Lend me your dream

Chapter 1 - In the grip of dreams

My name is Molly, I'm a tall and skinny 17-year-old teenager with blue eyes and brown hair. I like playing the piano, it's a way to get out of my head when I feel melancholy. I come from a wealthy family, my dad is a lawyer and my mom manages a luxury jewellery shop. I have a little brother, Barnabé, fair-haired, blue-eyed, I'm 3 years older than him. He has had a very vivid imagination from an early age, he has always been in his own world. We live all together in a big house where the atmosphere is always good and caring. I am just a normal girl by day, like most teenagers: secondary school, friends, love... but year after year I have become a heroine by night.

I'm pleased to tell you my story, but as a young French girl, forgive me if my English can be a little shaky. I will do my best.

As a child, I often couldn't sleep, I was a little restless in my bed. My parents spent sleepless nights too because of me, they took care of me when I had bad dreams. Then I grew up and I went to primary school. As time went by, I didn't understand what was going on in my dreams, it didn't make sense. One day, I realised that my best friend at the time, Lucie, had the same dream I had had on the previous night. She explained me that the hairless doll, Suzy, was hers. Brigitte, her angry nanny took Suzy away again in this dream. I was grateful to Lucie. What a great bond between us. Then the naiveté of childhood faded, and I understood that the dreams I had were never mine. Indeed, I saw those of others, but only of the people who trusted and appreciated me enough. That is my secret. I had no cape, no mask, but I developed my superpower step by step and it sometimes was a big challenge.

When I became aware of my ability, I dived into my relatives' minds and saw many enigmatic visions with curiosity. I was merely observing at that time. Most of my friends expected to spend some more time watching TV while I looked forward to sleeping, longing to discover new dreams. However, unlike on TV, I couldn't choose the channel, sometimes it was captivating, sometimes funny or crazy, sometimes worrying or scary... That is how I saw my buddy Valentin biking on clouds escorted by dragons. Valentin and I took piano lessons together in real life, I often played the piano in his dreams, by the way. Nevertheless, I wondered why I had blue hair, maybe because it matched my eyes. I was immersed in my brother Barnabé's wacky imaginary world. He lived in gruyere cheese and hunted kinds of half-ants half-pigs monsters with a giant strand of spaghetti as a lasso, and then he toasted his victory slouching on a huge donut he could eat at will. I also saw some of my parents' wet dreams, oh god, I didn't want to... I was so young. At least I knew that they really loved each other. I understood how badly scared of spiders my friend Dorothée was. I discovered that Justine's worse nightmare was to go to school in her pyjamas, fortunately it never happened, but she didn't seem to be sure of her ability to dress up in the morning. Peeing in dreams was common for many friends. Were their sheets always dry when they woke up? I don't think so... And sometimes I couldn't find out who was the dreamer.

All the information I was getting about my relatives didn't affect me. It was fun! As a child, I wasn't trying to make any connection with reality. I kept this kind of balance about dreams for quite some time.

Then I grew up, Lucie moved somewhere else and I went to lower secondary school where I had to make new friends because, except for Valentin, whom I always saw for our piano lessons, I lost sight of the others. They all went to other schools. Relationships take a new turn in secondary school. Spontaneity decreases, actions and words have strong impacts, we try to build ourselves while other young people judge us more and more. Dreams also change, concrete items are added to funny and weird scenes. So I learnt how to understand people and analyse what was inside their heads. I didn't have a lot of real friends but it didn't matter, I could access their minds without their knowledge, then I felt better than them, sort of. I didn't want anything from them. I saw their thoughts, their fears, their sorrows, some of their secrets... I am not proud of it today but the only goal was that my relatives should trust me to maintain access to their dreams. I could easily manipulate them because I knew who they were better than they thought, and when someone was too mysterious, I made sure I had the necessary confidence to go in their heads during the next nights. My dream control increased, I could now choose my victim if I wanted to. Whereas people often forget details when they remember a dream, I don't. I slept but I was clearly aware of what happened and my memories were perfect. My only obstacle was sleeplessness sometimes.

I became addicted to "my" dreams and the power I had over others. It was like a play, I thought I was not doing anything wrong because I only used the information I obtained in my own interest, to become popular. I wanted the others to like me at an age when social positioning was the key. Considered as a cool girl, I indeed had a greater upward mobility. I learnt dream revelations about the most popular girls' passions, their weaknesses, their attractions to men... I just needed to talk about the good things to get friendly. I got attention from Laura, she was repeating a year and seemed more mature than the others in the same year, she was self-confident and liked being admired, the way she dressed defined fashion at school. I managed to have her talk about her passion for dance and so we got close to each other. I didn't know how she moved in real life but what a talent in her dreams! I also comforted Laura by talking about her dead mother, who had a special place in her mind, where they danced together many times. Her death was maybe the reason for Laura's growing arrogance, like a sort of thick skin. It didn't matter to me because I knew her too much, therefore, she couldn't be boastful with me. I seduced Hugo, one of the most eligible bachelors in the school, a tall, pretty boy, dark-haired, skin-tanned and hunky, a player in the school football team. The kind of annoying guy because everything worked out for him, and very nice and intelligent on top of it. He got interested in me when I found a way to ask him about his secret passion. He was hiding it but he loved chess very much and dreamt about it really often, with a giant chessboard like in Harry Potter. He cared about his reputation and couldn't talk about this nerdy activity. I remember I foolishly pretended that I enjoyed it too, such a stupid lie... He invited me to play a game in his house after school and I had to learn the rules in record time.

At that time, I obtained what I wanted without any trouble and most people liked being around me. My success in relationships as a popular schoolgirl was at its best.