• The Dream World of Krista




    I floated on my back down into the gloomy pit of my own self-conscience. I felt my awareness drift from me, the sounds of my ticking alarm clock helping my drift and the rocking of my hammock helping me sleep. I landed like a flower petal onto dark water, sitting up I waited for the nightmares to come. I stood up, Helping myself up with my arms and pulled a sword from the dark water beneath me, I recognized where I was instantly, mariners rock from my childhood playing in the crick near my old home. I was enveloped in darkness, and felt the cold touch of filmier fiends, horrors, terror, and fear.
    For a fleeting moment I could have sworn that Man was beside me, the man I hate. I could hear his rasping breath, ice cold on my neck; the odor of his last beer mingling with the ring of mind numbing smoke adoring his greased soaked head. I turned around quickly to face this ghostly daemon, his ice blues eyes burning into me, his tattoos raging about his body, marking him a stray mongrel. I saw his mouth open in a wide, toothless grin; a high-pitched giggle escaped his lips, the likes of which no human could make without being in some sort of self-afflicted pain.
    I jumped to one side as this serpent slithered back and forth, coming closer. I remembered my sword and brought it up before me, swinging it wildly, slicing at his flesh. He frowned and looked angrily at me, reaching a hand out and grabbing my arm. The same vile stench that choked me before now choked me again, wrapping itself about my lungs, I coughed and sputtered, wrenching my self away and fleeing, his laughter echoing behind me. I hoped to evade him, the spirit chasing closely behind, I fled into the dark, running toward a bright light; I came closer to it, yet it grew no larger! I pounded on the offending wall franticly, seeing the spirit coming closer. I pounded with all my might feeling it burst; bright light blinded me, the dark glass cutting into my hands. I fell from the dark place into a pile of freezing snow, looking about I saw a cabin with a pleasant smoke coming from the chimney; I looked about for the ghost, but he was gone.
    I stood wiping the snow from my clothes, my breath steaming out in large puffs, I’ve had a lot of close calls in my life, I’m not sure what is the scariest moment is, considering that I can scare myself without almost any help. I started walking to the cabin thinking more on the subject, trying to gain my composure and not run away like a scared little girl. When I am scared I can be very unmanageable, the fear taking over me like a deer caught in headlights. Sometimes my fear can cause complete dread from the littlest things, a leaf crushing, a grown from a wall, and I would become fearful. I sighed kicking the snow, well, I thought running a hand through my hair, at least it wasn’t dark, I am deathly afraid of the dark and silence, I don’t know why, but it terrifies me. Standing in the snow, my hands bleeding still, I now felt someone creeping up from behind, I dared not to look and closed my eyes tightly, slowly, gently crushing the snow they came. My breath became quick, as that fear once again came upon me, arms suddenly wrapped about me fast, I screamed.
    I had fainted in a dream, that was a weird feeling, but now I was coming around in the warm living room of my deepest consciences. A tall woman was poking the fire while a boy sat besides her, watching her with full devotion. I felt in my hands a slight ache, and then looking at the purple hair woman before me, who was pulling the glass from my hands, she smiled sweetly at me.
    “What?” I asked simply, the woman from the fire looked at me smirking.
    “Ah! She speaks! I though Mmi near killed her off this time!” I felt a sudden hand on my shoulder and I glanced into two blood red glowing eyes, I screamed and crouched away, the woman working on my hands patted my back.
    “Honestly, can you do anything besides scare the poor girl?” Laughter came from out side as stomping steps and the front door slamming open, two girls and a boy ran inside dripping wet with the snow, the woman working on my hands pointed a motherly finger at them saying “Eve, Saki, and Imm! I know you did not waltz into this house with your wet boots on!” the three laughed more running up the stairs. The woman scowling turned back to me, her frown melting into a smile. “I’m Ari, this is block house, I wonder how deep of sleep you in to get this far.” I cocked my head to one side.
    “Block house?” I asked, the woman from the fire walked over sitting next to me, she smelt of the ashes.
    “Block house is where we all come when you have writers block.” She placed a hand on my head ruffling my hair; “I’m Sage.” She added. I thought for a moment, sputtering their names in apt surprise. They smiled and nodded at me, the red eyed thing stepping out of the darkness, a brown eyed man with bat wings folded about his shoulders like a cape, I shook my head, I am so in a dream, I thought to myself. Sage, as if reading my thoughts, leaned over and pinched my cheek, I recoiled from the pinch, rubbing it hard.
    “A little more deeply than usual it seems,” she said getting up and wrapping a scarf about her neck, James, the boy who was watching her with such desire, followed her out to the large snow covered oak outside, I shook my head smiling at the attached couple. I remembered being most attached to a teddy bear in my youth, for sixteen years I would not, and could not be separated from it, crying horribly when it went missing. I chucked lightly watching Sage finally give into the boys’ affections; Ari had just finished wrapping my hands, I came into realization that I was soundly, and firmly, asleep, my children, as I call my most used charters, were all about me, I was in my world, the snow covered cabin in a remote area.
    I smiled politely as Imm and Mmi came down the stairs, arms linked, a basket on Mmi’s arm. They had started “dating” a while back, to the surprise of sage. I reflected fondly on Vince, my friend and, again more recently, Boyfriend. I rested my head on my shoulder and imagined him there; he was one of the sweetest guys I have ever met. I felt confident that if he was there with me in Block House, that he would hesitate even kissing me while my guard was down, of course that would gibe me time to pop up and kiss him, but that didn’t matter. I heard thumping down the stairs as Eve and Saki raced out the door, Ari yelling at them, I found a warm jacket and fallowed the two out the door they had left open. It was snowing again, flakes falling from the sky. A scream made me jump into Sage standing on the porch.
    Sage smiled and laughed taking hold of my shoulder and giving me a slight hug, “It’s all right, and it’s just the kids plying.” I looked out at them, a sigh of relief escaping from my lips. Eve and Saki had enlisted James to help them destroy Mmi’s romantic picnic, it had worked and now they were all tossing snow at each other. Ari came out with a mug of cocoa for me, and some coffee for Sage.
    “It’s snowing!” I said dreamily. Sage nodded taking a deep drink from her mug; I laughed at myself acting so childish and took a long drink of my cocoa.
    “Most wonderful time of the year.” Sage mused as the white angel feathers fell to the earth. Suddenly a loud clang bell filled the air with noise; I clapped my hands on my ears, my feet lifting off the ground. The troop came over waiving their goodbyes. I looked confused, grabbing hold of Sage.
    “What is going on?” she smirked at me.
    “Your alarm clock is going off!” suddenly the deep stench filled my lungs again, I held tightly to Sage.
    “He’s back, He’s Back!” I screamed and Sage patted my arm reassuring me that Man could not harm me.
    “It’s only coming into sleep that you have to worry about.” She explained.
    I woke up in my hammock falling out and grabbing my alarm clock switching it off. Rubbing my head I felt something in my hand and opened it to find a crumpled note, it read:

    Dear Krista,
    It was nice to visit with you! Hope we can do it again.
    Yours truly,
    Sage, Ari, Imm, Eve, and Saki
    PS. Why don’t you write more? Block House is getting dull…

    Makes you wonder about dreams, right?
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