The continuing story of my strange, strange dream from last week. Read PART I first. Names have been changed cause I don't need any grief....
I follow when he finally confronts me and I get to see his face. It is my once-best friend Dave, from high school. The same Dave who is now living with and has a child with my ex, Rosemary. His face is wrecked, cracked and bleeding and covered in some sort of strange rash. He looks very, very sick. I immediately forget that he's not really supposed to associate with me and ask "Hey are you okay??? What's wrong?"
He sighs and looks at me in that inimitable "Dave" way and just says "It's allergies. Something in this cupboard maybe?" He's opened a cupboard in the kitchen. "Oh well," he says, and closes the cupboard and walks a few steps and turns on the light. I can see that the rash is slightly better. I'm about the ask what he's doing here when I hear voices coming from the living room. I recognize both voices. One belongs to Cameron. The other is my ex, Rosemary. She's asking where I usually sit and then picking a place to sit. She is, as per usual, not incredibly polite about it. Dave says "fucking bitch" under his breath and looks much sicker again, almost like a zombie. But only for a moment. Then he sighs heavily, shrugs and walks into the living room. I follow a moment later, still bewildered by this strange turn of events.
In the living room sit Cameron, Dave (beat me in and already seated!) and Rosemary. Cameron is talking and I understand that she has invited them over and wants to visit with them before she leaves again. They are small-talking. I forget the exact words, although Rosemary is doing most of the talking and I recognize the tone of her "insincere" voice...the one she uses on co-workers and my family...the one that says that she really hates the person she's talking to but is trying to make them like her. I wasn't really listening to what she had to say. It wouldn't matter anyway. Instead, I am staring at this surreal gathering, speechless and stunned. At least momentarily, until something in my brain decides to snap for a second. I walk a couple steps closer to my ex and exclaim, in an almost sing-song, fake-nice voice of my own, "Oh-hh Rosemary. You're SUCH a bitch. Get the fuck out of my house."
"What?" she replies, unbelieving. Her face changes, takes on a note of challenge. She thinks I am joking.
"I mean it." I say, nothing jocular in my voice now. "Get the fuck out. NOW." Rarely in dreams or in real life does my voice carry such authority and power behind it. I am clearly deadly serious. She looks at me like she is about to get into it, but instead just stands up to leave. Dave and Cameron both also stand.
"Strydes..." Cameron begins, looking angry and embarrassed. I ignore her and turn to Dave. "Dave...sorry." I say. We share a look. My look tried to tell him to stay. His look told me he couldn't. For a moment I soften and my memory flashes to the last conversation I ever had with Rosemary on the telephone, after which I vowed never to speak to her again without official reason. I remember how Dave didn't believe what had transpired between she and I when I explained my rationale to him. My resolve grows strong once more.
Cameron, meanwhile, looks pissed off and is leaving with her company. Rosemary's already out the door. Dave follows.
A couple of heartbeats later, I too follow them to the front door. The front door to this apartment is a strange device, more like the airlock of a spaceship from a movie. I have no problems opening it, however, and rush out onto a perfectly manicured front lawn with a nice black-top driveway on a small street in suburbia, with lots of little blue and pink houses and a car in every garage. It looks like the neighbourhood in Edward Scissorhands...almost as though it is made from Lego instead of actual brick and mortar. All of the doors are airlocks, but I have no problems breathing and feel no ill effects from the environment. There seems to be no reason for it. It is a bright, sunny day around noon or one in the afternoon. Birds are singing and a light breeze is blowing, making the perfectly cut grass move. It is NOT very February-like at all. Time has become sluggish and I see everything in slow motion. Dave, Rosemary and Cameron are not there, even though they had left only moments before me.
I fall haphazardly, painfully to my knees on the black tar driveway. It is as if I have lost all control of my body. My arms stretch out to my sides, Christ-like, as far as they can reach. I tilt back my head and scream. There are no words to this scream, just a guttural, gut-wrenching noise. This is the loudest scream I've ever produced. Louder than the screams I used to scream for my heavy metal band in the 90's, louder than I've ever been, even with a 1000 watt PA system to back me up. I scream until I think I will black out, staring into the bright, sunny sky. Fluffy clouds drift past and I scream. Finally, just before I think I may pass out, I stop.
I take a deep breath. I tilt my head back and I scream a second time...even louder than the first!! So loud I think that my eardrums might start to bleed. No other sound exists in the universe while I scream. I scream out all the frustration, the sadness, the pointless loss. I scream for all the tragedy in my life, in ALL of our lives. I never fully understood the meaning of the words "primal scream" until I heard what this sounds like coming through my own two lips. Finally, I can scream no longer and my head wilts on my shoulders. I am alone, kneeling in a perfect but somehow insidiously wrong suburban nightmare. I hear music. My alarm clock has gone off. I awake.
So what do you suppose it means??
