I dream that I’m waiting and waiting to be allowed back to work (just like I’m waiting IRL). It’s raining, like it often happens in my dreams, and it’s New Year. Ronald Dump, the oaf president, is on TV, chugging a bottle of Champagne. He’s looking down from his balcony wearing a night robe, fat and disgusting. A tall figure appears behind him, Drumpf is too drunk to notice. He’s gonna push him, he’s gonna push him, the whole word prays, eyes glued to the TV.
My alarm rings, I sigh in frustration. I really wanted to watch that murder going down.
It’s a Friday and it’s the second to last day of middle school. My cousin G. wants to end things in style by bombing the place, I’m helping her out even if I don’t approve: I’m actually gonna try to sabotage the bomb when she’s not looking. She’s so proud to have me on her team, hugs me and tells our classmates we’ve known each other “since we were babies”.
I see my chance when she mentions she can’t wait to go dance on Saturday night, I casually remind her we’re gonna bomb the school and we’ll all be dead by then. She looks taken aback, like she didn’t think things through. She starts quietly counting on her fingers, and I know I’m about to change her mind.
I go home and tell everyone I’m carrying a bomb, but not to worry, everything is under control. Meanwhile, can my parents help me bring all my stuff home from my classroom? I’m pretty sure I’m not gonna be back, I’ve had to repeat this school year over and over and over and over again in my dreams, hell, even my little brother is starting middle school and is about to catch up with me.
The next day my cousin confesses the bomb was only a bunch of New Year fireworks, and if we launch them in the park it’s probably gonna be okay. I rush to do so, meanwhile she travels to a far away kingdom: the king’s brother is forced to wear a red woman’s dress to entertain the castle, she wants to rescue him because she’s in love with him. I think the whole thing is way too heteronormative, but the man is a blonde viking very upset with the whole situation, hopefully he’ll be grateful enough to marry her.
I’m walking in the countryside with my dad, through stone roads and picturesque cottages. We can hear a bird trilling from a cage in someone’s yard, Dad remarks out loud about how annoying that is. The owner of the bird hears this and comes outside, angry at us: I wait for Dad to walk away, then take her hands in mine (they are small and stubby) and whisper an apology.
“I’m a good person, I’ve never beat anyone in my life!” the woman tells me, pouting.
“I wish I could say the same about my dad,” I reply, and walk away.
We leave the road and pass a wooden gate into a muddy path, and along the way I take cute pictures of pigeons. At the end of the path, in the middle of a clearing in the trees, there’s a small wooden house. A tiny old man greets us at the door, he looks vaguely familiar and Dad introduces him as a distant relative. He invites us inside.
The man’s wife shakes my hand: she is younger and portly, gives me an impression of energy and determination. I discover she is the leader of a political resistance and is trying to unionize a group of factory workers.
I’m now in the factory, I see the workers have received a secret message from their rebel leader. They gather in a room looking for something, they peep from a hole in the wall. Outside the room, their supervisor is growing suspicious: he’s a gaunt young man, he starts asking me too many questions. I’m standing next to a child, my little brother, and we both lie to him, tell him the secrete message was just someone calling a wrong number.
The workers emerge from the room, kidnap their supervisor and rape him with a rusty iron pole. I watch the whole thing, and while I believe the supervisor was enjoying himself, I still feel incredibly scared and guilty. I run back to the small wooden house and when my dad finds me, I lie and say I was there all day and never left.
I feel so guilty that, back home, I frantically try to erase my GPS history, I’m convinced I’m gonna be arrested. It’s hot outside, summer, my cousin G. wants to get me out of the house and have fun. She gives me an olive shirt and suggests I keep the buttons open with a small magnet, to show off my chest. Don’t I want to meet cute boys?! I say I don’t want to meet any boys and refuse to leave the house.
It’s New Year’s Eve. We all gather around the dinner table, a little bit dumbfounded. How can it be 2021 already, where did time go? I don’t have a journal for the new year, I don’t have any stickers, I don’t have a calendar. Then it downs on me: it’s still June, and we’ve been tricked. Is it the police? I check the online forums for traces I might have left behind. Then I wake up and I am very relieved to realize I’m not about to be arrested after all.
DECADE DREAM JOURNAL 