Nightmare

Nightmares create scars that the living just can't see. Or won't.

It's all about perspective. They're fragmented, you see. Nightmares. You're the living dead. Breathing just enough to keep the visions in your brain to create a clear picture, but the pictures are a slide show. One quick flash after another, and you aren't in control of the pace.

A motorway, airport car park. That's where it started. Sounds unreal, right? A long stretch of grey tarmac curving upwards into a thin bridge. Wind whips us either side as cars speed past. We are terrified. Our luggage weighs us down, even though we're pulling with two hands. A red car drives too close to us, and we question where we are going. He insists this is the right way, and we pick up the pace as he steams ahead. It's not worth an argument, so we try to keep up. But his legs are long, and he has no luggage, and he disappears out of vision at the top of the bridge.

I reach the top of the bridge and I am on my own. It's dark now. The motorway has gone. The kids are gone. He is gone, but I know I'm looking for him. Something happened, something on the bridge maybe. I can't remember, so I don't know what. All I see is what is in front of my face. It's a carnival, I think. There are bodies everywhere, crashing into me, drinks sloshing in plastic cups. Young faces with glitter face paint. Wide, laughter smiles. They distort in the darkness, lips stretching to ears. It makes my stomach lurch. I'm forgetting something familiar and I know it's important.

The music is a deep, loud thump-thump that beats against my ear drums. It cuts off my thoughts and now I'm scared. In front of me is a fence made of sheet metal. I go through a slot that is a door- I think that's how I go in- and it's pitch black. There is a spot light above, searching the crowd. In it, I see bodies. Naked flesh. Swaying and moving. I can hear grunts. I can see the O of pleasure in women's faces. Taught muscles pushing, pulling, raising bodies of soft, delicate flesh. The smell hits me before I realise what I'm seeing. A brief lull in the bass reveals a hushed sea of groans. He can't possibly be in here. He wouldn't do that to me. I can't stand to be in here any more, so I turn to leave. I am outside. I am encircled by men. Maybe six of them, experience tells me, but I'm not able to count. They're in black. They're taller than me, but I don't see faces. I've met them before, somehow. I know but can't quite tell. The one in front of me speaks. He's the devil. Face plastic, like a mask, painted red. Black horns curved, black holes where his eyes should be. Cheeks distorted, like melted plastic had burned away a smile.

We were supposed to be going on holiday. I am annoyed. The kids shouldn't have been with us. Couldn't have been, I decide. But where is he?

This is the only part of the nightmare that is clear to me. It's funny how the mind works. The things I need to remember are dissolving into nothing. But this..

I decide I'm not afraid of these clowns, and push past them to look for him. Initially I'm not purturbed when they follow me. My eyes, and what works of my brain are busy, scanning the crowd. Until I realise there isn't much of one.

My head won't move from left to right, so I can only see to where my eyes can move. The rest is black. There are people milling about, sure, but like they're at a fair that is dying out. There are stalls, like a carnival, but I can't see anything- no games or toys or people- only the circular boothes with the pointed roof. People walk in between, I think. Couples. Individual people. It is quiter here.

The more isolated I feel, the less protected I feel, the more I feel the prescence of the gang of men that I know are following me. I can hear their cat calls in the dark. I'm not as frightened as I was on the motorway, but I feel like death is looming. I don't fear it, but I don't want it either. I know what they're going to do to me. "Nobody is going to help you, now." Where is he? Why can't I find him?

They're going to bind my wrists, and hang me from a bar between two storage units. The music will be loud here. There will be nobody around. All I can see is darkness, and a red devil mask floating in front of me. But I know they're all there. I am naked. I am terrified, because I know I am going to die. I know they're going to do the worst thing they can to me, because nobody will stop them.

Surely, he'll come and rescue me.

I am naked. There are deep lashes across my dangling legs from a whip. I can't feel it but I know it hurts. My lungs hurt more. I scream so hard the music breaks, but nobody comes. They can hear me. I feel it. I feel the whip scorch my legs and I kick and flail against the agony. They're laughing. He's behind me and I know what he's thinking of doing, but I can't have that. There's nothing around me that can save me, so I look up. Salvation.

The bar that I am bound to, I lift my legs up, and twist so I can sit on it. Surpisingly comfortable. I can't tell if I'm still naked. I feel warm, and I don't feel like I'm just skin now. I've lowered the rope. Somehow I know how to tie a noose, and choke him with his own weapon. I pull and tug, and stand to do it, because I feel weak and want to know that it's been done. It hasn't. He's limp but I can feel his anger waking him. On my feet, I can see the dance floor of the orgy below me. The spotlight is gone but I can see him clear as day. She's younger than me. I can't tell if she's pretty. Skin milky white. The betrayal should sting, but I don't have the energy for that. There are no tears. Only thoughts. Fragmented, tortured thoughts. Of the girls I do or don't have. Of where they are. Of how I get down, escape. I am stuck here, on this bar. Alone. Wolves only a few feet below snapping at my feet with sharp, white teeth, baying for my blood.

This is where I should wake up. But I am in limbo. I am stuck.