Daily Dreaming

I was hiding in some undergrowth, trying my hardest to keep my breathing quiet. From a small gap I could look out onto the forest path ahead of me. A couple of metres along, a man stood silently surveying the surrounding area. Trying to keep as still as possible, I glanced to the left and right to see if anybody else was coming. It seemed to be just him. Hoping beyond hope that he would leave, I started counting the seconds. Surely before long he would get bored and move on… wouldn’t he?

After a very long time, during which my cramped position became increasingly unbearable to hold, the man finally walked further down the path. As soon as he was out of sight, I stretched my legs and arms to relieve the terrible cramp. As I did so, my leg touched a hard object that cracked. Hoping I hadn’t alerted anyone to the noise, I looked at what I had broken and then froze again. It was a human skull.

Now terrified, I hurriedly looked around again for any sign of life. There was some noise in the distance, towards the direction that the man had walked, so I decided to crawl the other way and hopefully escape this forest undetected. There was a metal fence behind me, and after reaching this I slowly shifted my body along the floor, following the barrier away from the overgrowth.

After an arduous crawl over painfully uneven terrain, I reached the end of the fence and found myself at a three-way gravel intersection surrounded on all sides by tall grass. One way led back where I had come from, and the other two paths led away from each other. I wasn’t sure where either path would take me, but before I had time to think there was a shrill cry from the forest and what sounded like a mass of bodies moving in unison. There was a group of people now heading towards me, and fast.

With a rush of adrenaline I bolted to the right, sprinting as fast as I could down the worn pathway. My eyes darted from side to side, watching for an ambush from the tall grass. When at last I had made it all the way to the end of the path and out of the forest, I didn’t even turn back. I kept going for as long as my legs would carry me, until at last I couldn’t move a step further. As I stood in the middle of a dusty road, panting and wheezing, I listened out for any further movement. Thankfully, there was none. I was safe.

—

Some time after, I was standing in a queue with my Nan at an airport check-in. Somehow, I had come back to a previous dream and was now ready to take my flight – except now my Nan was coming with me. All was not well, however, as the queue had not moved for a long time. For some reason, a few people in front of us were arguing with the staff about an issue relating to their boarding passes. I was tired, and getting bored with the wait.

When the arguing continued unabated for another ten minutes, other members of the queue began to voice their annoyance with the problem passengers. Tempers flared and it seemed as though a fight was about to break out, when suddenly an announcement over the tannoy stunned us all. The flight had been cancelled due to unforeseen circumstances.

I was so despondent at having to miss my trip, and my Nan could only comfort me as we walked through the airport back to the terminal carpark outside. As we waited for a taxi to take us home, I sat in a stoney silence with my eyes fixed ahead. When one finally arrived, I clambered into the back seat exhausted and ready for the day to be over.

The ride home was silent, but one final memory did stand out. As we were passing a set of traffic lights, I spotted a person who I remembered from school in a car opposite. He was running a red light, and suddenly with a loud crash his car went into an oncoming van. He had been a bit of a nuisance child when I knew him, and at least according to my dream nothing had changed in the years since.