Dreams and Realities
The first night after the hospital was surreal. I had just dozed off and was awakened at 3AM by the sounds of a pair of men repossessing a car on the street below. You can't really appreciate the amount of noise that a tow truck can make until you’re awakened to the sounds of scraping metal chains and hydraulic pumps in the middle of an otherwise quiet evening. It’s a sound so loud and disturbing that you wonder in your grogginess if the end of the world has come like Apocalypse has always said. It’s an awful sound that reminds me of destruction.
I always wondered why they did the repossession at night. During the day, the noise and activity of the city would mask the events on our little street. I would guess that no one would even look twice at a tow truck at 3:00 in the afternoon. At night, however, our entire building – and possibly the entire block – was aware that this silver minivan was being taken away. The owner came out of the building and began shouting profanities at the repo men, as though offending their mothers was going to stop them. I tried to ignore the noise and retreated into a fitful sleep.
Dreams are a funny thing. I usually remember something about mine, but that night they were exceptionally vivid and intertwined, in spite of the fact that none of them made any sense whatsoever. It began with incorporating the sounds of the shouting neighbor, that much I can relate to. Before long I was at a baseball game, a large concrete stadium with the bluest sky and greenest grass you've ever seen. The problem with this ballpark was that all of the fans and players were quiet, frozen in their tracks, with just this one guy standing in the next section over, shouting at the top of his lungs, flailing his arms angrily, cursing at the players and screaming at the fans. His anger frightened me, and I tried to call to him, to stop his shouting, but I couldn’t move. I was paralyzed; this is never a good sign in a dream. And of course, once I realized that I couldn’t move, I was completely terrified that something horrible was happening. Terrorists. Murderers. I didn't know exactly what evil lurked beneath the surface of this shouting man. There was a strange feeling of something brushing up against me, just out of sight of my peripheral vision. I knew instantly that it was an evil agent of the screaming man. Something bad was about to happen. I had to save myself.
I woke myself up screaming, and scared the living daylights out of the cat, which had been trying to curl up behind me and settle in for the night. Not exactly an evil agent, unless you have a terrifying fear of cat hair. There is, of course, no way to properly apologize to a wronged cat. She leaped to the foot of the bed, stared at me for a moment, and when I reached out to stroke her soft fur in an effort to put both of us at ease, I inadvertently whacked her in the snout with my cast, which I had forgotten. She shook off the indignity of the whole evening, and jumped off the bed to curl up in the corner, away from the lunatic that was huddled under the covers shivering.
A door slammed outside and I heard the tow truck pull away. I tried meditative breathing exercises I learned in a therapy session to slow my heart rate and enable myself to fall asleep again. I listened to the distant sounds of traffic and didn’t realize that I had finally drifted back into unconsciousness. I was back at the ballpark, but this time there were security guards to take the shouting man away. I felt empowered, and much more at ease when he was removed from the area, and I leaned back in my hard plastic stadium seat to stretch my legs.
In a flash, the scene shifted, and I was back on the gurney with Nick’s partner pushing me through a darkened corridor. I repeatedly asked her where I was, but she didn’t speak. Finally, I irritated her enough that she snapped, “You know exactly where you are. You’ll be living here with the rest of the fallen women.” She gave the gurney a shove and it careened through a set of swinging doors and into a room that was bright as noon in the desert with the glow of fluorescent lighting. I sat up and looked around. There were women everywhere, on the floor, on bunk beds, and even sitting under tables. Every one of them held a small, helpless baby, sweet and tiny and smelling of powder and cleanliness.
An alarm sounded and suddenly the women were surrounded, knee-deep, by ever-growing piles of dirty diapers and discarded bottles. The babies grew larger, louder, more demanding. There were hundreds of them. Thousands. The room went on for as far as the eye could see. The babies grew larger and the women grew smaller, more wrinkled and haggard. One turned to me, with dark circles under her eyes and her face creased into a permanent look of anguish. “Welcome,” she said.
“Where are we?” I asked.
“Hell,” she replied. “They never grow up. They never get better. They just scream and shit and shred your nerves for the rest of eternity.” She handed me her baby, which looked like a newborn infant, yet was now the size and weight of an eight-year-old kid. I struggled to lift him. He screamed with that pained wail that only babies can manage.
“Why is he crying?” I asked her. “What does he want?”
I looked around and she was gone. There was no one left in the room but me and the thousand babies. I couldn’t do this. I wasn’t prepared for this. How was I going to care for them?
The lights went out and I was alone in blissful silence. It was midnight in a park, and I was sitting on a bench. A police officer was having me view a lineup of suspects. They came by in groups of six.
“Do you recognize any of these men?” He had a deep voice, like James Earl Jones.
I shook my head no. The next group came through. He asked the same question in the same way. The answer was no once again. This went on and on, as though the tape was rewinding and replaying. Tall men, short men, white men, black men, well-dressed men, scruffy men. Nothing. I recognized no one.
He gave me a puzzled stare. “Do you actually have any idea what the suspect actually looks like?” I shook my head and began to cry. “Do you have a name? Even a first name would help.” I shook my head again, sobbing. He looked disgusted with me. “How is it possible that you could sleep with someone without even knowing their name?” I wondered the same thing myself. God knows I’ll never do that again.
The parade of suspects continued, although this time it was like the process was being watched in fast-forward. Nothing, nothing, there’s the guy from the coffee shop, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, a guy from high school, nothing. He wasn’t there, and I probably wouldn’t be able to identify him even if he had a large neon nametag that said, “I’m the one.”
The cop said to me, “We’ve reviewed every suspect in the metropolitan area, with the exception of the very young, the elderly, and the homosexual population. It’s time for you to face facts, young lady. You’re all alone in this one.”
I knew it. I shifted my weight uneasily on the bench. I was less depressed than humiliated at that point. I just wanted to run and hide and not have every guy in the metro area know that I was knocked up by an unknown sperm donor. Damn it. How could I have been so careless?
The alarm woke me up. I curled up on my side and listened to the radio, watching the numbers on the clock tick forward. 7:01. 7:02. Time wasn’t on my side. Nothing was. I pounded the button to shut the radio off and headed to the bathroom to wrap my cast in a plastic bag and take a much-needed shower, washing the night away.
I always wondered why they did the repossession at night. During the day, the noise and activity of the city would mask the events on our little street. I would guess that no one would even look twice at a tow truck at 3:00 in the afternoon. At night, however, our entire building – and possibly the entire block – was aware that this silver minivan was being taken away. The owner came out of the building and began shouting profanities at the repo men, as though offending their mothers was going to stop them. I tried to ignore the noise and retreated into a fitful sleep.
Dreams are a funny thing. I usually remember something about mine, but that night they were exceptionally vivid and intertwined, in spite of the fact that none of them made any sense whatsoever. It began with incorporating the sounds of the shouting neighbor, that much I can relate to. Before long I was at a baseball game, a large concrete stadium with the bluest sky and greenest grass you've ever seen. The problem with this ballpark was that all of the fans and players were quiet, frozen in their tracks, with just this one guy standing in the next section over, shouting at the top of his lungs, flailing his arms angrily, cursing at the players and screaming at the fans. His anger frightened me, and I tried to call to him, to stop his shouting, but I couldn’t move. I was paralyzed; this is never a good sign in a dream. And of course, once I realized that I couldn’t move, I was completely terrified that something horrible was happening. Terrorists. Murderers. I didn't know exactly what evil lurked beneath the surface of this shouting man. There was a strange feeling of something brushing up against me, just out of sight of my peripheral vision. I knew instantly that it was an evil agent of the screaming man. Something bad was about to happen. I had to save myself.
I woke myself up screaming, and scared the living daylights out of the cat, which had been trying to curl up behind me and settle in for the night. Not exactly an evil agent, unless you have a terrifying fear of cat hair. There is, of course, no way to properly apologize to a wronged cat. She leaped to the foot of the bed, stared at me for a moment, and when I reached out to stroke her soft fur in an effort to put both of us at ease, I inadvertently whacked her in the snout with my cast, which I had forgotten. She shook off the indignity of the whole evening, and jumped off the bed to curl up in the corner, away from the lunatic that was huddled under the covers shivering.
A door slammed outside and I heard the tow truck pull away. I tried meditative breathing exercises I learned in a therapy session to slow my heart rate and enable myself to fall asleep again. I listened to the distant sounds of traffic and didn’t realize that I had finally drifted back into unconsciousness. I was back at the ballpark, but this time there were security guards to take the shouting man away. I felt empowered, and much more at ease when he was removed from the area, and I leaned back in my hard plastic stadium seat to stretch my legs.
In a flash, the scene shifted, and I was back on the gurney with Nick’s partner pushing me through a darkened corridor. I repeatedly asked her where I was, but she didn’t speak. Finally, I irritated her enough that she snapped, “You know exactly where you are. You’ll be living here with the rest of the fallen women.” She gave the gurney a shove and it careened through a set of swinging doors and into a room that was bright as noon in the desert with the glow of fluorescent lighting. I sat up and looked around. There were women everywhere, on the floor, on bunk beds, and even sitting under tables. Every one of them held a small, helpless baby, sweet and tiny and smelling of powder and cleanliness.
An alarm sounded and suddenly the women were surrounded, knee-deep, by ever-growing piles of dirty diapers and discarded bottles. The babies grew larger, louder, more demanding. There were hundreds of them. Thousands. The room went on for as far as the eye could see. The babies grew larger and the women grew smaller, more wrinkled and haggard. One turned to me, with dark circles under her eyes and her face creased into a permanent look of anguish. “Welcome,” she said.
“Where are we?” I asked.
“Hell,” she replied. “They never grow up. They never get better. They just scream and shit and shred your nerves for the rest of eternity.” She handed me her baby, which looked like a newborn infant, yet was now the size and weight of an eight-year-old kid. I struggled to lift him. He screamed with that pained wail that only babies can manage.
“Why is he crying?” I asked her. “What does he want?”
I looked around and she was gone. There was no one left in the room but me and the thousand babies. I couldn’t do this. I wasn’t prepared for this. How was I going to care for them?
The lights went out and I was alone in blissful silence. It was midnight in a park, and I was sitting on a bench. A police officer was having me view a lineup of suspects. They came by in groups of six.
“Do you recognize any of these men?” He had a deep voice, like James Earl Jones.
I shook my head no. The next group came through. He asked the same question in the same way. The answer was no once again. This went on and on, as though the tape was rewinding and replaying. Tall men, short men, white men, black men, well-dressed men, scruffy men. Nothing. I recognized no one.
He gave me a puzzled stare. “Do you actually have any idea what the suspect actually looks like?” I shook my head and began to cry. “Do you have a name? Even a first name would help.” I shook my head again, sobbing. He looked disgusted with me. “How is it possible that you could sleep with someone without even knowing their name?” I wondered the same thing myself. God knows I’ll never do that again.
The parade of suspects continued, although this time it was like the process was being watched in fast-forward. Nothing, nothing, there’s the guy from the coffee shop, nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, a guy from high school, nothing. He wasn’t there, and I probably wouldn’t be able to identify him even if he had a large neon nametag that said, “I’m the one.”
The cop said to me, “We’ve reviewed every suspect in the metropolitan area, with the exception of the very young, the elderly, and the homosexual population. It’s time for you to face facts, young lady. You’re all alone in this one.”
I knew it. I shifted my weight uneasily on the bench. I was less depressed than humiliated at that point. I just wanted to run and hide and not have every guy in the metro area know that I was knocked up by an unknown sperm donor. Damn it. How could I have been so careless?
The alarm woke me up. I curled up on my side and listened to the radio, watching the numbers on the clock tick forward. 7:01. 7:02. Time wasn’t on my side. Nothing was. I pounded the button to shut the radio off and headed to the bathroom to wrap my cast in a plastic bag and take a much-needed shower, washing the night away.
posted by Ali at 10:02 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home