I wanted to premise that I have strange dreams often.
And in this dream last night I know not where it began.
I drifted off to the ambient music of sleep and awoke someplace in a stark totalitarian looking building.
Somewhere that was fenced in, somewhere that I wasn't in control.
We were shuffled towards rooms with no windows, one entrance and multiple beds.
I refused and pushed my way out of the room and down a stair well until I felt the breath of the warm night upon my cheeks.
The cars arrived immediately out of the night, flashing lights ablaze, surrounding my defenseless self.
They were creatures, not people, but they could comprehend my words and I had no choice but to concede to their will.
I was shouting, okay! Okay! as they hustled me back towards the doors. This world seems more menacing than the last.
I was told that someone, I believe my chauffeur, was taking my car home for the midnight curfew.
I would never come to learn where that home was and I was shoved forcefully back towards the doors.
These creatures. It's foggy, and I can't remember much more than they resembled zombies, but they spoke and were cognizant. They were the dominant species, but they had us roped and cornered like the Nazis had the Jewish.
I was indignant while you were afraid. I experience this in my sleep, each night a different world, a different companion and this is the first time you've graced me with your presence.
It became a game. I moved back to our quarters where you lay curled up against another girl in a mattress on the floor. I tossed and turned on what resembled the water bed my parents owned when I was a child.
I paced by the door smoking cigarettes and throwing wistful glances through the gap in the door frame and back to you, eyes gently closed and at ease, soft brown hair flowing gently over your shoulders.
As I grabbed a blanket, I was suddenly confident to lay my head against the pillow beside you. You turned in your sleep and wrapped your arm around me and I was lit with an electric sense of excitement, passion and longing in this stone cold world of oppression and I knew this moment would be fleeting. I'm sure it was subconscious on your part, but I grabbed your hand and held it to my chest as I slipped peacefully into dreams within my dream.
And then came peril. We were shuffled in groups and through our building that only resembled nondescript bureaucratic offices and I slipped away down elevator shafts and through hallways I wasn't meant to parade and by some paranormal means I was tossed out into the abandoned mall where we used to meet.
It was vastly empty as we stood in front of that fountain, overgrown with vines, murky water no longer welcoming. The escalators were now stairs with steps missing, exposed wires the entrails strode over a land given up to the forces of a war unexpected.
I reached my hand to you and you grabbed mine in return and informed me you couldn't stay long.
But you could never stay long. And I remember that. Our moments were always fleeting.
"They will not enter here," I can hear the birds chirping from the empty windows where skylights used to be. We wander the massive hallways as it begins to drizzle through the open ceiling. Each shop is cordoned off by gates, fully locked or half mast. Empty kiosks and overturned benches grace us with their presence on our stroll. Ghosts dance delicately out of the corners of our eyes, alluding to the innocent moments we had in our youth.
On the second story, we stay braced against the railing, entwined and picturing the life this establishment once held.
I collect a foreign flower I'd never glimpsed before and gift it you.
Chaos and wildlife have overtaken our developments. I can feel we were a people torn ragged by a battle that could only have been lost. And I marvel at how the beasts carry no weapons. We must be a broken people now. A population that doesn't rebel. A population that can only follow.
We're in an empty park, next to a tetherball pole, a sad excuse for a jungle gym and in the middle of a waning four square court.
My arms outstretched to wrap around you and this is the longest moment we've shared, but I know it will be the last.
The glint of a flashlight from the far end of the asphalt startles and I begin to run, your hand still clenched in mine.
Past dilapidated housing, chain linked fences, barbed wire, back to our building, the single windowless room we've been residing in. Hoping they can't identify our faces. Hoping they can't prove our infractions. Hoping they won't take us too.
We gain no amenities, no possessions, but for some reason my keys still jingle at my hip and the pack of cigarettes still crumples in my back pocket.
I'm still dressed as I am in each formation of a world but the spark was so real in this one.
The danger was so near, and we were so close.
Up the stairwell.
Dropping down the disintegrating elevator shaft.
Stepping out into the bleak fluorescent lit hallway.
I grab for you as I feel your hand slipping away. These moments always were so fleeting.
And I am awake again.
