Nightmare

My nightmare started out last night with an image of a woman sitting by the grave of her recently deceased husband. She was one of those people who don’t (can’t, won’t, etc) understand that dead people are dead, and so go to gravesides and talk to their dear departed ones.

She was describing to me her husband’s attitude about this and that, as if he were still alive. She was happy and playful, teasing him as if he were there. She made some remark about his hair. And then he was there, lying in an open casket. His head was towards me and his feet towards her. He had a big pompadour of gorgeous hair (I’m practiacally bald, so figure that fact into any analysis).

I did not recognize either the husband or the wife..

And then his casket disappeared, and he was lying on a bed of ice, like a fish in a fishmarket. And then we were in a room of similar wives, all sitting by their dead husbands cooling on beds of ice. And then my dream got weird.

The man’s head moved, which startled me. And then his hand moved. I cried out, “He’s alive!”. I tried to run for help. He sat up. We were in a hospital. His wife was the nurse. Some of the husbands were fish. The nurses were evil. I cried for help. It was a science experiment. If you figured it out you got put into a coma. They were coming for me. I cried out, “I know what you are doing! I will save him! I am alive! I am not a fish!”

When I cried out “I am not a fish!” my wife shook me. “John! John! You’re having a nightmare. Wake up!”

So I woke up, but not really. I soon dozed back.

I was back in the mortuary-hospital-fishmarket. I ran and they chased me. But I was also aware, thanks to my wife’s intervention, that I was in a nightmare. I was in a waking-sleep.

Sometimes I write short stories, and I have written a few horror stories (that were not very good). Lately I have been thinking a lot about writing stories for publication, and horror writers like Stephen King make a lot of money. So I thought, “this is a terrifying nightmare! I should stay with it, and write it down when it’s over. It’s probably very original, more original than Stephen King!” But the nureses read my thoughts and came to put me in a coma double-quick.

I think the husband-fishes may have been involved at this point, as well as the caskets and the wives and some doctors and scientists who were studying comas. It was scary and I began to run and scream. I was also looking for my notebook, because I did not want to lose my notes on the earlier portion of the dream.

My wife woke me up again. I was shaking and breathing hard. I got up to pee, and then I went back to bed, with my heart racing. I stayed away until (as I thought) all traces of the dream were gone. I went to sleep and slept well.

But all day today the dream has been with me.