11

In my dream I saw an old-fashioned bassinet in the room I'd been painting to use as a nursery. There was a large pink satin ribbon on the top of it, which was odd since my ex-wife, Rachael, had been pregnant with twins—a boy and a girl. The corners of the room were dark to the point they were indistinguishable from the black shadows that crouched in them. The ceiling was gone, and in its place were the rafters of my roof, gaping holes between them. A very long pull string dangled from above. I stepped forward and reached up to pull it, hoping to expel the darkness with some light, but all I saw was a shooting star streaking past the holes. When I looked down again, I was standing in some sort of an old barn.

There was straw on the ground, fresh, dry and dusty, but no animal smell. I moved toward the back of the structure where I saw a bit of the outdoors beyond a door that had been left ajar. The air was cooler outside and wind blew through the treetops, but failed to reach me. I felt overly warm and doffed the jacket I wore, unbuttoned my shirt partway and rolled up my long sleeves. Despite the refreshing cool air, sweat felt like a layer of insulating warmth against my skin. I walked over hard-packed earth interrupted with patches of matted, drying grass. There was a scarecrow before me, barely visible in silhouette against the dark tree line. I felt compelled to go to it. I needed to see its face.

A dog barked and I hesitated, but it hadn't sounded close. I continued walking and the breeze finally caressed the earth, flapping my shirt against my skin, throwing fallen leaves into a tizzy. There was a peculiar smell in the air like charred pork…like burning power lines. The hair at the back of my neck stood on end and the sweat streamed freely down my skin like melting cheese. I started running for the scarecrow. It was shaking badly like a stop sign in a bad storm. I thought I heard it making a rattling sound like a diamondback, but my mind returned to that empty bassinet and I stopped, bent over myself, gasping for breath. How far had I run? Was I that out of shape? A foot stepped into view, and I looked up at the scarecrow. It was just an old beat-up wide-brimmed hat on a stuffed sack over a ratty sweater stretched between sticks. No feet. I stood before it and the wind changed and the scarecrow spun unexpectedly. I caught what felt like a fist to the left side of my head, grunted, and dropped to one knee. Hand to my head, I opened my eyes to see the foot again. The knee above it met my chin and knocked me backward.

I panted, scrabbling backward on hands and feet, nowhere near as coordinated at retreating in such a manner as I had been when I was still in elementary school. The thing followed, the right side drawing back a black limb against the star-salted sky, something in its hand like a pitchfork, tines wicked and long. With a gasp I rolled to my right and kept going until I thought I was clear. The figure followed. My skin twitched like that of a horse thwarting flies. I looked hopefully toward the barn that seemed to be glowing with a golden light. As I stood there I was raked across the back with something that really could have been a rake, arched my spine and staggered forward, away from it. Now it was a man bent on hurting me or killing me. Killing me. Definitely killing me. As I seized his wrists and discovered his superior strength, I realized for the first time that he felt like a stranger to me.

His wrists felt like they were wrapped in coils of spaghetti. Loose, mushy bits fell away as we struggled and he twisted in my grip. I heard a sound like gas escaping from a tank and realized his hands were in fact the heads of two enormous snakes. The mouths opened and whenever they were able they raked my arms with needle-like fangs.

I was sweating so badly my hands simply slid over his strange, pulpy flesh. The barn behind me was on fire and I could hear screams coming from within it even though I knew there'd been no animals inside. The animal screams started to sound like infants crying and I knew somehow it was my own children who were dying, and I broke into tears and started yelling at my assailant, "I have to go to them! I have to be there!"

"You'll be there soon enough," a deep, gravelly voice promised, and my nostrils flared with the sudden stench of burning hair.

With a burst of adrenaline-fueled strength I thrust him away and turned toward the conflagration. "NO!" I hollered, trying to run toward heat that defied me with its intensity. I tripped and slid backward across the tussocked ground, something inhumanly strong gripping my ankles. My hands tore at the earth, catching on patches of grass. I thrashed and screamed while I was dragged toward the cool edge of the black forest. The moment I was released, I lunged on all fours toward the burning ruins, and the thing landed on my back. I tried to buck free of it and a hand eased across my left cheek like the caress of a lover.

Lover.

I was sleeping. This was a nightmare. It must have been Amanda touching me to comfort me. I screamed for her. The thing on my back laughed and repeated me. I screamed again and swore I could hear myself moaning in my bed. The man began to pound on my spine with his fists. I curled and uncurled, wriggling until I could face him and the blows increased as I screamed my throat wet and thought I could taste my own blood.

Something like cool shafts of light pricked my brain and I all I could see were beams of white-blue streaking across a field of black. My heart was in overdrive, my breathing had turned to coughing. I rolled onto my side and pulled at her like she was my blanket. "'manda," I gasped softly, barely able to draw the breath I needed to form speech. "Oh, 'manda. Nightmare. Thank you. Thank you."

She withdrew her fingers from my forehead and ran them down over my sweat-damp hair, partially atop me, her presence calming me quickly, her touch easing me back into untroubled sleep. The last thing I knew as the sweat dried and chilled me was my partner slithering over me like an anaconda to curl up in my arms while I breathed the mountain-breeze scent of her hair.