Dream XCV

I was staying at my friend Tom's house, in his downstairs bedroom. I got out of bed and went over to work on one of two laptops I had brought with me. When I looked back in the bedroom, there was a small child playing a computer game called GlideOne. He was small and cheerful and had very blond hair. He was playing the game by standing in front of the other laptop, where he couldn't possibly see the screen, but he was scoring really well and having a great time.

I figured this was a child from a neighboring house who came over from time to time to play games, and that Tom was okay with this. After a while, Tom came downstairs and I said, "Hey, I met your neighbor."

Tom looked me with a puzzled expression, and I pointed to the bedroom. He looked, then looked back at me. "I don't know what you're talking about," he finally said. I mentioned the neighbor boy, but when I looked in the room, no one was there. There wasn't any other exit from the room, so I was just as puzzled as Tom. I explained what I'd seen earlier and he shook his head, again confused.

One of Tom's friends from his audiophile club came by, and while we were talking, I happened to look in the bedroom. The child was back. I tried to draw attention to him, but my throat became tight and raw, my lips became thick and unresponsive, and my jaw became so heavy I could only open my mouth by using my fingers. I could make sounds come out of my mouth, but they were barely intelligible. They knew I was trying to draw their attention to something, but I could not make myself clear.

Finally I learned that if I spoke using a fictitious third-person voice, I could make myself understood. I asked Tom's friend if he could see the child, and he smiled and shook his head. I looked, and the child was still there. Finally, Tom's friend said, "Oh, I bet I know what this is. Is the child a boy or a girl?"

I thought the child was a boy, because of the short blond hair, but I looked closer and saw a braided pigtail running down the child's back. So I told him it must be a girl.

"Ah, that must be the ghost of Kay Hagan," he said. "I know all about her. Not everyone can see her." They went on with another discussion.

I looked again and saw she was still there, and she seemed to be much younger that I had thought. I approached her and asked her if she needed a diaper change; she giggled and said yes, so I carefully changed her diaper.

I tickled her and got her giggling again, she she seemed much happier. I picked her up and carried her with me, wondering what I should do with the old diaper. For now, I carried it with me in my free hand.

The others had left by this time, going into a further area of the house. I hurried to catch up with them. The floor underfoot became a muddy and damp, finally opening up into a vast, ruined section of the house. I caught up with Tom and his friend, and together we walked along the crumbling, peeling walls, stepping around pools of water and avoiding piles or debris.

We had to climb through one set of ruins to reach a higher level, and as we did, the roof started to collapse on me. I thrust the child up to the others, asking them to save her, and I was buried in debris; as I fell, I suddenly knew why I couldn't go through the roof, and why I was dying now. I had actually died long ago, when I ordered the bombing of Kay Hagan's village during a war. Kay had died then, but now I knew my death would mean that Kay was now safe, and my soul could depart...

Then I awoke, when I heard a high-pitched whistling sound. Tom, his friend and I were in a room in another building, a large office building full of living rooms, like a dormitory, but with several floors. The three of us were peering at an air-conditioning unit, thinking the sound was gas escaping. We checked the unit and the sound was not coming from it.

Tom and I were relieved, but Tom's friend said it might be carbon monoxide, so we started searching the other rooms to see if the sound was coming from one of them. We found nothing, but, remembering my dream, I asked if the others would come to my room, so I could find out if my body was actually lying on the floor, meaning I was dead. The others seemed unconcerned but were willing to search.

Before we could do more than a rather hasty search of the current floor, I woke up again, this time on a train with the four of us. We were traveling over a long gray bridge, over farmlands crowded with various birds, cats, lizards and other small creatures. Some of them were in little cages, but the majority were ambling around between the fenced yard, existing quite contentedly with each other.

Tom's friend guy was lamenting that he had recently taken a test at the local college, but he knew he had lost a perfect score. When pressed, he said it was because he didn't know the name "Kay Hagan." Startled, I looked up from the window. The farmlands below were narrowing as the river pressed in on both sides. "Would you like me to tell you about Kay Martin?" I asked him.

"I never want to hear the name Kay Martin," he said, and looked out the window at the animals below us.

"Are you sure?" I asked.

He shook his head. "Please tell me about Kay Martin," he asked.

So I did.