had not a single speck of dust to be found. My daughter started to get fussy, and I realized it was time for her daily break of sunshine and unfiltered air. We went out onto the deck (it was covered!) and I put her into the hand-hewn rocking bed that was made with love and thoughtfulness by her father. I sat down next to her in my own rocker, made by that same man, and we rocked until she was asleep. She loved to be outside, and even more surprising, she loved to be in water. She was so like me in many ways.
            The delicious sunshine and a timid breeze made the setting peaceful and comforting. I happily absorbed the radiating heat and calming light of the setting sun. The roses, honeysuckle, and lilac bushes I had cultivated around the house smelled divine, and in that instant, I was nearly perfectly happy. Time passes in odd intervals in this dream-land. It seems to speed up and slow down. We’d been on the deck for what felt like hours, but by the position of the sun, I knew it’d been less than thirty minutes. The sound of gravel shifting and a roaring engine alerted me to a visitor, but I was happy and calmed at the sound.
          There was a burst of tears from the little sweet that had been asleep. We walk into the cool, nearly silent house; the only noise is the air in the vents. It smells even more heavenly now, rich and juicy, and I can almost picture this mingling of scents working at being dinner in the oven. I climbed the stairs and went into the hunter green bedroom with the blue sponge stenciled animals on the walls. Plush animals are all around, a beautiful matching cherry-stained crib, rocker, dresser, and changing table all bring the room earthy notes. The fussing has stopped, it’s officially nap time. I lay down the beautiful babe already asleep in my arms, and make sure the monitor is on, turn on the mobile, and quietly leave her to her rest. She truly was a gift.
            The garage door was closing as I came down the stairs, how I missed it opening, I’ll never know. My heart beat faster. He was just on the other side of the door. I heard the pickup’s door close quietly, as if he knew I’d just put our daughter down for her nap. The knob turned and-

BRAP! BRAP! BRAP! BRAP! Tears filled my eyes as I turned off the damning alarm clock. That damn cat was as close as I would ever come a child of my own. I know, deep down, that I will never become pregnant, nor carry to term. Yet still, on the odd nights- hot or cold, sick, or exhausted- she would come back to me in my dreams. I have never seen the mate in my dreams, but I know he’s consistent in them. Sometimes I’ll get a shadow or the outline of him. He was tall, and broad. That’s all I knew.

            The dreams were easier to bear than the nightmares. At least, the dreams held the promise of light and hope. They had scents other than death and decay. The nightmares- the usual fare- were beyond normal comprehension. Ice cold terror and every image shown in grayscale made for a reliving embrace of wakefulness. Terrors buried so deep no one ever wanted to ask about then haunted her subconscious like the beings told of in hushed whispers near midnight on childhood adventures.

My heart ached for the babe I would never hold, never nurse, and never see grow older. She had been a regular fixture in my dreams since the accident that robbed me of the ability to produce her. I had been only twenty-two. I rubbed the ridge-covered scar across my abdomen, and climbed into the shower to have a good cry before heading off to work for another day of casual office sexism.