The Art of Dreaming

Drowse

I pulled the cloth down from in front of my eyes and joined the other protesters in the chant. The streets were packed with people in face masks holding up signs and marching. Another unarm man was killed and people were showing up in the streets around the country. Calling for an end to this violence. All the police were gathered together behind a squad truck. 

"Woo sa woo, tah meh go!" The crowd yelled.

The clouds floated in front of the moon and darkened the night. The streets transformed into drumpads and all of the sound of the protests disappeared. When my foot came down on the street next, a bass drum sounded. With every step there was a bass drum. The buildings transformed into large equalizer bars; they lit up with every step. I could see people talking, the ones without facemasks. There just wasn't any sound coming from them. Finally, a man with a blurred face was up on a wall screaming through their facemask. I could hear him.

"You have to let life happen to see what else life has to offer. This is life happening."

Bright lights now lit up beneath our feet, I pulled out my phone to record it. It was like the street had come to life. The lights were pulsing.

"And that's my app. You can control the disco lights from your phone."

The disco ball looking machine stopped flashing lights and spinning around. The presenter looked eager to hear a good review of their app. The basketball sitting next to the machine  got most of my attention. It looked like it was moving by itself. After staring at it for a few seconds it started to roll closer to the machine. With a quick lunge the basketball ate the disco machine and jumped out of the window.  The presenter started to spaz.

"It'll never be perfect." I told her.

She continued to spaz though, so I jumped out of my chair and started to move like she was. Spasmodic motions, unprovoked and jerky accompanying her strange grunts and sounds. The left wall fell like dry sand and I put my headset on. 

"Start your engines!" I said.

The teddy bear in my lap started to vibrate and rumble. Coming to life and jumping around the room. Flower to lilypad, it turned into a frog and then a  chameleon. We were both chameleons, slowly moving our legs. Maneuvering our eyes to get a view of our surroundings. I didn't feel like I could do my job. I had to get this guy a haircut. I placed a chameleon hand on the clippers and felt them vibrate. It was the year 20,000 and I was representing my species. I had to do it. 

"Swed num se go?" the guy asked.

"Id by a." I responded.

3-9-16. That was the combination to the guys head. With a couple turns of the lock I was in and the cameras from the corners of the hall watched me enter. Time is really just life conceptualized in an abstraction of individual segments that can be distinguished apart from other segments. Assumed time, realized time, defined or not. I've assumed I had time before. I've realized I didn't have time before. It was when I realized I didn't have time that I could finally define what was missing. A gold tooth. 

It was staring at me right in the face this whole time. I needed a golden tooth. Framed in my mouth. It would demand perspective, it would know where anybody was going. The hallway was ending so I picked a door to walk through. I stepped into a coffee shop at 8 am. I asked for a normal coffee.

"Normal is a common and impossible goal." the barista answered.

I was wearing a camo colored basketball jersey with a facemask. I just ordered a biscuit instead. The window was covered with spiders and where there weren't spiders you could see birds sitting on everything outside. There were a few birds inside. They flew from overhead light to overhead light in what seemed like a game of bird-tag. I laid down some coins and took my biscuit to go. It tasted like 8% of what a biscuit should taste like. A large horse walked by without making eye contact with me and I continued to walk beside it. He seemed to be walking to a large crater. The crater was formed by comet, meteoroid, or asteroid. When aliens came out of the crater we both ran. The horse was gone in an instant and I was still way closer than I'd like to be. Half the biscuit still protruding out of my mouth. Troin pulled up beside me in a convertible with glowing tires. She was wearing a facemask.

"What are you waiting for?" She asked.

I jumped in and the water spilled over the sides of the car like an overflowing bath. She pressed the gas and we sped away from the aliens. It was hard to read what the signs said but I was glad to be leaving.