Real Life and What Comes With It, Part Four: The Tantabus' Visit · 4:52am Jun 15th, 2017
I’ve been writing a lot of a Tantabus origin story recently. It's coming along nicely. I'm 6 chapters in so far of a projected 10-ish, but you guys know how I am with projected word/chapter counts. I'll share something with you guys in a few days.
In light of this, Luna must have dreamed of me, because I had a dream sequence in three parts that went like this:
In the first part I was a complete observer. I watched the dream play out as if I were watching a TV screen, with the screen filling up the entirety of my vision. It was of a parade on a downtown street in a nameless city—tall buildings, wide streets, overhanging traffic lights. The paraders kept completely to one side of the double yellow line for some reason.
The parade morphed into an F1 race on that same city street. For whatever reason, Peter Griffin from Family Guy suddenly became the protagonist of this race, in a predominantly orange-and-yellow racecar. He sing-songed his own narrative as he cut other cars off, in the vein of the Ding Fries are Done jingle, but he wasn’t making much headway with all the cars ahead of him.
It was then he noticed the race was still only happening on one side of the double yellow line, so he crossed it to blitz past everyone else. Leave it to EQG Derpy to J-walk in front of the entire race just as he did this (I don’t know why I remember this detail, but she was wearing a grey shirt, brown skirt, and brown knee-high boots).
She screamed, he screamed, and at the exact moment the car touched her shins, it was as if me and everything else were suddenly yanked impossibly fast away from her, all blurs around the edges of sight as she disappeared beyond the horizon line.
I was then myself in a house that was not my own. I don’t remember any details of that house other than when I stepped out on the porch, it reminded me of one of the many side streets where I grew up—closely packed houses whose well-trimmed lawns sloped up a few feet from the street. The porch itself was fully wrapped by a solid waist-high wooden wall, except for the cleanly squared opening where you stepped up from the front. It was daytime. I was wearing my baby-blue lab coat from work, sleeves pushed up to the elbows like I always did.
Two houses to the right and across the street, some black kid dashed off his porch and onto the sidewalk. His dad stepped out onto the porch, yelling at him and wielding a kris of all things, point down for stabbing rather than thrusting. The scene played out, and eventually the kid went back up the porch to his dad all mopey-like.
I ran across the street toward them, because the other door of their house (it was a duplex) was mine, and I needed to go home. When I stepped up onto the porch, I introduced myself to them. The dad was nice enough and said his name when we shook hands, but I only caught that it started with an ‘S.’ The kid was quiet, looking down, but said his name was Dionte.
Something something, I was in my house, and someone behind me fired a Hanzo ultimate (blue, thankfully) that then helixed its way through the entirety of the house. It was then that I pulled out my wallet, and all the credit cards inside were mashed and torn across the middle, as if they were made of stock paper, wetted, and then pulled both ways around a small pipe.
Briefly, I stood in the back room of my grandmother’s house, where I used to sleep whenever we’d visit her. It was bright, as if the walls and ceiling were made of clear crystal beneath a noontime sun.
I lay in bed in the back corner of my room. In my house this time—my real life, current house. Though I sleep during the day (I work nights) it was dark outside. The closet door on the opposite wall stood wide open. My dresser sat in the far corner (left of the closet) past the foot of my bed, and my computer desk sat in the corner to my right.
Behind the desk, the power strip had a little light to indicate it was working. During the day and when I go to bed, the light is faint enough that it never bothers me (oftentimes, I don’t even notice it), but when my eyes adjust to the darkness, it’s like a beacon that illuminates my entire room.
The ceiling fan spun on full blast, because I like it cold in my room when I sleep. My covers were down below my chest and my arms over my head. I could only move my head and probably open my eyes, but I was too lethargic to do either.
I was acutely aware that I was dreaming. It was one of those where you know you’re asleep yet you keep on dreaming while the dream happens around you.
There was a knock at my bedroom door, in the corner diagonal from my bed. “Chris, I’m sick.”
It was my mom. She definitely sounded sick, all weary voice and stuffy nose. I wanted to get up and let her in, but all I could do was turn my head toward the door. My eyes were still shut, but I saw everything as clearly as if they were open.
“Come lay in bed with me.”
That was weird. My mom wouldn’t say anything like that, nor had she ever. I stared at the door, unsure what was going on and why she would ask that. I couldn’t say anything, even if I wanted to.
“Chris, please.”
This was wrong. She shouldn’t have been there. She shouldn’t have knocked on my door. Not that she would never have had a reason to wake me up, but because she couldn’t have: I live alone.
“Don’t make me come in there.” It was not her voice.
A hollow, sucking noise surrounded me. It was quiet enough that any other noise would have drowned it out, but in the silence that otherwise commanded the room, I could hear it as if it was some monster breathing down my neck.
I stared at the door, terrified of what was on the other side. The power strip light slowly dimmed, until the bedroom door disappeared beyond the darkness. And there it was, the click of the door latch.
Shivers ran down my arms and back, as I was still fully exposed to the cold air of the room. I wanted to hide, to pull the covers over me, but the sleep paralysis kept me exactly as I laid, only able to stare into that darkness that slowly overtook the room.
I couldn’t breathe. I felt my chest rise and fall as if I was trying with all my might, but my lungs refused to fill with air. The darkness crept closer. I still could not see what it was, the thing that wanted in, but I sensed it closing in, almost looming over. The seconds felt like hours.
Eventually, my body couldn’t stand the lack of air any longer. I heaved a huge breath, and my eyes shot open. The door was shut. I was awake. I pulled the covers up to my head, and I watched the door far longer than I probably should have.
I did not embellish any of this story whatsoever. And that terrifies me.
Feel free to share a recent/worst nightmare that you’ve experienced below.
(Into the Dark tagged because dreams, and because we don't talk about the badness that is Darkness Beckons.)
Well. This was bracing.
The last dream I can remember of any substance is of myself as I am now trudging through a pile of leaves towards my grandmother's house. Clearly, only half of the house is being lived it. I make my way to the side door, and knock. I do not know why I do this, she always said just come on in, since she couldn't hear the door.
But the door opens, as if I'm expected. It's a nurse, and I know, as one frequently does in dreams, that it's my father's nurse, and that we've known each other a long time.
"Come on in, he's expecting you. The office has been cleaned out, so you can set up there."
I raise my eyebrow, and realize I'm carrying an inflatable mattress. I have been, of course I have. I'm moving in for a while.
"Thanks, J--" and I don't remember her name. Which is odd. I can remember her jasmine perfume, her light brown hair, and her annoying habit of raising the last syllable of almost every single sentence like its a question. But I don't know if she's Janice, Janet, Janelle, or what.
And she's gone. It's time for his meal, I know. So I set down the mattress and my backpack that I've had the whole time down in the old office. It's clean, now. Maybe for the first time ever.
I feel watched. But that's not new, I always did there. I keep setting up.
It gets worse. Annoyed, I turn around.
My father is in his wheelchair, but looks far older than he ever really did. This man is ancient. He is full of hate. And he's just glaring at me.
"Hey, Dad--" I start.
From cracked, drool-spattered lips, he spits, "If I take you with me, I win."
And I wake up.
Sleep paralysis, folks believed it was caused by a hag sitting on your chest sucking the life out of you.
As far as nightmares go... I dont remember the last one I had. I think I had them when I was much much younger. I have either little to no recollection of my dreams, the same dream repeatedly with minor variations, or decidedly odd ones.
Dreaming of a Hanzo ultimate is truly traumatic, my condolences.
Be grateful it wasn't Genji.
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True, but it was blue, so I was safe anyway.
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Hanzo is ALWAYS trauma inducing, regardless of team!