Chapter Thirteen
Background Theme: Awakenings
"Hello?" I asked
breathlessly as I answered the phone.
As I had leapt out of my chair in a mad grab for the phone, I tripped
over the line's extension cord, causing it to tangle around my leg. Pulling on the cord would have ripped it out
of its connection at the wall socket – the last thing I wanted to do was lose
my phone connection, especially tonight.
I had to carefully disentangle myself and get to the phone before the
voicemail picked up on the third ring.
I made it just in time, interrupting the
warble of the fourth ring.
"Hey," came the soft, melodic voice in
response; it then took on a quizzical tone as she inquired, "Why are you
breathing so hard?"
"Just me being a clutz. Tripped over the phone cord and about broke
my shin against the coffee table going for the phone."
"You just ain't right," she replied with
a chuckle. That was her way of saying that I was a few fries short of a Happy
Meal.
She sounded really happy as we talked,
nothing at all like my saddened love from the early afternoon. This was odd.
"So, what's the good news?" I asked, hesitantly.
"Good news?"
"Yeah.
You sound awfully excited about something."
"Well, I guess you ought to know, being
my best friend and all." She screamed
with delight as she exclaimed, "He asked me to marry him!"
I could feel myself starting to go
numb. My voice was barely a whisper of
disbelief as I managed to ask, "He…what?"
"He proposed to me!" She squealed again happily.
I began to have an extremely tight
feeling in my chest, and my stomach started to knot. "And what did you say to him in response?" I choked, each word an effort to speak as they
slowly came out.
"Why, I said 'yes', of course. I just can't wait! I've gotta tell my family, start the planning…he's talking about
a honeymoon in…"
Her voice began to fade from my hearing
as the sudden realizations started kicking in.
I set the phone down softly. I
could still hear the slight buzzing as she continued to talk, oblivious as to
my lack of presence or attention.
My vision began to blur as tears stung my
eyes. I stood up, careful as to not
trip over the phone cord again, tripping over it anyway, and walked to the
kitchen, turning out the light as I passed through it to the sliding glass
door. Unlocking it, I slid it quietly
open, feeling the cool, humid night air flow over me. Walking to the balcony railing, I grasped the top of the rail
with both hands, suddenly feeling the strength go out of my legs. When I could stand again without the rail's
support, I turned my face to the night sky.
The heavens were cloudless, but devoid of any stars. Even Luna, in her resplendent glory, was no
where to be seen. The relevance of this
was lost on me as I put my face to my hands, elbows supporting me on the rail,
and wept bitterly.
* * *
* * * *
I am uncertain how much time had
passed. When I came back to my senses,
I stood up and cleared my eyes. The podium
top was stained with what I surmised were tears that had flowed freely down my
face. They formed a puddle on the floor
behind the podium which trickled away from the podium, down the stage, into the
orchestra pit in front of the stage.
The pit, about thirty feet across along the stage, fifteen feet wide as
it projected into the auditorium, and about twelve feet deep, was about a
quarter filled with the liquid sorrow that continued to trickle forth. I blinked hard and did a double take. I was back in Furinkan's auditorium. That meant…
Alisha's
call never happened!
The orchestra pit began filling faster
with the tears of joy and elation that spouted out of my eyes with the
realization. By the time I stopped,
tiny waves were lapping at the top of the walls of the orchestra pit. I walked to the edge of the stage and stared
in amazement. What is going on here? My
brain began doing somersaults as it tried to adjust to the strange occurrences
taking place. I looked around the
dimly-lit auditorium, empty save for my thoughts and I.
There was a slight plop-ping sound as a speckled koi broke the smooth waters, leaping
about three feet up out of the pool of tears, flipping gracefully on its back
as it plunged headfirst into the waters.
As I watched the fish slowly disappear below the surface, looking on in
shock, another realization hit:
This
was all a dream! And I was awake, but
still dreaming!
I've heard of dreams where the dreamer is
not just an unwilling and unwitting participant, carried along with its
currents like a leaf that has fallen into a stream. In these dreams, the slumbering dreamer awakes within the dream
and finds that he can not only become an active
participant in the dream, he can actually influence and direct the course of
the dream. I've experienced this kind
of dreams a few times. The first taste
of it was a dream where I was battling a demon. My alarm clock had gone off and was slowly pulling me into
consciousness. I did not want the dream
to end unresolved, so just before I awoke, I hurled a huge fireball at my
adversary, shattering it like a mirror into a million pieces. Needless to say, I awoke that morning
feeling great.
The first significant experience with it was in a dream where a mad gunman
was chasing me through a huge white house.
As I ran out the front door, I realized that I was dreaming, and that I
was awake during this dream. This being
the case I decided that I'd be damned if I was going to allow some idiot in my dream, who was a figment of my
sleep-sodden imagination, to chase me with the intent of harming me in any
way. Not in my dream. Not when I could control it. Turning to face the house, I confronted the
madman. As he raised the gun to shoot
me, grinning maniacally, he was suddenly surprised to discover that his hand
was empty. Not only was it empty, but I was now holding the gun, and was in
fact pointing it at him. Naturally, he turned tail and ran in stark
raving terror. With newfound confidence
and courage surging through me at my accomplishment, I tossed the gun aside and
rose into the air. Flying off into the
night sky over a nearby forest, the dream slowly faded into consciousness.
I had one other experience with this sort
of dream…but let's just say it can't be
mentioned in mixed company.
What I did discover in these dreams, though, is whenever conscious control
is exerted, immense concentration is
required to hold the dream state together.
The body's natural inclination is to awake upon the resurfacing of
awareness. Overriding this natural
response, as with overriding most other natural responses, requires an intent
mind focused singly on maintaining
the illusion of the dream.
In this dream I often found myself simply
flowing with the dream, exercising control over the passage of the dream only
when I wanted to nudge it in a particular direction, create a desired effect,
or to make a spectacular point. The
latter was most evident in the incident where Monsieur Class Clown was quickly introduced to Senior Eraser. As with
anything, though, practice makes for perfection. The more often I could assume this state in dreaming, the better
I could become at maintaining and sustaining the dream.
Following the meeting with the students
my suspicions about my sudden change of residence and change in station caused
me to suspect that things were far too good to be true. As I experienced the flash-changes in scenes
and out-of-the-ordinary events taking place, I saw my suppositions confirmed.
Careful to avoid slipping into the
orchestra pit, I knelt down at the edge of the pool. I gazed again at the waters, cautiously observing my reflection
in the dim light. Without warning, one
of the stage spotlights suddenly came on.
The warm, blinding light flowed over me, causing a dark shadow to be cast
upon the pool's surface where my reflection had been. To my left, another shadow was cast, indicating one other
presence slowly, quietly, approaching.
Turning to look over my shoulder, I saw a familiar outline,
shoulder-length hair spilling over soft shoulders, eclipsing the bright
spotlight shining down from above.
Slowly kneeling behind me, she extended a hand, gently brushing tousled
hair from my eyes and softly caressing my cheek, Her palm warm on my face, Alisha's voice spoke softly and
tenderly, the slight yet wistful smile on her lips.
"Wake
up, Sleepyhead," she whispered.
