The Dreams That Were Dreamt

Chapter Four: The Canary In The Coal Mine

I saw her; the woman in the picture. She was dancing, through one room and into another, lost in her own reverie. I heard a piano playing. It was a piece I recognized. When I walked further down the corridor, she began dancing towards me. ''What did they do to you,'' I asked her. She whispered something and danced circles around me. But I couldn't hear what she was saying.

I woke up with a strange taste in my mouth. I had slept as though dead. I felt chilly, the way you feel when you are about to catch a cold. I had fallen asleep on the couch. It was dark outside, and everything was still and quiet. I never understood people who lived like this; when you were all alone with your thoughts.

If I dropped a pin it would fall for eternity. I wanted to know what time it was. I tried searching for an answer on the face of the clock that was hanging above the door to the back, but it was too dark to hear what her answer was. I don't even know if it worked. I had a blanket over my body, but I hadn't put it over myself. Roger must have. I could hear him breathing in the other end of the room, sleeping in the bed. I found a strange, shameful type of comfort in this.

It didn't really matter what exact time it was. It was night; the night I was supposed to be working. But I wasn't there. I was here, far, far away and there was nothing I could do about that. This made me incredibly uneasy. I imagined all the trouble I would be in. I imagined that my phone, that I didn't know the whereabouts of, probably was full of missed calls and text messages. From Agatha, from Owen, from Cindy. ''Hey, Aaron will you be late?'' – ''Aaron, where are you?'' – ''Aaron, has anything happened?'' – ''Aaron, people are starting to talk about you.'' 

I repositioned the decoration pillow from under my head to the top of my face. That didn't help. I try putting it on my stomach and holding it as tight as I could, like I was putting pressure on a bleeding wound. I tried my best to calm my breath. I tried telling myself that everything would be fine. Missing one shift wouldn't be the end of the world. There had been cases of people forgetting to call in sick before. Missing two in a row? That's pushing it. Missing three? Unheard of.

I wasn't going to be able to go back to sleep. I had been asleep more than I had been awake this past day. After I had gotten the sand out of my eyes, I was back to normal. Now it felt like my head was clear from all the toxins, and at the worst time at that. I wasn't in a haze. It didn't feel like I was dreaming anymore. I wish it did.

God, how I wish that he was here. I wished that I was in his arms and that his body could create a border for the pain, like it had done, in many of times before. Even though Owen was around, my longing never turned to him. It always turned to him. But feelings like these were also very dubious. A part of me wanted to hold on to it and another part of me was screaming in my ear to let go. Seeking refuge in memories like this was like digging your own grave. But how could I stand on my own two feet when I couldn't even get the air down from my chest to my stomach? When I couldn't even muster the strength to open the jar of peanut butter? I was better by your side. I just was.

Why had I dreamed of her? Probably because I had just been introduced to her. I had been shown her face and my head had been trying to figure out if I had seen her before and that's when she got stuck. But a part of me didn't want to believe this. A part of me never believed it worked like this. If this was my gut feeling, my intuition or the child in me talking, I don't know. 

I played with that thought and tried to piece together the little information that I had from the dream to see if there was something to go on. Where were we? It was a long corridor with many doors. It could have been a hotel, maybe a hospital. All the doors were open. But the place looked so worn down. I hadn't been there before. 

How was she feeling? Careless. She was neither sad nor happy. She was in a world of her own. She wasn't wearing any shoes, only a burgundy dress with cap sleeves. And that piano piece. It seemed so familiar. It wasn't elaborate. It was the same loop being repeated, over and over again. It was easy to hum and led my mind to a circus or a fair. I wouldn't say that it was a piece that reeked of joy, but it wasn't sad either. Eerie, would probably be the best word to describe it. But what was she whispering?