Listeners, today I had a nightmare.

It was not, as you may first think, one of the government mandated nightmares that, at this very moment in time, we should all be sharing.

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No.

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It was a very different kind of nightmare all together. A nightmare that I should not have had, for I should not have been sleeping, but I was and that is a fact. And in that moment when I was sleeping, when the rest of this violet and secretly monitored town went about its daily, chaotic business, I was not me but a girl. I was asleep, but I was a girl at the same time. I was a girl in a country that is far, far away from our quaint desert community. I was a girl in a country that is far, far away but at the same time it is not far enough. I don't know who thought that. Was it her? Was it me? Maybe it was the both of us. Maybe it was neither of us. Hopefully it was just a dream.

Hopefully it was just a dream, non-governmental nightmare, about a girl in a country far, far away, in a town of significant religious importance to everyone but its citizens. If it wasn't a dream then my heart aches for this girl. Her heart aches too, I felt it. Whilst I was sleeping, whilst I was the girl, I could feel her heart ache in her chest as if it were my own. But it was not my own. It couldn't be. It was hers, I'm sure of it.

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Have you ever been heart broken, listeners?

I have not. I have never loved, nor have I been loved. I have seen love. I have heard it – we've all heard it. Our daytime host, Cecil, is not exactly conservative when it comes to matters of his extraordinarily large heart. He brought an x-ray of his heart in once, to show to all of you out there. He left it in this booth so I saw it too: large, red and pulsing within its ghostly white prison there on the page. For something so large it looked shockingly fragile. One small squeeze and I'm sure it would burst like a cooked tomato between my fingers. So shockingly fragile…

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I have never been heart broken. I have never loved, nor have I been loved and that is a fact. Before my nightmare, I had never experienced a broken heart first hand. Now I have and I am forever changed.

The symptoms of a broken heart are hard to detect. Masks are everything and this girl wore such a clever one. Smiles are the best mask, especially when those looking at it do not wish to see past it. This girl would walk, work and socialise with a smile. Not a grin, not a grimace, nor a sneer. Just a small smile, big enough to be noticed, small enough to be unquestioned. She smiled when people were looking and sometimes when they weren't. She couldn't fool herself into being happy though. She was alone, abandoned, forgotten by the one she still desperately loved.

It was sad and pathetic.

It was beautiful.

She walked and worked until her feet were sore and her hands burnt. This girl was a waitress, or maybe a janitor. She might have made sandwiches, or perhaps it was coffee. Who knows? It was just a nightmare after all. A nightmare full of meaningless half-routines and hidden tears, or internal screaming so loud that my ears bled, and of dead-eyed looks in the mirror.

These things that I have listed to you, listeners, are not scary. They are painful and unpleasant, but they are not scary. They are not why it was a nightmare. Nightmares are designed to make us fear and now, in my real body, I am not afraid. I know where I am. I know what will hurt me (which is, of course, everything) and I know who is to be trusted (no one). But when I was asleep and, at the same time, this girl, I did not know that. Every friendly face, every unfriendly face, and all those in between, were to be trusted but at the same time they were dangerous. They were unknown and terrifying because they could hurt me, they could hurt the girl, but they could also save her. We could have been killed or saved by any number of people… but we weren't.

I wasn't.

She wasn't.

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And this girl, who was so sad, made me sad too. I felt her heart breaking every time someone stared through her, or brushed past her, or didn't speak to her even if they claimed to be her friend.

People are blind and cruel and stupid. They cannot help it. They cannot help this girl either. They cannot help the girl hurting so hard that when I awoke, her pain stayed with me. I carry this pain now, when I ought to be sleeping, just as all of you are. I am defying the law and my contract by being awake during my hours of broadcast and for this I am sorry.

But I'm not.

I am in pain and I am indifferent.

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Hours ago I awoke not completely myself. In my nightmare I had been this girl and in my reality afterwards I was still partly her. I can still feel her aching heart beat right next to my own. Two lonely hearts, side by side.

How poetic.

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How deadly.

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[Inhale]

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[Exhale]

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Can you smell that listeners? The sun is rising.

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As you wake up, as you all wake up together like the single-minded organism that you are, I slink off into the increasing light.

Thank you for finally hearing my voice, Night Vale.

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Did you know, it's a sweet life?

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