I dream that I’m watching a Sailor Moon episode that turns into a horror show about a painting that is beautiful if you have a pure soul, and show inexplicable horrors if you are a sinner. A taxi driver goes back to work after seeing the painting, a tall monster in a trench and bowler hat sits in the back of his taxi. “I’m going to hell,” says the monster. “That’s fine,” says the man, “I’m already there.”
Then I dream about punching my brother in the face, and it was well deserved.
I dream that I’m going to visit my Gran, and that’s already making me uncomfortable because we should be isolating from the pandemic. I run into an old schoolmate’s mom, she’s not wearing a mask, a can only stand in horror as she grabs me and kisses both my cheeks in greeting. How could you! I yell. She doesn’t seem to understand what she did wrong.
At Gran’s place, I’m watching a TV show, or maybe playing a video game, or possibly living in it? It’s about a little girl who can speak with ghosts, she’s always haunted by the spectral figures of her dead parents. She’s currently sitting in her classroom, her teacher is John Mulaney. Then she goes home skating, she runs into a murderer running away from the police. Why didn’t you call us? The police demand. She doesn’t know how to explain that, due to her psychic powers, cell phones don’t work around her.
She arrives at Gran’s place, where we find dozens and dozens of single shoes and slippers. I try to find a logical explanation for it, but we all know ghosts are dumping them. The little girl avoids mirrors because she can always see reflected in them someone who just died and is being sent to hell. It’s like a white, crumbly room that goes into the unknown. We decide to explore hell as well, we take an elevator and arrive at the white room. We step inside.
I’m watching a TV show, a comedy I think, the main character is played by Steve Carell. He needs to find a certain dog, for very important reasons I assume, but the dog has died and gone to hell.
Steve Carell and his friends travel to hell, which looks like an old church turned into dog pound, perched on the side of a mountain cliff. Steve is sad, but he promises he’s gonna be okay as long as he sees no dogs suffering. The (rather normal looking) demon lady who guards hell says she can work with that, and has the group wait outside for a few minutes.
The group walks through some long corridors. They see an ugly man asleep on a pillow, his face red and wrinkly: the demon lady explains he’s actually a pug they transfigured to not upset Steve Carell. He has walked ahead and they hear his panicked voice yelling,
Guys, I’ve already seen three dogs!!
They reach a room bathed in beautiful sunlight, inside there’s a Golden Retriever with a kind face; he sings a mournful song about having nibbled and peed where he shouldn’t have, like a real naughty boy. Steve Carell is crying, and the dog hugs him. I notice the animal is looking to the side, no doubt to his handler with a treat ready for him. What a good actor, I say to myself, and what a good boy!
We have a new kitten in the house, she’s honey-colored and real cute, I try to take pictures but my little sister is always in the way. I’m the middle one of three young sisters with long brown curls.
My old priest comes by to talk us into coming back to church, I’m not home but my two sisters are in their room, already tucked in bed. The older one, who’s about sixteen, asks him for takeaway pizza money, the house has big windows and a mother passing by is scandalized to see the priest bending over a bed, giving money to a half-naked teen. The older sister blackmails the priest into giving her more money because, she threatens him, she took pictures and she’ll release them! The parents come home and she quickly hides a photo album.
Meanwhile I’m in town, it’s a gray, rainy day and a guy named Peace texts me: he wants to meet at a certain pastry store. His coworker demands to know why, she’s a blonde woman with an 80s perm walking next to me. I google the name and find out it was some sort of… fairy tale themed place? My great aunt D., who’s also there, reveals that the store burned down months ago, maybe the guy would like to go to (she points) that pink donuts stand instead?
The truth is, the pastry store has reopened in a new, secret location that only great aunt D. knows, there is a hidden clue embroided with a red thread in her white shirt sleeve. She refuses to show us the sleeve, and later when she’s filming a Youtube video she CGIs it out, just to spite us. Her pettiness doesn’t work because I find the store on my own and I follow her to the nearby sea town just to rub it in her face.
There are too many people around, a crowd cheering on a parade. I try to get away but people surround me, a girl laughs in my face and I yell to keep her germs away. I can’t find my way home.
Now I’m a little boy, and I’m lost, my parents and two sisters have been searching me for years. I walk and walk until I can see the coastline, there are lions on the beach. Eventually I arrive in some sort of carnival town where everything is made of colorful papier-mâché. My family find me as I walk on a stage that is literal hell: there are paper flames and a paper Devil, blond with piercing blue eyes. He recognizes my older sister, the one who took pictures of the priest and is now a prostitute, and tells her she’s doomed.
I offer myself in exchange for her soul. The Devil lifts me by the armpits, looks into my big, childish eyes and can’t find a trace of sin in me. We go back in time and my sister is a pure young girl again, riding her bike with a purple helmet and a big smile.
My brother and I are watching a special DVD edition of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets with two whole disks of extra content.
There is a deleted scene with Harry and Ron on a pirate ship. It’s a red and gold steamer with three black funnels, it’s smaller than a regular ship and it belongs to Captain Hook. Harry and Ron have been kidnapped along with other children, at twelve they are taller than the others so they try their best to look scared and innocent. I think it’s great to see them both so young again, it’s like going back in time.
More deleted scenes are shown, one is just a storyboard, one is really bad CGI, in one we see Harry from afar but it’s clearly a body double with glasses and gray hair. One scene is preserved only thanks to a couple of Indian voice actors in their booth, Hermione is too high-pitched but the boy playing Harry sounds remarkably like him. My sister catches us watching and says she’ll want to watch all the extras too when she comes back home.
I’m now at work, from my desk I can see inside my boss’ office because there is a closet missing, and apparently there never was a wall behind it. A customer is inside, I’m supposed to transfer her mobile data from her old umbrella to a new one. I ask my cousin for help and she tells me to use a standard cable.
Boss Lady walks out, demands to know why Saturday’s files weren’t archived. I promise her I archived everything I was given that evening and somebody must have hidden some files from me. Cousin G. gives me a new task, to wash our uniforms in a bin outside. I set to work in a sunny garden, and I wash with such gusto that I somehow end up drying the clothes as well. Boss Lady is even more impressed when I kill a mosquito that was walking on her neck.
I go back home and my sister is sitting on the living room floor. I’m really heartbroken because I was hoping she’d be gone forever.
I wake up and fall asleep again for a few minutes before my alarm rings. I dream about having to carry an old dying man to Hell. His wife is asleep in their room, unaware of what is happening. I take the man by the hand and we fly away, stars and building zooming behind us.
Once arrived to Hell, a demon cuts the old man’s penis off. He won’t need it anymore, the demon explains.
DECADE DREAM JOURNAL 