Dream

Dream

I was moving into my new house. An old one actually, probably well over a hundred years old. A patio around the front and both sides, a sort of dark yellow color. Hardwood floors, rooms painted in different pastel colors that seemed darker somehow than they should be.

For some reason, many of my family (and now it occurs to me that it was only the women of the family) were in a house across the street. As if one of them lived there, but it was empty too.

At some point, I grabbed my white Strat and went out for a while.

I set up on a dark stage, in front of very few people I couldn't actually see. I was going to play a Warren Zevon song.

Then Warren walked in the door on the opposite side of the stage. Good trick for a dead guy.

Somebody else was with him, by his side the whole time, but I had no idea who it was.

Warren didn't talk to me. He didn't really even acknowledge my presence, except that I could tell he wanted me to play with him. He sat at the piano. I plugged in the guitar. We played Werewolves Of London. He sounded really good, but tired. I did a good job, but didn't feel like I was needed.

I don't remember anything else about that part, except that I felt like I was seeking his approval somehow, and never got it. But I did get to play music with the dead man, and for that I felt lucky.

I'm back at the house across the street from mine. I'm talking to a woman I do not know. Shoulder-length black hair. Soft warm eyes. A very pretty lady, maybe a few years younger than me. I don't know what we said, but it was as if I'd been friends with her a long time, even though I have no idea who she might be.

My grandma starts coming up the stairs. She looks tired.

I become aware quite quickly that she is going to fall down the stairs.

I find myself not reacting fast enough, feeling powerless as I watch her trying to get up the last few steps, still talking about God knows what in her quiet I'm-an-old-woman-who's-se en-everything way, but she keeps going one step back down for every one she makes.

She falls backwards, hitting halfway down once, then landing at the bottom on her back.

I find speed too late, and immediately I'm there beside her. She still has a look of contentment on her face, completely resigned to whatever comes next.

"Call 911!"

"CALL 911!"

"WILL ONE OF YOU STUPID FUCKS CALL 911 FOR FUCK'S SAKE??? ARE YOU JUST GOING TO STAND THERE, ASSHOLES???"

I'm screaming this at my family. Who aren't doing a thing. One of them is just looking at me.

I stay by her side for some time. The brunette I was talking to has disappeared.

It seems no one but me gives a shit. But, for whatever reason, I apparantly decide that my grandma will be OK, because I get up and go try to find the brunette.

She's over at my house.

We talk (about what, I can't recall) and I admire the cabinets in my new home and wonder how I'm going to pay for it.

A weird sort of detachment comes over me. My grandma is laying on her (possibly broken) back at the bottom of the stairs across the street, it feels like at least an hour now since it's happened, and no ambulance has arrived. But somehow it seems that everything will work out. That the best thing for me to do is to get used to my new home, and this new woman.

Some of the former owner's things are still in the kitchen. A set of blue plastic plates and cups. Several glasses on a high shelf in one cabinet.

Outside, I have a white rocking chair, and a couple stools. One of them has a revolving seat. Why I remember this but not one word of the conversation with the brunette, I do not know.

I go back across the street. I ask if anyone called 911. I get no answer, but it somehow seems they have. But it's been an hour and a half, where are they?

Grandma seems to be quite content to lay on the floor.

Everyone else is in their own worlds.

Apparantly, so am I. Detached. Not totally in the moment.

The brunette gives me some kind of reassurance that everything will be OK.

I look out the window, across the street, to a dark yellow house, and see the chair and the stools outside. I wonder how I'm supposed to pay for this. But I seem to feel confident somehow that it will happen.

The brunette girl just looks at me, smiling. She's very pretty. I wish I knew who she was.

I wake up.

Love,
Dougie