I dream that I’m working at the store even though it looks nothing like my IRL store. A group of three old schoolmates walk in, two women and a man. They are also famous people, I think their leader is Amber Riley? The other girl could be Vera Lovell.
I greet them with a smile, tell them I’m such a big fan. They are mad at me though, they demand money. I signed a contract, don’t I remember? I pledged to donate money every year to their theater company. I object that they haven’t put out a show in ages, they say it doesn’t matter. How will they feed their children if I don’t donate?
I whip out my bank account app, show them I only have 91 bucks to my name. Then, when they’re not looking, I rip out my signature from the contract. I hope that’s legal.
I dream about meeting an old French woman. An aristocrat, maybe? She takes my siblings and I to the mall, wants to buy us presents. I settle on a Disney board game, but I realize my siblings are picking really cheap presents and I put it back.
I notice an aisle with pretty stickers and go examining them. A little boy is staring at me. I stare him back, angry. He says,
I guess you’re cute, even though you’re old.
I find a little book of Chinese stickers. The old lady wants me to translate them, I start scribbling with a pencil as fast as I can, it’s getting late and I desperately want to go home. The old lady won’t let me go until I finish.
I dream that my Gran lives in a pretty little town. I go visit her. There is an IKEA nearby and a bus that can take us directly there so we plan our trip, but as we go I realize I forgot my purse and face mask, I have to run back to the house.
I collect my things and go back again. The town is beautiful, there are churches and a big white monument, I wish I could take pictures but the phone in my pocket is my old 2000s Nokia. I find Gran sitting at the bus stop chatting with some ladies. They send me to a nearby pizza takeout to buy our bus tickets, the owners speak German for some reason (maybe I am in Germany??) but they understand my English. They want to be paid in Marks, I’m confused because I only have Euros with me.
(I should add that while all this happened I was somewhat aware I was dreaming, I kept waking up and stubbornly going back to sleep because I really wanted to go to IKEA. I couldn’t tell you if it was a dream in a dream situation or I was legit waking up for a second or two.)
We finally reach IKEA and it’s nothing like the real thing, more like a bazar. There’s only one type of item I’m looking forward to: stationary! I spend ten minutes agonizing over washi tapes, much to the other costumers’ annoyance. I finally select one with fish illustrations. I’m moving on to stickers, when a woman stops me and ask for help picking a fountain pen. I’m wearing a red polo shirt and she must have mistaken me for an employee, she’s so disappointed when I tell her I’m not she violently wakes me up.
My sister is once again back home and we hate each other. She makes fun of my drawing of an… ancient Greek bust of a lady, I think. It’s too gay, apparently.
Gran is here too, I feel guilty because I’m napping instead of entertaining her. I haven’t seen her in months but she looks great, plump and with hair perfectly died and coiffed. We go out in town, I’m embarrassed because unlike hers, my hair is a mess. We walk next to a store with a big sign outside, it says,
We made these bottles of herbicide and you shouldn’t pour them over your heads, you EFFIN’ MORONS.
Back home, my dad offers to pay for some of my streaming services. I’m very happy and start listing them, then I wake up and realize I’m an adult and will have to pay for my own shit after all.
I’m in my parking lot, from the fence I can see the nearby public park. There is a baby fox half hidden in the grass, looking at me with big eyes. I stop to take a picture of it, and I see two teens threatening a child with a metal baseball bat. One of them sees the baby fox and tries to pick it up, the mother (that happens to be a full grown, angry tiger) jumps on them; I hear blood-chilling screams and I see limbs being teared off, I’m so terrified that I run home.
I make sure that my cat is safe, then I go see my neighbor. The little boy from the park is there, the back of his head is missing and my neighbor is carefully bandaging it. I ask if he’s gonna be okay, she says,
“No, he’s gonna die tomorrow, but at least he’s not gonna expect it.”
She then tells me to call the police and explain what happen, I take my phone but someone stops my hand: he’s one of the teens, he has a blond mullet and one arm is missing. He tells me he’s a time traveler on a mission, I need to trust him and not tell anyone about his secret.
I’m filming a reality show with my dad. Our team is behind, we need to complete a recipe before we can be moved to the next location, a beautiful European beach city. I’m supposed to make rice pancakes, but there is cat identical to mine chilling in my bowl! I shoo him off, then painstakingly clean all the cat hair from the white dough. I’m all alone because dad is off driving my aunt home, but finally I make my pancakes.
I’m took not to the beach, but to a gray winter city. I’m not wearing a mask and feeling guilty about it, the production team gives me a dark brown one made of fabric. I get lost and end up in a pharmacy, the girl at the counter is pretty and I start flirting. I say I need to make a deposit and get from my bag an envelope filled to the brim with money. The girl’s eyes get enormous.
There is a man chasing us, he’s wearing an animal skull on his head. He’s immortal, no matter how much we hurt him he keeps getting up; eventually I throw a bomb and blow him to smithereens. I know this is gonna buy me some time so I go to class; I can’t pay attention though, ever few moments I glance at the door, wondering when the man with the animal skull will be back.
I’m taking a walk in town with Gran, we’re not wearing a face mask and I feel guilty about it. She buys a notebook and I pay for it, then she gets a coffee to go (more sanitary!) and I pay for that too, so now I don’t have any money left.
I go back home and use the notebook to copy down a Sudoku board, I make a big mess of inky splotches and have to rip out the page. An old schoolmate comes over, he shows me a book he’s writing: the plot is about a rich young boy (self insert much? I think) with a kidnapped little sister. The book*I* am writing is much better, it’s about a genius little girl living in Victorian times.
He notices a picture of Narcissa Malfoy on the cover of one of my books, says she’s the most beautiful woman in all Harry Potter canon. I argue that would be Rowena Ravenclaw’s daughter, I try to google her but there’s something wrong: I’m writing her name on my notebook instead of a computer, and each two words I write, a drawing that combines both of them appears on paper. I immediately start combining pornographic words, and I’m still having fun with the results when my alarm rings, dangit.
I’m grocery shopping with my cousin, we find an aisle in the supermarket stocked with every kind of face masks: they are expensive, truly outrageously expensive, common surgical masks cost 20 bucks apiece and there’s one single N95 mask, orange, that costs more than 600 bucks. Still, we’ve been looking everywhere and we really need those masks, I want to call my dad and ask what to do but once again I only have an old phone on me. I look for “home” on the contacts list and a stranger answers: he’s using my childhood landline number, I feel weirdly angry and protective.
We go to my cousin’s place and have fried fish and chicken for lunch. Then I go to school and my old philosophy teacher is there, but this time he’s teaching math, even better. He’s graded yesterday’s tests, on mine I only wrote down half of the answers and that half I copied. He’s really angry with me, he asks why, oh why am I so bad at math? I explain it’s because I’m smart, I’m so smart that in primary school I never learned how to study, everything was so easy. And now that math is difficult I cannot study to save my life. He says he doesn’t believe me.
I go back home and around the dinner table I explain the situation. I say I cannot even be bothered to learn my classes’ schedule. My mother is very worried, she says I’ll need to do something if I want to pass my finals. I say that hopefully this pandemic will be over soon, I’ll be back to work and won’t have to go to school ever again. Who cares about my finals anyway? Everyone is shocked and angry at me.*
My sister who’s also at the table sends me to fetch her boyfriend’s dog. I walk to town and start looking at every person walking with a dog, hoping to recognize her. I eventually find her, she doesn’t look at all like his real life dog but she’s limping just like her. She’s pooped all over herself and has to be rushed home to get washed, as we wait my sister and I walk into a stationary store. I hope to find stickers but only find pretty notebooks.
*I want to point out once again that I’m an adult, I’ve been out of school for 15 years and I definitely passed my finals back then. WHY DO I KEEP DREAMING ABOUT THIS.
I’m at a train station trying to get home, there are some classmates with me. We check the timetables, only find one train going the right direction and it’s still hours away. There are only a few people around, I know today is supposed to be the town festival but everybody is quarantined at home.
As we climb the stairs to go look for the ticket booth, a classmate stops me. Wouldn’t I like to rent a car instead, she asks? It’s a service provided by the local hardware store and it’s only 16 bucks. I accept.
Now Steven Universe is the one who’s renting the service: along with a car it also offers a complete superpowers package. You only have to cover your body with transparent film (food wrap, basically) and you can jump very high and even fly. Steven is enjoying his new abilities and takes the chance to kiss a girl, but as soon as she feels the film on his lips she pushes him away, disgusted.
Steven isso upset he jumps on his rented car and crashes against a wall. At the hospital, while his body is in a coma, his spirit wakes up and doesn’t realize what happened; wearing only one of those backless hospital gowns, he skips around and dances outside in the garden.
I walk to the store, but once inside I see it’s a mix between it and my old job at the vet clinic. There is a young man at the counter, I buy something and he gives me change from the old cash register I’ve used so many times. I’m a bit annoyed seeing that he doesn’t use gloves to handle the money.
I try to be nice to him anyway, I ask where my old buddy the cat is and he says I can go in the back to look for her. I see a ramp of stairs with a long-haired tabby sitting on it, I call her name (I can’t remember it but it started with an “S”) and she jumps in my arms. Then I see my old boss, the vet’s wife, coming out from a door and I don’t want to be caught in here again when I should be quarantined, so I leave in a hurry.
I’m walking back home and it’s a beautiful spring day, the sky is a perfect blue. I realize with horror there are too many people in town, why is nobody respecting the lockdown?! I come across a whole wedding gathering, people are crowding around the groom and wife and clapping and taking pictures. I have to walk between them and I hold my breath, hoping and praying I won’t be infected.
The Mayor walks past me with the police, I wish they’re gonna arrest everybody. I go home and decide to self-quarantine in my room for the next two weeks, because I really want my dad to be safe.
I’m watching Star Wars on TV. Darth Vader is on screen, he is not wearing his armor and his flesh is red, burned and bleeding. He removes his helmet too, we see two big eyes, long eyelashes and eyebrows wincing in pain. I realize he’s actually played by Hayden Christensen, I don’t know how they convinced him to come back! Even weirder, he’s wearing a black wig that makes him look like Snape or Kylo Ren. He yells in pain and anger, and a stormtrooper runs over to help.
Now I’m watching the latest Critical Role episode. The battles are beautifully animated with the same style as Gorillaz’s videos. The episode ends with Nott being teleported away, and Matt says goodbye because the show is quarantined like everything else.
I try to go back home, but it’s raining now and there are too many people out and about, I realize with horror. Why aren’t they all in lockdown?! We are all gonna get sick! I decide to hold my breath and try desperately not to touch my face until I’m out of the crowd. A woman tries to grab me by the hand to beg for money, and I run away.
I end up at the store, my boss’ boss is there. She wants to know if I prepared the list she asked me to, I lie and say it’s on my tablet. I’m saved from further embarrassment by my dad, who burst in waving a piece of paper with a credit card glued on it: the government has sent me money, to make up for the fact that I’ll be quarantined at home for months. There are 750 bucks on the credit card, and I’m really excited because I’ll be able to buy myself a new computer now.
DECADE DREAM JOURNAL 