Lock and Key

Weird Dreams

Grace had never taken the sleeping pills that were kept in the infirmary before but she remembered some of the children who did complaining that they gave them weird dreams. Grace assumed this was what the children had meant. She stood all alone in white void. Void. That word had been thoroughly ruined for her. Grace was aware that this was a dream though she wasn't sure why. "That's called a lucid dream." someone said to her. Grace turned around to see who'd spoken to her only to find the last face she'd expected greeting her. "Hi Grace." Hazel said. This Hazel was odd, in that rather than take on the appearance of a single one of Hazel's forms she seemed to cycle through all of them at random. Sometimes Hazel would be a full turtle, the next minute human looking and then half way into her turtle form.

"You're confused." Hazel said matter of factly. Grace nodded her head.

"How did you know that?" Grace asked. Hazel smiled and began to explain.

"This is a sleeping-pill induced lucid dream, you can make whatever you want here." Hazel gestured to the endless expanse of whiteness surrounding them. "You haven't created anything yet so the world is empty." she explained. Grace nodded.

"What about you, what's your deal?" Grace asked Hazel who continued shifting through her forms.

"I'm a manifestation of your subconscious." Hazel said. Grace raised an eyebrow.

"If you're just a projection of my inner thoughts how do you know about stuff I don't? " Grace asked her.

"We know all the same things. It's just that it's more difficult for you to process some information on your own so your brain chose the person who you'd be most likely to listen to as an avatar for your subconscious thoughts so that they could reach you." she added. Grace still looked at her curiously.

"But if all you do is explain my subconscious thoughts what's the point? Why would I need another person to regurgitate the things I already know?" Grace questioned. Hazel put her head in her hands frustrated.

"Just because they're your thoughts doesn't mean you know them. You," Hazel gestured to Grace up and down. "Represent the conscious mind. I represent the subconscious mind. While we both have the same information I have information that you can't process unless given to you by another person. Am I making any sense?" she asked. Grace nodded.

"A little I guess. So, why are you Hazel?" she asked. Hazel simply shrugged.

"I guess Hazel is the person that you trust to give you correct information making her the best vehicle for delivering thoughts from the subconscious to the conscious. Also before you ask me I'm cycling forms because your internal vision of Hazel doesn't have one concrete form and this was the most accurate way to represent that. Do you have any more questions?" Hazel asked. Grace shook her head. "Great, so what do you want to do?" she asked. Grace thought for a moment.

"You're not the real Hazel, so nothing I say will badly affect you, right?" Hazel nodded. "I want to kill Simon." Grace said angrily. Hazel simply looked at her.

"Okay, make it happen." she said stepping aside. Grace cracked her knuckles and tried to conjure up the scene she was going for. The white abyss dissolved into the Mall car around her.

"Alright, I've got the setting down." she noted. "Now to create..." Grace trailed off. Hazel squeezed her hand.

"You know Grace, you don't have to talk if you don't want to. I can hear everything you think." Grace paused at this for a moment before laughing.

"No offense but hearing that come out of Hazel's mouth is supremely creepy." she said happily. Grace then closed her eyes and focused on conjuring up Simon. "Ugh, no this is wrong!" Grace said annoyed. The Simon who she'd imagined looked more like the dork that she'd called her best friend than the violent unstable asshole who'd broken her leg. Grace tried again to bring to mind the ridiculously high number and loose hair of the Simon who she wanted dead but again found herself unable to conjure him. Grace turned to Hazel frustrated. "What gives? I thought you said I could make whatever I wanted here?" she questioned. Hazel nodded.