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Melpomene (melpomene@graffiti.net).
Insomniac Dreams
Midnight. Isolated pools of light lit random faces while others slept anonymously in the homogenous dark. Wesley wasn't asleep, but not for want of trying. He felt the distanced ache of exhaustion, but after the last five sleeping pills, it seemed like a hopeless battle. Instead, he watched the bland darkness of the desert road that rolled past his window, unseen things blurred by outside. Gradually, his hard-to-focus eyes lighted on the reflections of the other passengers on the bus. There was a boy. Wesley decided to call him Henry. He wasn't exactly sure why but he wanted to. Henry was probably 11 and was quiet for a child of that age. He sat in the dark although Wesley could see him blinking occasionally as he stared at nothing. Henry was dressed up, he was in a rumpled suit that didn't quite fit him, maybe a size too big. Next to him sat an equally over-dressed woman, whom Wesley assumes is Henry's mother, her eyes were closed in sleep, but her posture was unrelaxed, her clothing, in immaculate order. Henry didn't touch his mother at all, even though he was sitting next to her in the cramped seat of a Greyhound. * * * Once upon a time, there was a boy named Henry. When he was born, he didn't make a sound, no crying out in celebration at being set free into the world, no sad wails, mourning the loss of the comfortable ignorance of the womb. As Henry grew up, he remained very quiet, watching the world, but not part-taking of it. His parents, Lord and Lady Blueblood, grew concerned that their son was unnatural, so they gathered all their scholarly friends to determine whether the boy was, indeed, unnatural. Unfortunately for the Bluebloods their suspicions were confirmed by their scholar friends. They couldn't abide having such a horribly strange child, so they dressed Henry up in his best clothes, and sent him overseas, telling him that he was to go to school and learn to be normal. So Henry set off, to go to school. When he got to his new school, he blended right in until no one noticed he was there. And he did well that way, doing what he was told to do and not doing what he wasn't. And he learned what it meant to be a normal boy, which required constructing another face that he could cover his own with. On the inside, though, Henry was still a quiet boy and when he stayed at the school on the holidays while everyone went home, he was free to be his unnatural self. He took to reading lots of books and found that he had a passion for them. One night Henry had a dream, which is not very unusual, but the dream affected him profoundly. When he woke up, he didn't remember it, but now Henry realised what he wanted in life. Henry wanted to be a book. To speak with the same quietness of paper and to exist with the same objectivity of ink, to keep watch on the world with the words written in him, and to never be held accountable for what he says. And he knew he'd never want to be anything else. This made Henry extremely sad for he also knew that it was something he could never have. So he made himself a very fine pointed pen, filled it with ink and wrote all over the blood that was in his veins. And when Henry was found, the distended veins all over his body were still filled with ink, marking him with intricate lines that expressed his sorrow quietly and objectively. * * * Wesley was depressed, he was being too spontaneously creative to be anything else. Wallowing in self-pity was tiring, all he really wanted was to sleep. He felt like crying in frustration. But he pulled in a breath, albeit one that shuddered, and managed to hold off the tears. Five more of the sleeping pills were in his hand before he even thought about it. And since they were already there, he figured why waste the effort, and swallowed them. He looked back at the glass his head was resting on. A sliver of moon just showed up on his side of the bus. So he thought tired thoughts at it. *hello there, where have you been?* the moon looked affronted, which was not what he was going for, *Oh, no, I wasn't admonishing you, I was just wondering...* then it occurred to him that he was thinking at the moon and how that could actually be insane. The moon moved suddenly, which took Wesley quite a while to puzzle over, finally realising he was actually thinking at the reflection of another passenger. The moon was actually the silver frames of a pair of spectacles. Wesley felt absurdly relieved that he hadn't offended the moon. He settled into studying the reflection. It was a young man, early twenties, black turtleneck, strategically mussed black hair, pale, clean shaven, jeans just the right shade of blue. In short, perfect. Wesley didn't even need to hesitate on what to call him. Julian. Julian was reading a book, a slim paperback. He had two seats to himself so he was stretched out, facing Wesley who sat right across from Julian. Julian also had his book folded at the spine and held it with one hand while the other rested behind his head. For a moment Wesley wanted to lean over and tell him to treat his book with the respect it deserved, but then he turned the page and Wesley noticed that his hands were distractingly slim and long fingered. With the repositioning of the book that went with the turning, Wesley could see the cover. It was Allen Ginsberg. * * * Edward watched Julian reading his book. He sat on the grass, his back against a tree, as he covertly watched his fellow classman. He'd gotten hold of the other Ginsberg book their library had, but couldn't make head nor tail of it, much to his dismay. Edward had wanted, perhaps, he admitted to himself, dreamed of an opportunity to talk to Julian, hence the Ginsberg. And at the same time, he dreaded it, more precisely, he dreaded making a fool of himself. It was all very cliche. Julian was perfect. Intelligent, beautiful, mysterious, a loner who preferred books, he had a cynical but tortured air which, Edward thought, was very Pushkin. Edward sighed, it was useless to sit here pining after Julian, nothing would come of it, and he knew that the moment he admitted to himself that he was in love. He stood and left, he had some work to do before his class in the afternoon and planned to go to the library before he wasted any more time. * Edward startled awake, he'd had a dream. He looked around to find books open and scattered around him like a nest, all of them on Scandinavian mythology. He'd nodded off in the library, something that is unusual, Edward being the kind of student who thought it was unseemly to do so. He'd drooled slightly on the page he'd been resting his head on. Thankfully, it was his own note book but when he went to wipe away the saliva he smudged his writing slightly. Vexed, he looked at his watch, to find that his next class was in 10 minutes. Hastily he put his glasses back on, pushed the books into a pile on the table, (normally, he would have taken the time to re-shelve them) then he almost ran out of the library, forgetting all about his dream. * Months went by, Julian left, dropped out, and Edward had gradually forgotten his infatuation with him. It was the middle of winter and the snowfall was heavy this year. Edward was up late in his room, pretending it wasn't cold and trying to wrap his head around Urdu. There was a commotion in the hallways. Edward, frustrated by his lack of progress, decided to abandon the translation. He opened the door to find four people clustered together, whispering animatedly. Edward went to join them. "...he was found among ...*unsavoury* characters." "I *did* hear he was addicted to heroine." "No, it was cocaine." "Did he have any friends here?" "No, he kept himself to himself." "What happened?" Everyone turned to look at him. Gossip made everyone bright eyed and forthcoming. "Do you remember Julian? He died three days ago, it had something to do with drugs." It was a shock, Edward hadn't thought about Julian in months. He felt guilty that it was so easy to forget. He'd been so sure that he'd been in love and it was naive, he knew it, but he was ashamed of his helplessness. * Years later, Edward was still at the university. Now as a professional academic and researcher. He'd fallen asleep in the library, and when he woke up the dream he was having was gone. Feeling restless, like there was something he'd forgotten, he got up to wander among the shelves before going back to his translation. He found himself in Russian literature where he noticed a portfolio sitting on one of the shelves, obviously misplaced. He pulled it out, curious, if somewhat put out, and opened it. The pictures were beautiful. One was of a man sitting down, inebriated and jolly. His shoes split open in
places, his clothes ill-fitting and dirty.
One was of a mother and daughter. Asian, both smiling shyly, the little girl
looking down at something that's not in the picture.
There was one of a dog. A stray, it's fur flea-bitten, it's tail crooked.
And there was one of Edward. He was asleep with books haphazardly strewn around him.
Edward looked for some indication as to who the artist was, and found it in the
last drawing. The picture was of Julian, sick, with junk-hollow eyes and skin
that sagged off the still-exquisite bones.
* * * This time the pills made it into Wesley's mouth before he noticed he was taking them. "Are you so sure this is what you want." Wesley found a man had come and sat next to him, one of his eyes would wander, the pupil dilated to pin-size and bobbing erratically. The other eye was fixed, its tiny pupil pinned Wesley down, unnerving with its total awareness. "I beg your pardon?" "She will not come." "Why?" "She is not meant to, I am." "Oh. I made a mistake then." "You are very tired." "Will I sleep now?" "You are sleeping." "Thank you." Wesley closed his eyes and he felt the man's fingers pressing gently against his eyelids. They felt cool and dry but dusty. End.
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