I remembered the dream mostly from the smells it evoked. The tang of ozone before a spring shower. Bakery fresh bread on an early morning breeze. Salt from the sea at high tide. Camphor and incense from my great grandfather's wake. All these things whispered through my mind as I awoke, and then were gone, a gentle kiss of silk on skin. It was still dark outside, still night. Tears fresh and warm upon my face gave light to the darkness I dreamt about.
Again, I saw her face, the blue eyes, the rose petal shaped birth mark on her left cheek. The casual wave as she stepped out into the street. Then the taxi, the screech, the bang, the frozen moments of flight, the crunch of impact twice, first bone with metal, then bone with tarmac. The howl ripped from my soul, then diaphragm, then lungs, then lips. Then the grayness. Then the white walls, and the coarse white sheets, sun glinting through a window, medicinal peace, thoughts drifting into waking dreams, and then into terror filled nights. Again the howl from some unknown beast. All things shifted two and a half inches to the left. Then the blood tore free, creating concentric spatter patterns on the street and sidewalk.
A bell peeled sharply against the contrived silence of this place. Restrained but drifting free, I saw the darkness beckoning to me from the corner. Soft warm lips, slightly parted in greeting. I let the emptiness take me again and again and again.
Why me and how? Yet why not and now? Desolate and irresolute, somehow broken but stitched together, my thoughts tried to coalesce, take cogent form. But I fought and fought, for just one more moment of emptiness, then another and another.
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