music in the rain

I was in the suburb of my childhood, staying in the house of a friend. The garden sloped away from the house, merging with a park. In the early morning I went outside in the rain to brush my teeth at the tap. The man next door was in his garden, eyes closed, playing a violin. I leaned into a shrub, hoping to remain unseen, so as to listen. I could only just hear the beautiful music over the rain and I realised this was why he was out here: playing his violin, the sound masked by rainfall, so as not to disturb his wife or the neighbours. I felt both joy and sadness, witnessing an old man delight in his passion, but having to be so discreet.

layers

I was walking, at night, alone. I ventured into a small, dark cabin and, finding nothing there, I opened the door, intending to leave. A tall man stood in the doorway, blocking my path. He said nothing, but closed the door again, locking it. I was trapped inside and wondered what would happen. After a time, he opened the door and ushered me out into a yard where several other people were waiting. I was instructed to climb up a ladder, onto a diving platform above the pool, where I was to undress and then dive into the pool. The people sat around, awaiting my performance. I climbed up and began to undress, but beneath each layer of clothing was another layer. There was nothing provocative about the routine; each item of clothing was sensible rather than attractive. I removed a pair of black socks to find sports socks; under my jacket, I wore several layers; under my pants, were other pairs of pants; and so on. Concerned about appearing naked in front of the audience, I seemed to conjure layer upon layer of clothing.

The following night, a similar dream:

I was in the bathroom of my grandmother's house, undressing so as to get ready to go somewhere. In the bathroom with me was someone I trust implicitly. I removed my shoes, my dress and found I was wearing rather old-fashioned undergarments: a camisole and a half-slip petticoat. I attempted to remove the camisole, but, upon pulling it up toward my head, I found myself stuck. My friend helped me; he did his best to gently tug the top up and over my head, and then helped me with the next item of clothing. Again, there seemed to be several layers of clothing, appearing as I removed each previous item.

trapped

I was on my way home, having travelled far away. My luggage was packed into the back of a taxi and I sat in the passenger seat, waiting for the taxi driver to collect another person before we could be on our way. The taxi was parked on a road in a park. Rain suddenly bucketed from the sky and pandemonium broke loose. People were running, cars drove wildly around the path and across the grass. In the confusion, the taxi driver started the engine and drove, without the other passenger, attempting to move the car away from the chaos until it had calmed. I was nervous and felt trapped. We drove up the street, through a lot of construction, overseen by numerous police and security guards. We passed a marching band and maneuvered our way through narrow streets and tall buildings. I was lost. The taxi driver, an old man, tried to kiss me. I told him to stop but he persisted until I shouted at him. Even then, he crossed boundaries and I repeatedly had to defend my space. I did not try to leave the taxi; I felt I couldn't. We drove back to the park where we picked up my friend. While the driver was busy with something, I asked her if she would mind being dropped off at my house, then I could drive her home. She was puzzled, but agreed. I didn't want an opportunity where the man might try to come in. I then realised that the man was going to see where I lived, and I tried to concoct a different address. Through the car window, I could see a dear friend in the park and I wanted to go to him, but, again, I felt trapped in the taxi. The driver steered the car across the park and, instead of turning onto the road and going home, he drove through the pond to the other side where he lived in a shack. We alighted the taxi and visited his home. I did not want to be there. The memory of other women haunted the place, women he had taken there. I could not only feel them, but hear them. Some were laughing at us, some were warning. I hoped they knew I was not there willingly, that I would continue to defend my space and that of my friend.

he turned out to be the devil

Hurrying somewhere through a public place, I heard a thud and the sharp knock of bone against cement behind me. I turned to see a man sprawled on the ground. He had fallen and broken his arm. Although I was keen to keep going, to be on my way, I knelt beside him to check on him. He was obviously injured, his arm broken. I asked someone to call an ambulance and I held onto him, keeping him conscious and doing my best to comfort him. I stayed for some time, waiting with him for help to arrive. As time passed, he began to ask me questions about my life, my family. I felt uncomfortable as his questioning grew increasingly intrusive. Finally, he seemed to have recovered from his fall - without the intervention of medical aid - and I left him to repack my suitcase so that I could leave. Somehow, all of my belongings were now strewn across the ground and, knowing that he would hide something of his in my bag given the chance, I checked everything thoroughly before packing it. Someone helped me to pack and I told them to look for anything strange as 'he would try to bait me', with the object of somehow tracking me. Sure enough, I found his necklace - a stylised silver cross on black leather - among my things. I threw it back over to where he was waiting, hoping he didn't notice. Unfortunately he did and he came over with the cross, insisting angrily that I should have it. Realising that he was the devil, I looked him in the eye and told him that I wanted nothing of his, nothing at all. My certainty drove him away.

past, glass, man and walking on knees

I was in the neighbourhood where I grew up, across the road from my home, walking through the yards of our neighbours. I was the age I am now and I wondered if anyone would recognise me if they saw me. Apart from a secretive kiss in the shadows, against the wall of the house across the road, I cannot recall what I was doing; I am only aware of revisiting my past.
Next, I was in the bathroom of the family home. It was very changed and now seemed to be open to the public. I put my hand up to a broken window and tried to pull out the sharp shards so that no-one would lacerate themselves upon visiting. I extracted shard after shard, but somehow ended up with dozens of tiny splinters of glass in my hand. I then turned my attention to removing the glass splinters, red blood covering my hand and dripping onto the floor. Someone came in to use the bathroom. I asked them to wait while I cleaned it up a little. I washed my hands and scrubbed the sink and the floor where a puddle of blood had pooled.
Next, I was to meet a colleague who was visiting from overseas. He was a tall, rotund man, around my age. We were to go to lunch as part of business proceedings. I stepped into a toilet cubicle for a moment and he followed me in, assuming intimacy. I asked him to leave, which he did. Outside, my sister appeared and I told her about the man, saying that I thought I should cancel the meeting because of his actions and expectations. She was certain that, indeed, I should not proceed any further with him. I went to find him, but I could not see him. I travelled up and down escalators, climbed endless staircases and crossed vast expanses of empty space.
Next, I was walking on my knees through a crowd. I saw a lovely Chow Chow dog adorned with black jewellery and feathers, walking alongside a circus performer. I fell behind the person I was walking with, as she was standing properly upright, walking normally. I was struggling, each step awkward and labouring. I continued on and eventually sat to rest awhile. A young woman approached and I told her that I thought she had a beautiful face. She said she knew, and, in response to my surprise at her candidness, she said she felt that it was important to be honest and not falsely modest. There were other aspects about her person that she would improve upon, but she was perfectly happy with her face. She was at ease with herself.

buried alive

I was watching a television program about an abduction case. It was horrific, although the victim, a young woman, possibly still in her teens, had survived to tell the tale. The program flicked between interviews with the victim, reconstructed 'footage' of the happenings and interviews with the police who had investigated the crime. The perpetrator, a man of about sixty or older, had abducted the girl, and buried her alive in a vault beneath his house that was fitted with a bed, sparse furniture and even some decoration. In the interview, the young woman recollected how, sitting on the bed, which ran parallel to a wall under the low ceiling, with her back to the wall, she looked to her right and saw the cut-out pages of fairytales, particularly Red Riding Hood. The man had selected the most frightening of images of wolves and nightmarish characters to line the walls. She remembered how, in the dim light, she looked around, slowly realising by the strangeness of the air - its gradual depletion - that she had, indeed, been buried. The police talked of how they later found the skins of various reptiles in the man's possession as the camera panned over skin after skin of snakes and lizards. They mentioned that his mind had been affected by drug-use in the sixties. The program also showed a reconstruction of the man's wife and daughter arriving home on the day of the abduction, unaware of his harrowing deeds. They both went into his study, the room from which the underground chamber could be reached. I, somehow, went into the scene and slowly drank a glass of water in their kitchen, waiting for them to come out, knowing that they were about to discover that something was horribly wrong. They walked out of the study and into the kitchen area, stunned, and looked to me for help. I went with them, back into the study, to see the man lurching about. He had a bleeding cut on his forehead from where his wife had hit him with something, and he was ranting about spitting, saying that it was wrong to spit. He staggered toward me and, although frightened and repulsed, I grabbed his hands to steady him, hoping to calm him and sit him back down. He was clearly out of his mind. The worst and most sickening thing about it was that I recognised the man, though now he was disturbingly changed.

travelling through the pipes

We were standing in the shower of a bathroom, in a downstairs unit of an old apartment block. Somehow, we were to travel up through the pipes to a unit upstairs. We sent some of our belongings up ahead of us and then we entered the pipes, shot upward and emerged in the shower of the designated apartment. This shower was above an old, pink enamel bath, enclosed by a plastic shower curtain. I hopped out of the bath, thrilled that our journey had succeeded, and waded through the items we had sent before us, which had spilled out of the bath and over the tiled bathroom floor. I opened the bathroom door, about to walk into the living room, but I heard the television and realised that someone was home. I quickly closed the door and ushered B back into the shower. I collected as many of our things as I could and jumped into the bath, closing the shower curtain around us. Through the curtain, I saw a young man enter the room, having heard us trying to get away. He glanced at our remaining things lying on the floor, walked straight over to the bath and grabbed the curtain in his fist, about to wrench it open. We held it closed and, although we could see through it and watch his response, he could not see us. I called out: Please don't open the curtain, I'm simply having a bath. He retreated, but said he would be back. B and I tried to send our things back down through the pipes, desperately trying to recall how we had morphed to fit in ourselves. Through the curtain, I could see the man. He had closed the bathroom door behind him and was again approaching. Suddenly, it worked. The pipes received us, opening up like a tunnel or a black hole. We travelled downward and, soon, B and I were back in our own unit, again standing in the shower, surrounded by our things.

ticket and man

I was journeying home. I had been away for some time and now it was time to return. I boarded a bus and purchased a ticket from the driver. It was quite expensive and, although I asked him to select my cheque account, he selected savings. I knew that I did not have the money to cover the cost and that I would be fined for overdrawing. I was a little annoyed but told him not to worry. He wrote out a receipt and I left the bus, aiming to return when it was due to leave. I wandered down through an underground terminal, searching for something to eat as I had not eaten since early in the morning and it was now night. I found a kiosk that was closing so I quickly took a big bottle of water from the refrigerator and stood in line. The lights of the kiosk flicked on and off. As I waited, I scanned the shelves, but there was little food left. A man in front of me in the queue with longish brown hair was playing up, teasing the person behind the counter and creating gentle havoc. He scooped out the few remaining hot chips onto a plate and then handled them before throwing them back into the counter tray. Though the chips had been touched, I was hungry and bought the remaining hot chips. They weren't great but they would do. Suddenly the man, his friend and the few people in the shop started to head down the stairs of the terminal, outside and down a hill. I too sensed that the bus was ready and hurried after them. As I reached the man, I started running and grabbed his hand, pulling him after me. We gained speed, running incredibly fast and leapt up and over the fence that blocked our path with great ease. Landing, we laughed, sitting down on the grass. I started searching through my bag for my ticket, but couldn't find it. I found numerous receipts, notes and brochures, but not the ticket. He too rummaged through his bag. Embarrassingly, I pulled out a wad of papers stuck together with stray chewing gum, but, somewhat comfortingly, he too found papers in his bag glued together by chewing gum.

camping and pink flowers

I was with a large group of people, camping in a huge building. Our sleeping mats lined the floor forming a grid of bedding. I ventured outside onto the verandah, and sat on a high stool. A man, who last time I saw him was a teenage boy, ran his hand over me and I smiled at him, telling him that I had always allowed him to get away with too much. A second man, who I also knew in my teenage years, copied the first man's actions, but with him I felt angry. I told him never to touch me again, not to assume such intimacy. He appeared surprised, presented me with two long-stemmed yellow roses and justified his behaviour saying that we were on a date. I could not recall arranging a date with him and told him so. I went inside and took the flowers with me, but I forgot about them, later finding them on the ground under some clothes, their petals damaged and browned. I went into the next auditorium where hundreds more people were preparing to sleep. I found two close friends there, their beds next to one another, and I felt a little envious seeing as I was alone in the other room. They had arranged beautiful pink frangipanis in garlands around their heads. I wished that there were enough flowers so that I could wear a garland too.

missing man

I was lying on a couch watching a television program about a missing person. The footage was old, in black and white. A group of men were going to work, entering a big building like a shed. The man in question was dressed like all the others: overalls (which I assumed to be dark blue) and a white shirt with sleeves rolled up). He had overgrown dark straight hair, although not long, and a big bushy beard so that much of his face was obscured. His eyes were serious, dark and possibly evil - although people often appear sinister in old footage. The man was last into the building and, as he crossed the threshold, he looked behind him, seemingly straight down the lens of the camera. He went inside, the door shut behind him and the commentator said that that was the last time he was seen alive. Suddenly, there was a pile of blankets and sheets on top of me and the man, dead, was lying to my right with his limbs sprawled across me, weighing me down. B stood at my left looking down at me. The man was still in black & white, or rather, shades of grey. The colour was drained out of him - he was lifeless. The blankets and sheets shifted so that they covered my face and I felt pressed down into the couch, buried under the weight of everything on top of me. I tried to scream, but could make no sound. Breathing became more difficult and with each exhale I tried again to scream or to ask B to pull the blankets off so that I could breathe, but I could barely muster a noise. B tried frantically to uncover my face, eventually unearthing me in the pile of blankets. Again the pile shifted, burying me under. Again I desperately tried to scream or tell B that I was suffocating, again making no sound. B scrambled to uncover my face, pulling away the blankets to allow me to breathe. In an instant, B was gone, disappeared from the room, and the second she vanished the man shuddered - a deep shudder, shaking his body. I was not sure if he had been feigning death, or if he was now waking from death, but I knew that either way, he was a terrible man. I was filled with horror and woke.