Author's Note: Because I'm still alive, I swear, but I can't seem to find the inspiration to continue writing the actual story, I present to my loyal (and new) readers a series of character dreams and awakenings. There are a couple more characters that I could have included here, but one you've only met briefly and the other you haven't met at all, so I decided to hold off on them. Enjoy! Once my brain decompresses (now that finals are over) and I finish packing and moving, we'll see about a new chapter.
Chapter Twenty-Eight:
Interludes in Colour
Nishiko is dreaming furiously, images passing behind her closed lids almost faster than she can process them. Smiling blue eyes, pale skin, pink hair. Someone she should know. Brown eyes, this time, and pale hair, a headband that should be significant but she can't imagine why. "Eriko." The name is on her lips as she wakes up, but she's forgotten the face already. Shaking her head, she dispels the last of the dream-phantoms and prepares to begin her day, feeling unaccountably lonely.
Nishiki is content, floating in soothing black coolness, not sure if his eyes are open or closed, not sure if he's naked or clothed. It doesn't matter, there is no one here to judge him anyway. There is nothing here, in fact, and he has the vague feeling that this isn't right, but he can't remember if there is anything but this darkness, if there ever was or ever will be anything else. It doesn't matter, he decides, but then a word crosses his mind and he speaks it into the blackness, the first word it has ever seen. Frail silence shatters, and he wakes up confused.
Mika dreams of normal things. She dreams of cherry blossoms, of sunrise, of jumping into a pile of fragrant red leaves that crunch as she lands on top of them, of doing cannonballs into the pool and shrieking with delight as the cold water envelopes her. She dreams of playing cat's cradle, of making paper cranes, of laying on cool, neatly-cut grass on a warm summer day. She wakes up feeling relaxed, refreshed, and utterly, boringly, normal.
Maki dreams. Of what, even he can hardly say. He dreams of neat, tight stitches, of lace and ponytails and business casual, of dark skin and bright eyes, of cool water and bright red...bright red. He dreams of paper cranes and butter cookies, of crackling fire and popcorn. He dreams of a gear shift and stirs in his bed, dreams of warm summer sun and lies still again. He dreams of everything and nothing and wakes up tense and tired.
Keiji is having a nightmare. His model, the perfect model that has haunted his dreams for so long, is sitting right there. She's in his studio, posing nonchalantly nude, her hair loose and rippling around her, tumbling to the surface of the couch and shining gloriously. Where is his canvas, where are his paints? Here, here they are, but...where are his brushes? Frantic, sobbing, he searches for them, but the room is bare. Nothing but him and her, canvas and paint. Finally, he dips a finger in the paint and touches it to canvas, where it spreads, changes colour, becomes a mirror showing a lunatic back at him. Screaming, he awakens and begins once again to sob.
Takeda's dreams are not nightmares. In his dreams, he fights and he wins and somebody is holding up his hand and declaring him the victor, the winner, the better. His parents are not there, he has no older brother. There is nobody to tell him what to do or to belittle him, and he is at long last in first place, at the top of his game, happy with his life. And then the dream comes to an end and he puts his fist through the plaster of the wall. Soon, another circle of fresh plaster and paint will join the others on the same wall, but he doesn't care.
Makoto thrashes in bed, his hair mussed and skin showing red where he's scratched himself. "Mother," he screams, "Father!" But his dreams are filled with glue, with tape, with everything sticky that attaches him to the floor, keeps him in one place while his parents walk away. Together. "You caused this, you know," says a voice in your head, "If it weren't for you, they'd still be in love." And he screams and screams and screams, and then he wakes up and does it some more. He will be absent from classes today.
Brennan mumbles in her sleep. In English or Japanese doesn't matter – in her dreams nobody can hear her anyway. She's wandering, dressed in pajamas, begging for help, but nobody will help her. They just walk right by, going about their lives as if she isn't even there. There's her mother, walking away, and there's her father, looking right through her as if she's smoke. She hasn't seen either one in over a year now, and the details are a little fuzzy, but she knows it's them. She wakes up silently, the tears still tracking down her cheeks.
Satoru does not dream. She lies awake, does not sleep, floating in cool colours in her mind, seeing swords and green eyes and butterflies and purple eyes, cruel eyes, sees a slap coming from the corner of her eye and does not bother to dodge it. It's all in her mind, in these visions that assault her with memories and fancies. She remembers - or is it a fancy? - dark skin, a lithe body moving over hers, remembers disconnecting and drifting away in her head just like she's doing right now. Done with these not-dreams, she floats in dark, satin blue for the rest of the night and when it is time to wake, she feels nothing.
END CH28.