#64 Bad Dream #65 Red Cap #66 Angel

“I got my head in the clouds and I don’t got to sleep to dream.”
Maybe I should—maybe I should just keep the dreams locked tightly in sleep.
You can’t write about this now.

Your bed is tilted. You look forward to sleeping in it tonight. You look forward to dreaming. Your dreams are so real these days.
They are beautiful.
Friday night was a dream.
An awful repetitious dream. Recoccuring. You have had it before.
Black light gin and tonics at the basement. The color of mermaids in water.
You drink them like water.
You glow the blue of mermaids and you are invincible.
All you need is a companion.
You swim to the bar-through the hippies and the clowns—a million clowns in that bar.
You reach the wood rail and the barstools lodged firmly in a sand bar—you are waiting for matches. There is a man to your right. He is leering—although you don’t know—although you are looking right at him.
The two of you talk—bubble bubble bubble—under the water talk.
“I talk politics.”
“I hate politics.”
“You think Bill Clinton should be president?”
You nod—Your hair floating around you in a shimmering wet halo—“Yes every man should have the right to a good blow job.”
“You give good blow jobs?”
Bubble bubble bubble.
And you are above the water again, with three people. They are arguing. The two guys. There is a girl-throwing herself on you—“I love you—please come with us—I want her there. I am scared.”
She seems scared and drunk. She is a beautiful angel—you know that only you can save her—but you are a mermaid out of water—and you know this is just a bad dream.
The van has carpet on the ceiling and the walls and you cling to the angel and stroke her hair while she cries. You tell her about the water and the way the light plays off the surface. Mascara runs down her face and she whispers, “Wake up wake up wake up this dream is too bad.”
The apartment is littered with Bud Cans. There is another man there—
You know him—but not until he recognizes you.
He tells you, “I hang out in your bad dreams.”
The three men conspire on the couch.
Red Cap.
Nose Ring.
Bad Dream.
The girl is Angel and she is purring in your ear. The two of you stand—walk to the bathroom. Conspire.
You never go to the bathroom with girls.
The two of you kiss.
You’ve moved from bad dream to bad porn.
They bang on the door and beg, and you run the water in the bathtub and crawl in with her. You taste the salt of her skin under the water and she pulls you up thinking you are drowning.
You are on the living room floor with her-their voices in the background.
Your mouth hurts and you realize you already gave Red Cap a blow job—you are his.
But you are on the floor and they are all behind you.
He stops you and takes you to the bedroom.
“Will you move in?”
“No.”
“Will you come every Friday night?”
“Yes”
“I’ll give you twenty dollars.”
Bad Dream comes in.
“Mermaid, make Nose Ring leave.”
You stand naked and blue—and slip across the apartment to the living room.
Angel is fighting off Nose Ring-and you put yourself in between them. Bad Dream moves Angel to the couch.
Nose Ring looks at you, up and down.
“Do you realize what you just did?”
You shake your head slowly, it is so heavy here on the land.
“I’m the good guy.” He kisses you. Softly, slowly, like an old friend, and leaves.
You go back to Red Cap.
You half wake a few times. You hear seagulls.
You try to go home.
Red Cap pulls you back into bed.
Once you make it to the living room—put on your shoes.
You watch Angel and Bad Dream sleep. She looks so familiar.
Red Cap pulls you back.
“You can’t leave yet—I’ll see you again right?”
“Why am I here”
“You’re not. You’re on the couch with Bad Dream.”
You wake up suddenly, feeling Bad Dream’s arm wrapped lightly around you—your legs entwined—his hair resting on your cheek—his breath in and out slow in your ear.
It was just a bad dream. Read more!