The Dream

I awoke. Flashes of amber light shone across my windblown hair, its strands at first concealing my view of the world in front of me. The air was cold, the ground was hard. Dirt had encrusted itself between my nail beds and as I rose, a cavity remained were I once lie.

I found myself in a grassy parking lot of sorts. The sky clear as evening dawned and the wind tracing the well cut edges of the hill's canyons. Just beyond the few rows of parked cars ahead of me stood the ocean—a grassy, sage-colored cliff the only barrier between the depths below and I. In the distance, upon the cliffs, stood a tall wind-battered lighthouse.

I began to walk around. There was a building ahead, wooden 70s style grange of sorts. The wood paneling had clearly seen better days and the oaks grew tall around it, almost through it. As I passed by cars I stopped to see a car covered in dirt and the innocent scrawlings of a child etched in the dirt on the back window. I, in my child-like being, etched my own bit of happiness. Just a small face smiling back at me to remind me of those young ages of long ago—maybe to let the maker of such innocent drawings smile back and see the magic still left in the life of their golden days.

I continued walking towards the building. I saw no one outside, well, no one except for this one individual. Sitting in the outward branch of an oak I saw a girl. She had rather short hair, almost silvery even in the gold light surrounding her. She had on fairly well-fitted jeans with tears, some looked homemade and others looked intentional for style purposes. She also had on a flannel shirt, similar to one I owned long ago, it suited her well enough. And at the bottom, some boots hanging off the edge of the branch along with her feet.

She didn't pay too much notice of me, and I of her—just enough to acknowledge that she was the only other being out in the frigid air, although, the air did seem different around her, almost as though it weren't there at all.

I headed inside the building and found it to be filled with people, young and old, mostly young. There appeared to be not a single light on inside, but instead the light of the outside world illuminating the old wood lining the hall. Outside the trees almost formed a wall, blocking out the surrounding world, their green reflecting to the indoors and even seeming to grow within the walls.

Suddenly there was a scream.

Everyone came rushing to the scene, faceless people passed by, faceless all except one. There was one who wasn't running to the aid of this child-like scream. It was the girl from the parking lot, her face staring into the rather odd black watch upon her wrist. It was as though all the world was forgotten and all that mattered to her was time.

Instead of coming to the aid of the child who had screamed—and still had been screaming—I followed the girl. She seemed to be going around the scene of the growing cataclysm. I followed her behind the trees and past the faceless crowd. They seem to be standing around a swing-set and I hear a child's cries. I see the child on the ground, a little boy with brown hair and a fading rosy complexion.

From within I could hear a voice shouting, "I think his neck is broken!"

And another, "Someone get a doctor!"

Yet I kept on following the girl with silver hair.

"I think he's gone" I heard someone despondently say beyond the trees as the sounds of sadness pierced through the air.

Suddenly the girl stopped.

An odd cubed emblem began rising from the ground, about the size of the shoe. The girl with the silver hair steps onto it and before my eyes she becomes the the rosy cheeked boy.