Nellas

I'm living in a house, with an old infatuation staying as a guest. A lot of time has passed since we last spoke.

She cries out while she's in the shower. I go to her, completely naked, to check on her. She had slipped in the shower. I make sure she's okay before leaving. I can't help but notice that she's nervous around me. I think maybe it's because I'm naked, and I'm not sure why I'm naked either. It doesn't feel unnatural, though.

She screams again when she's in her bedroom. I go to her again. There's a wasp flying around in her room. We both try to kill it. I whack it with a towel, and then suddenly several more, smaller wasps come out of it and start swarming in the room.

I shoud, "God, Jesus!!" and bolt out of there.

I am with my girlfriend on a highway I don't recognize. It is jam packed. We take the wrong exit, so I turn around and start going the opposite way. People aren't driving cars, but walking. The highway splits, we stay right at the fork. The highway gets narrower and steeper, until it's just wide enough for one person to fit through and so steep that it's nearly vertical. We get to a point where I know we can't keep going. I look down at her and say we have to go back. I don't look forward to going back to that flood of people.

When we make our way back, we find ourselves at the end of the highway. It's like the bridge just cut off suddenly. Something lurches us forward, and hundreds of us fall into the water beneath us.

We are then lifted up onto an inflatable raft that is tugged by a speed boat. It moves faster than we can hold on, and some of us fall off.

Someone speaks through a megaphone and tells us to let go and fall into the deck below. We do so, and I'm so thankful to have solid ground beneath my feet.

In front of us, on the speed boat, is a stage. And on the stage, an old Bruce Willis with long hair has the microphone and he's leading his band. The band consists of him as the singer, Jaden Smith as a wild dancer, and Michelle Rodriguez on the side looking cool. Bruce Willis says something that's supposed to be funny, but only a few of us laugh, including one of us who had fallen into the water and was floating nearby. Bruce gives us a strange, strained smile, like he hates the icy crowd and his job.

Jaden dances around a bit as the boat tugs us to land. I talk to my girlfriend about what's happening, thinking it's nice of them to have rescued us. She says this must have been planned, that biostaticians never do anything without the data to prove that it's profitable to do so. I think that she's right and I get upset about the lack of selflessness of humanity.

The place I'm in is a mix of a house set by a lake, but there are no enclosed rooms. I'm with my uncle, and he is still mourning my aunt's passing. It's a Friday night. We're talking, and something happens. There's a spark. We have chemistry. We are enjoying what the other person is saying. I'm confused about my feelings, and he is too. I leave, promising to come back on Sunday.

I tell my girlfriend about it, and she is very supportive. She sets up the meeting on Sunday. She wants us to get together.

Sunday, I go to him. We lay in bed together. I am overpowered by how sick he smells, how old he is, and that he is my uncle. The chemistry I felt is gone, and there is only revulsion. Still, he strokes my face and kisses me. I try to kiss back, but I can't. The kiss is warm and wet and disgusting to me. I am so embarrassed. He senses it and pulls away. I close my eyes and whisper, "I'm sorry..."

I leave and sleep on the couch. I wake up in the morning and walk around. I don't know how long I slept, but my uncle is nowhere to be found. I really wanted to explain to him that maybe, people had a short connection and then it disappeared, and it wasn't meant to be pursued. I saw that he had put his laundry in the wash. The television in front of the couch is on, but I don't register what's playing. I am only filled with guilt.

I walk out of the house to find my girlfriend. She knows it went wrong, and she is angry with me. We are talking on the phone until I find her sitting at the water's edge of a lake. She looks sad and holds a guitar. I try to go to her as the water levels rise and consume her while she plays the guitar. And she doesn't care.

I wake up from this deep dream and I'm shocked at waking life for a moment, so different from the emotions of moments before.

I am on the top of a tower with my girlfriend's best friend. It's kind of like Sauron's tower in Lord of the Rings, except it's not dark and scary around here. It's bright and sunny and beautiful, except it's supposed to be midnight. We reason that it's due to time zones, but a few moments later I'm questioning it again. It looks like mid-afternoon but it's supposed to be midnight. Then it clicks. I look at J. I say, "You know why we can't figure this out? It's because we're dreaming." I shake his shoulders for emphasis. But I don't get lucid. Everything seems so deceptively real. When I shut my eyes and scrunch them and focus on waking up, I can't fathom how any of this could be a dream.

But then another few moments pass. I can feel the dream slipping, like I'm on the verge of waking up. So then I say, "Wake up."

I wake up in the bed of another dream. I'm still not lucid, but I know it's a dream. I'm in what was my younger sister's bedroom of my mom's house. A dream sign missed.

I leave and go exploring. I have to go to some high school graduation of an all-boy's school.

On the way there, we run into some bosses that remind me of the difficult bosses from FFVII. I tell my gf and her friend that we have to save our progress before fighting them, because they are in an inconvenient spot of the game and losing would keep us trapped here and unable to level up. We fight them. I'm unsure if we beat them, but we get passed them.

I need surgery on my stomach. Then I'm on a surgeon's table. They only give me a local anasthetic. I watch the doctor take a blade specifically for cutting humans. I see the blade approaching me from his perspective, but then I look away because I don't want to see. Cut to after the surgery. I get incredibly nauseous and my fever spikes. The nurses ask me if I'd eaten anything before the surgery. I remember eating breakfast. I should have known. I tell them I didn't know I wasn't supposed to eat.

The doctor prescribes me a huge bag of orange vicodin. I am afraid of becoming addicted, and also of my gf finding out and freaking out about it. I'm not in any pain, but I do feel like my insides are not what they used to be. It is very uncomfortable. I leave and go to the high school graduation.

I'm sitting in the bleachers of this small schoolyard. The valedictorian and his best friend are leading the event. They have so much energy and look so bright and happy. The best friend looks like a younger BM. The valedictorian is small and in shape. I reflect on being younger, and that it's strange how quickly that youth seems far away.

After the graduation, someone fights me. I'm still weak from the surgery. They flip me over and stomp on my stomach. I curl up and cry, I can't believe they would do that. K comes to me and I ask her if I can take some pain medication. I show her the bag and she freaks out at how much the doctor gave me. That shouldn't be allowed. One of the women in the schoolyard looks hungrily at the bag, and salivates while doing so. I take the bag back and hide it on my person.

Start out visiting a friend. She is convinced her boyfriend is cheating on her with a woman, or a man, or both. She comes up with a plan to find him out. She takes a blow dryer out and starts talking into it as he is walking into the house. He tries to talk to her, but she talks over him. The noise of the blow dryer brings out background noise of his thoughts or something, revealing what he had been doing.

But then, plot twist. She asks, "You think this was about you?"

And then we go quiet, and hear that her roommate is sleeping with someone and making a lot of noise doing so. This roommate of hers has a boyfriend, so it's actually her roommate who is the cheater.

I leave, and go to a Church which is a part of the school I am going to. One of my coworker's is there. I sit in the second row of pews and grab what looks like a prayer book. I immediately drop it on the floor. Without thinking about it, I pick it up and kiss it while sitting. I hope that no one realizes I am a Jew in a Christian church.

The prayer song book has artful Hebrew letters written on it. But, it's not the book the woman leading is reading from. She's playing guitar and everyone is singing along, very much like my Hebrew school days.

Then, I'm in the front row, squished between my coworker and a stranger. I start feeling very claustrophobic, but I don't want to offend my acquaintance by moving. My discomfort is making it hard to listen to the words being said, so I end up moving so I can pay better attention. My coworker follows me and sits a space away from me in the second row.

The pastor, a woman, is talking about something I can't understand. Her past. It sounds a little shady. Someone comes in and unveils her as a terrible sinner who has committed horrible deeds and should not be teaching the word of God to anyone. She gets defensive at first, and then gives in to her dark side and tries to hurt us all. I want to escape, but there are traps laid out everywhere. My coworker and I eventually escape. He says something about being shocked that she could be like that.

I wake up. I have a few minutes until my alarm goes off.

I shut my eyes, and immediately I can see my hand floating before me. I realize it's in my mind, and I'm lucid, so I just lay there staring at my hand. I try to keep it in focus as long as I can, but the dream gets darker and darker until I can't see anymore.

I did it!!! I think. Haha.

Here's the dream:

I'm collecting something? Searching through a pile of trash. I'm acting out a part for a kid at a festival. I don't have to - but I want to.

I'm repeating the same puzzle over and over. There's a shower I keep trying to take, but my teammates are there and they make fun of me while I'm naked and it embarrasses me.

Then, I'm on a different level and we have to complete certain challenges. There's a magazine at the beginning of the level that is full of Tenchi Muyo information. It talks about a second Tenchi Muyo movie, which I think is stupid. I flip through the pages quickly, admiring the art. My team loses because I'm distracted.

The next round, I'm determined to redeem myself. I run past a Charr (guild wars 2 race) and hop onto platforms like a jumping puzzle. I reach a point where I enter a room that is hot pink and glowing. My friends from high school are there.

I get lucid. My friends and I talk excitedly about dreaming and how we are all sharing a dream. They tell me the room is a different color for each of them. One of them who I am fighting with in waking life hugs me and it makes me intensely uncomfortable.

I rub my hands to stabilize the dream and add clarity. I remember The Dreamcatcher Society and decide I want to try it out. I'm reluctant because I'm attached to the current dream plotline but I don't know when the next time I'll be able to try this is.

I walk over to the wall where there is a white panel. I slide it to the side and there is a door behind it. I push through.

The room I end up in looks like an old Englishman's study, with and old couch and two armchairs and the whole room is lit by a fireplace which is where the door I just walked through is. My dad and his siblings are all sitting on the seats around the room. I can't tell if we are in a castle or not, but I keep going with it.

I go to the coffee table in the middle of the seats. It's very cluttered with books, magazines, and other objects. There is a small flask which looks like a glass potion bottle. I pick it up and drink it.

It tastes AWFUL. Sour, smells like bad chicken broth, and there are chunks of I don't know what. Luckily, it's only a shot's worth.

My dad is talking the whole time but I can't understand him - it's like Charlie Brown's teacher.

I look over to the wall and walk to it. It's another panel. I push it to the side and walk through the secret door. It's another room, exactly like the one I just walked from, except no one is in it. It's very quiet. I'm supposed to find something about myself that I didn't know before, so I start looking around.

I find a small hallway. Through it I step into a room that has a small old CRT television playing a cartoon that reminds me of coyote and roadrunner from Looney Toons. The story is incoherent and keeps going from one weird thing to the next. I don't think it's what I'm looking for, so I leave this room and go into another.

In this room, there is a Vietnamese woman standing at a desk working a sewing machine with a pile of clothes next to her on the table. The room is lit fluorescently, much different than the warm light of the study before.

When I get close to her, she turns to me and starts speaking to me. It's English, but I still can't understand her. I listen anyway and keep looking at her.

She finishes, I leave the room and decide to run down the hallway. Immediately it feels like there are two demon dogs chasing me. I can hear barking behind me and the hallway around me is getting dark and I'm scared.

I tell myself to wake up and I do.

think it counts?

I'm in Zelda OoT. I'm Link, going through the game. This mostly takes place in Kokiri Forest while it's overrun with monsters of the forest. It's different than I remember. Adulthood is dark, dangerous, and vaguely boring. I'm trying to find something - new equipment, something. Hiding from pursuers, but I don't know who they are. It's just a feeling. I think about how it felt to play OoT the first few times - being adult for so long... then getting to the Spirit Temple and having to be a child again briefly. You've been an adult so long that you forget what it's like to be a child.

I'm flying to Pluto to do some work for my supervisor. When I get there, she's already there. We work together to produce great science, the kind of stuff that will change the world. I look up, and I see the most beautiful sunset of my entire life. Brightly lit orange clouds, a painting. They move and push against each other. I try to capture it on my phone, but I can't focus it very well. I look up, and the clouds part, and a space ship lowers through the opening. It looks like a ship from Star Fox 64 or something. It hovers there a moment, as if studying us, then goes back up through the clouds. The clouds fade away, and all that's left is the beautiful darkness of space and endless stars behind it.

I won't ever forget that sunset.

My youngest two brothers and I are going through a building, which feels like a hospital. I'm unsure where we're going, only that I feel like there are forces pursuing my brothers and I have to keep them safe. My brother seems more mature than he is in waking life. I feel protective of them both because I am so much older than them.

I call my uncle who I am quite close to, and we speak on the phone for a little while. He has to hang up on me though, because he starts crying. He recently moved away from everything he ever knew to start a new life, and he has been lonely getting his new life started with his family. Having moved to a city where I knew no one, I understand his loneliness. I call him back immediately. He answers, and we speak some more. I can hear my cousin playing video games in the background, and then it's like I'm in the room with him and can see his living room and his daughter on the couch playing Call of Duty.