IMG_0054These trees are all leafless now, and the sun is rising more to the right, but I love this summer picture.

Up early this morning, so my mind is still half in the dream state. Which is good for writing, but bad for responsibilities. Ah, well, bills can wait.

So, from the dream journal:

December 6, 2017

She was rail thin, of thoroughly mixed blood, beautifully boned. Her hair tufted at her head like a crown. She raced into the room, laughing, followed by a tall, lean man with flowing, fluffy hair. They played, clearly in love, radiating joy. He caught her, his gentle hands pulling her close for a quick kiss before releasing her again, to let her run. She laughed and dashed away, to the far corner of the room, trapping herself as he reached for her again. She froze, hit with the terror that stalked her relentlessly.

As his hands touched her arms, they became someone else’s hands, cruel hands, and he became not her lover, but her horror. I watched her shrink, as she lost herself in time and space, vanishing to now, and living in a distant past.

“Let me go! Don’t touch me!” she cried.

His gentle hands hesitated. Uncertainty replaced the lover’s confidence. He tried to pet her arms, to soothe, but she shrank into the corner, cowering into a small ball of fear.

“Please don’t touch me,” she begged, whimpering. She couldn’t see him. She could only see images in her mind.

He looked at me, helpless despair in his eyes, his hands still hovering near her as she cowered in the corner.

I rose from the couch, and went to them. I took his hands in mine, squeezed briefly to reassure him, then let go. Then I turned to her. “America,” I said softly. “Come to me.” I reached one hand toward her, palm up, and waited. The room was still.

She pushed from the wall and grabbed my hand. I pulled her to my chest, holding her close. She shuddered as the terror released its hold. We stood, clutched to each other, and moved to the couch where I sat holding her tightly to my side. Her lover watched from his position near the corner, his shoulders drooping.

I caught Mike’s eye, as he sat in a chair to my left, and gestured with my head. He rose and went to her lover, and ushered him out of the room, with an arm about his shoulders. He would take care of him.

She still held tight to me, watching them go, and whispered “What about…”

“He’ll be fine. Don’t worry,” I said. “He only needs to know how to switch from lover to refuge. Mike will teach him. He knows how.” I rubbed her shoulder. “You’re going to be all right.”

“No, she’s not,” a strange new voice interjected. “She shouldn’t trust him. He’s a man.”

“Quiet,” I told the woman who had appeared near the patio door behind Mike’s vacated chair. She was dressed in black, her greasy lank hair hanging loose around her shoulders, her flabby body reeking of old sweat and a lack of soap.

“Why should she care ‘what about…’? When it’s a man who’s done this to her?” the angry woman demanded. “They’re all the same.”

My anger swelled, giving me that powerful surge, that rock solid core, that cold hard ‘immovable object’ of wrath as I left the couch and advanced on the woman.

“She. Wants. To. LIVE!” I said. “And you want nothing more than for her to take her terror, use it as a blanket, and wallow in her pain for all eternity! You want her to dwell in the past, refusing to see what’s in front of her face, and abandoning any chance at happiness. You want her not to care about him, the love of her life. Because YOU ARE HURT, and refuse to heal! Your victimhood is your power, and by God, you will cling to it.”

The nasty woman’s face contorted. “That’s a lie!” she screamed.

“Is it?” I asked.

She stilled, tears filling her eyes. A moment passed, while I waited for a reply, and she hunted for an internal shield. At last she muttered, “I’m going to be sick.” She opened the patio door and leaned her head outside to puke over the flagstones. Then she left.

I returned to America.

And then the scene switched to their wedding, America’s and her lover’s. And Paulina Porizkova was her maid of honor, looking as radiant and young as she did in the Cars’ “Drive” video. Only, she’d lost the mad look.

Nobody ever said dreams end sensibly.

Oh, his name? Jefferson.

Damn, I love that man.