Somewhere in a Nightmare PT.2

The pain behind my eyes was excruciating, opening them was not an option at this point. The natural motion when your head aches this bad is to immediately place your hand there to ease your pain but my hands wouldn’t move. Nothing on my body would move. I began to panic breathing in and out as quickly as my lungs would allow only to realize my breath was returning to my face with a sweltering heat, after each breath. I tried to scream to the point that my throat hurt but no sound was escaping, only silent breath followed by sound of my heart beating, loudly, throbbing inside my temples with each beat of my heart. It was apparent now that fighting wasn’t an option so I did my best to calm my breathing and center myself. I needed to know where I was, the ‘who’ was pretty obvious. You can break something that is already broken so he planned to keep me here until my last breath to get the answer he seeks from my dying lips, but he underestimated me. As my heart began to calm and my breaths became more shallow I could hear footsteps from a distance, growing closer and closer but from which direction I couldn’t tell, was I underground? Was I in the air, where did that bastard decide to place me while he watched me die. My eyes, still swollen shut tried to open but to no avail. Just then, my body fell what seemed like ten feet onto the cold hard floor with a hollowing thud. The pain was unbearable and with all of the energy I had left in my body the words ‘Stop’ came streaming out without thought.


I lay there, on my back waiting for something, anything, a smart ass comment, another physical beating but nothing… not even his sick demonic laughter wasn’t there to taunt me. My body was free now, at least not in-closed I could feel a cord of some kind as I tried to move my hands, a cord wrapped so tightly around my wrists it shot a stabbing pain through each arm the more I tried to move. Under my body was cold concrete, it felt damp to my weak hands, I went limp in despair and could feel the warm tears flowing involuntarily down each side of my face and as the first tear reached my right temple I felt a cold wet cloth brush against my face causing me to jerk sideways. “Shh, don’t move” I heard, in a soft feminine voice, barley a whisper. The cloth touched my forehead and slowly moved down the left side of my face and over my eyes then pulled away. towards my feet I could hear the trickle of water and the clank of something metal. I tried to speak but before I could even force out any sound a small hand slammed across my mouth with an intensity that needed no words. The cloth began to kindly touch my face, again and again until I could tell the dried blood on my face was gone, the tightness I felt in my skin before wasn’t there, I could move my mouth, my lips freely without the pressure on my skin. “open” she said quietly, with one finger on my bottom lip, I had no choice to fight her off I had no energy and the pain throughout every inch of my body was so severe by now that death was a welcome notion. “you’ll feel better if you eat this” as a small capsule was placed on my tongue and a metal bowl of water held against my cheek. I tried to lift my head, and with the help of the small hand on my neck took a sip of the liquid and as I swallowed I felt the pain slowly leave my body an inch at a time, I began to fully relax and I could feel myself falling asleep.

Somewhere in a Nightmare

When I awoke it was daylight, my surroundings had changed. My eyes flickered painfully towards the light streaming in from the broken window above me. It took a moment to catch my breath, as I sat up slowly to examine myself. Intact, no cuts, scrapes or burns, my right hand was still there, it must have been a dream, again. I looked around at the dilapidated area in which I had awoke. This wasn’t familiar, it sure wasn’t a place I felt safe. I quickly gathered my wits and pulled myself up on the chair that sat directly in front of me. The room was large, at least thirty to forty feet in height. The walls held tightly to what remained of the wallpaper. I could tell it was once a thing of beauty that was now ran down with time and weather it was peeling off in strips with a delicate breeze. A Fireplace at the far end of the room caught my eye it looked out of place here. It appeared to be white marble with a beautiful gold framed mirror hanging at an angle above it. I took a step towards the fireplace only to catch my foot on something and stumble to the ground. I could feel it, the hand around my ankle… squeezing tighter and tighter and I knew this was just another dream. I closed my eyes and tried to thank of the happiest moment to escape this terrible place but nothing came, the grip only got worse and began to pull me backwards. Yanking my leg as I turned my head to see what it was that had ahold of me I realized that part of him had come along with me. He was gone, the Devil, but his hand which looked as if it were severed by an animal’s teeth still clings to my leg as if he was still here and that was not a dream. Shaking my leg violently, the hand came undone and I sat in utter fear staring at it. I knew it was his, the ring was still on his middle finger but I also knew he couldn’t still be alive if his entire hand was here, with me, right? Grasping at the finger on which the gold ring was fitted so tightly, while trying not to look at the dark red blood dripping from the finger tips that touched my hands and slid carefully down my arm, I took the ring directly to my pocket and threw  the cold bloody stump as far away from myself as I could. I jumped up and ran towards the fireplace as fast as I could, stopping to look deeply in the mirror at the mess behind me only to find that the reflection of this place was not what I saw at all. I turned around, to where I had ran from and the room was still old, ran down and aged… seemingly abandoned with even a tea cup and saucer still resting on the table in the center of the room. I turned back towards the mirror and took another look, surly my eyes were playing tricks on me but alas, the mirror I was looking into appeared to be a window to the past. In it the wall paper was a thing of pure beauty, it was a soft light blue with golden designs swirling around making different patterns from the floor to the ceiling. There in the  center of the room I noticed a beautifully lit chandelier, crystals seemingly dripping from a golden floral arrangement mounted into the bright white ceiling. It was lit with candles and as each began to melt the trail of wax edged it’s way towards the tips of each crystal one by one. The room was empty, except for the large glass table in the center, and the small red sofa to it’s right. Directly across from the sofa sat a small velvet chair, matching stool and burning cigarette placed delicately in the large crystal ashtray. I stood there, staring into the mirror in awe. Taking in every wonderful detail of the room, the large floor to ceiling windows that lined the south side of the wall, but not interrupting the gorgeous flow of gold flake on the perfect wallpaper, it only joined it making the frame of the window a part of the art itself. Each Window outlined with what appeared to be the most amazing gold I had ever seen. Just then the door at the opposite end of the room from the fireplace flew open and he stood there smiling at me with his light brown eyes. A shiver ran down my spine as I turned to face him, I didn’t want my back to the man I knew what he was capable of. To my surprise though, he wasn’t there, just the chair, the table with the tea cup and saucer and years of dust and broken glass lie strewn across the wooden floors. “You can’t run”, he said in a soft almost angelic tone, “I can be anywhere you go, even if you can’t see me”. I turned my back to the room of the past and examined his face in the mirror, he was closer now, just behind me. Leaning his head down slowly all the while never breaking eye contact he placed his lips upon my shoulder and left a warm soft kiss that as his lips left my skin burned like hell. I gasp for air and grab for the burn as if my touch will make it feel better and as my hand reaches the place his lips just left appeared a huge blister that once my hand reached it, shot pain through my arm so badly, I dropped to my knees in tears. Before me the once cold, dark fireplace roared to life as if it had been burning the entire time. The flames licking the white marble as they reached towards the sky up into the darkened flute. Still on my knees reeling from the pain in my left shoulder, left by the devils kiss I tried to steady myself but to no avail. Immediately, he pulled me to my feet, spun me around to face the mirror again and said “It won’t hurt forever Dear, once you give me what I came here for, you can go back to your pointless life, in that pointless town with the rest of those pointless creatures you call friends and family”. I clinched my jaw tight, knowing he could take my life, my breath at any moment but he will never find her or the necklace. With a smile that showed his freshly bleached teeth wrapped softly with his welcoming lips he placed his check against mine. The heat coming from his face began to make me sweat and just then he grabbed the back of my hair and slammed my face into the cold white marble.

Dreams. Pt. 2

Still seated opposite of the woman with the bright hair and eyes she never breaks her gaze. She knows me, and every piece of my being. Who I was, who I am and who I will become in this lifetime. With a slight nod she gestures to my left. Looking down I see his hand on mine. Kind, soft hands twice the size of my own playing with a small piece of ribbon. Tying it first into a knot then into a bow and holding it out in front of him for the young chocolate eyed girl to pull on, only to undo the entire thing and start again. He isn’t a small man in stature, he’s quiet, reserved, olive complexion with dark brown eyes and short soft brown hair. He doesn’t break eye contact with the small girl across from him, smiling and laughing at her they exchange words that I cannot understand. With a swift motion of her hand the woman at the end of the table takes me to a place that I have never seen before. Here, in this place I am surrounded by bars, ankles chained to them in a seemingly endless tangle of iron. There in front of me stands the man that was seated to my left, the tall, heavier man with the kindest brown eyes I have ever seen. He stares back at me in adoration, pure undying love and within me I cannot find reason for this. He does not speak, he only takes my hand in his, opens it and with his other hand places a piece of ribbon into my palm. I look down in total confusion to see a key tied to the end of that ribbon. This key, isn’t of any material I have ever seen before. It is beautiful, amazing. I look up to ask the man “what is this?” but he is gone, I am still here, surrounded in chains behind harsh, thick bars of steel. I glance back to the key in my hand, around it the soft pale ribbon made of the softest material ever to touch my skin. With my other hand I pick up the key- at first appearing a translucent purple, now with the soft light bouncing off of it, appears to be blue, and then pink and then translucent purple again. It appears to be glass, a key made of glass? Making no sense what so ever I slump to the ground with the ridged clank of metal surrounding me when I realize, the only lock on my chains appears to match the key in which I hold in my very own hand.

Heart Vs. Brains

From the moment we form a cell through the entire process of our lives it appears that our hearts is forever in search of the brain and the brain in search of the heart. The two rarely see ‘eye to eye’ or think on the same ‘page’ yet everyone tells you to refer to one or the other to make emotional life decisions. So the question here is, which is really the one to follow?

Dreams

I dream of a place where my heart still dwells there among spirits trapped in time. Every dream it’s the same place, with slightly different details. The people I know and grew to love each hidden away in their own little shop, always there to greet me with a smile when I stroll down the streets. I only see the ones I grew to love and cherish as true friends there, simply amazing how they are ever the same upon my return no matter how long it takes for me to make my way back into that dream. The dream, of course is better than the reality. In one small café every person I’ve ever loved sitting at a long banquet table, all smiling and laughing, sharing wine and great stories of their lives. Somehow this particular café doesn’t exist in the real town, but every time I visit the dream it becomes the meeting point of emotion. She is always seated at the far end of the table, her hair long and soft as it was in life. The light hits her face as if she is transparent yet the heavy glow of her long locks seem blinding in comparison to the others around the table. She never speaks. Seated at the table I find the greatest loves of my life, the FEW men that have ever touched my heart and burrowed a place in my soul, all with piercing blue eyes and flawless smiles. My heart flickers when I see them peering at me. One, seated next to a childhood version of myself appears to be still caring for me, chained at the wrist with the innocence lost so many years ago, in the days when your first date meant the world, when ‘what your mother thought’ didn’t matter and a curfew was the most annoying thing in the world. There he is, still beautiful inside and out a grown man now. Years of pain show in the glimmer of his baby blue eyes and lightly thinning blond hair. He is the man she always said he would be, my mother… funny how she loved him so. His hands, weathered yet still soft as they help the youthful version of myself piece back together a broken heart that lay bleeding on the plate before me. He glances back at me, and upon eye contact I feel every word he has to say, I remember just years ago making the drive just to see him for what seemed like five minutes. Two days went so fast in a city that smelled of trash, petro and sand. In him, in the one soul that still penetrates the very being of the ‘real’ me, I carry him closely. The pain he caused all those years ago before the choice of college even crossed my mind, the man I came to know again in life once I had realized who I really was and again the man I still hold so dear. He whispers something to me, that I cannot understand and exits the room with the young long haired blond that used to be me. Across from their empty seats is a man draped in darkness, I know him because of his eyes and the sound of his voice when he speaks. He is captivating, my eyes slam shut and my memory finds me in a cemetery. It is an autumn afternoon, the smell of freshly cut grass and decayed flowers linger in the air. We sit in silence, our fingers intertwined. His hands so soft and nearly feminine in comparison to mine, I found him magnificent. THIS moment, the one before the truth came out, the moment when everything was still reality and the thought that I found my soul mate resonated in the air is quickly whipped away with the harsh reality that lies never stay buried, they come out like the dead and scare the life right out of you. After that day he was never the same to me, but in this memory, he is still perfect and that is where he stays, locked up in the dark shadow to hide him from the world and remind myself that it was all just that, a lie.

It isn’t just the past love I had felt seated at this table, it is the future as well. A young girl with chocolate eyes and intelligence beyond her years sits with a meek smile to my right. When she looks up at me I feel the light again, the one that used to be over my right shoulder in reality is now seated within this small person at the table with all of these emotions. She, herself is an emotion… raw, innocent and unscathed by life this far. My overbearing urge to protect her grows stronger with every moment I take to examine her perfect features. She is amazing, she is painful, she is mine. The woman at the end with the bright light still silent as she watches my reaction from one person to another as if some sick episode of Christmas Past, her silence is daunting and the look in her eye says something, but what I cannot figure out.