I find myself, for no earthly reason, working in a ceramics shop somewhere in Western
Europe. My responsibilities include management and restocking of a variety of tiny
teacups (meant for someone mouse-sized or smaller). As I am straightening the tidy piles of minute cups and saucers, a woman approaches me from behind and slides her arms around my chest. I can smell her hair and skin and feel the
pressure of her breasts against my shoulderblades. I turn my head and see her face: flawless, dusky tan with deep blue (think
Fremen from Dune, but only her
irises are colored) with a strong chin and perfect white teeth. She's smiling at me, warmly, knowingly, and she tosses her hair (masses of rich
chestnut curls) over her shoulder and rubs her
forehead into the back of my
neck.
From an office above the sales floor a window opens and a corpulent man leans out, berating me for mauling his daughter.
She nuzzles closer, her hands roaming my body with the familiarity of an experienced lover and the delighted surprise of a just-met smooching partner.
Her father roars his fury from the second floor.
I turn in her arms and slide my fingers into her hair as she tips her head and closes her beguiling eyes in anticipation of a kiss.
The scent and touch and taste of her lips lingers in my mind even as I open my eyes to find myself alone, standing in the predawn darkness near an empty barn.
There are other men standing around me, clad in football uniforms and helmets. They are agitated and excited, bouncing up and down in readiness for the imminent carnage to come. From within the nearby barn a car engine grumbles to life and headlights illuminate the high windows under the eaves.
I can see the dark shapes of the opposing team on the other side of the field and have time to notice that while both teams have uniforms, I am clad in only my pajamas before the car crashes through the front door of the barn in the style of any car-based road movie you care to name and lunges toward the other team. Trailing it at a respectable pace are the other members of my team and, spurred to action in this surreal and no doubt suicidal situation, I follow at a run.
There are glimpses of savagely maimed football players, bloodied headlights and tires, and a horrifying moment of vertigo when the driver's side window purrs down and a hand reaches out for me.
When I open my eyes again I am tucked into my childhood bed at home. I ache all over, and want nothing more than to know that someone found me a matching football uniform shirt. My mother assures me this is so.
The really amazing part of this dream is how vividly it stuck in my head...enough to remember it all through my
shower and morning preparations for the day. The mind fairly boggles. I
never remember my dreams.