Dreams

Leena knows dreams. Sometimes they are dark, flashes of shadows, indescribable and hard to identify. Like blurred black and white photographs, paintings from a time before time. These dreams are irritating, neither here nor there, waking is a state of confusion, and the answers are withheld from her. Leena hates when her own mind betrays her.

Sometimes they are white and cracking greys. Barred windows, the smell of urine and medical equipment. The air is rife with sound of screams, mutters, calls for doctors, cries and the clanks and squeaks of beds and trolleys being moved or wheeled or tidied. The banging of hands, feet and heads against the walls or furniture. And then the tight constraints of yellowing white cloth encasing her, tying her limbs to her torso, buckled tight and straining her elbows and shoulders.

She fights, she can feel the pain again, struggles, tears and jerks, screeches at the top of her lungs, the thick cloth and ties bite into her neck and wrists, red staining the light cloth. Hot flashes of pain that enrage her. She wakes, wrapped in her blanket, still fighting, wrists and neck stinging and aching, flesh remembering what the mind tries to deny. And oh, she hates these dreams just as much. They are testament to her past torments, moments of truth in her fantasy world.

And then there are the 'good' dreams. She stands tall, 5ft 4, with the curves of any woman. A black silk dress flatters her frame, hugging her shapely hips. Dark lipstick, she can feel it on her lips and she smiles. He looks back at her and it is bright in his eyes. Lust, love, adoration, need. As though he could survive simply by gazing at her beauty forever. She moves on top of him, hips against hips and lips against lips. Feverish kisses eagerly shared between them. And it is perfect, her world is perfect and the pleasure is almost too much-

As always she wakes, eyelids sliding apart and she curses, fists slamming into the sheets, the mattress, the fluffy pillows. She screeches, muffles the sound with a mouthful of soft, frilly sheet. A fucking babies room; stuffed toys, pink frills, a canopy and a child's princess bed. Her paintings on the walls the only part that feels hers. And her only comfort the black light truth behind those silly childish pictures. There is comfort in the lies, the darkness her stupid adoptive mother and that ridiculous nun cannot even begin to comprehend. So trusting, so naive to the real world.

Leena's favourite dreams happen during the day. Those moments when she sits by John and paints or draws or watches television or they simply talk. Inside she imagines his hands on her and it makes her smile harder, her heart beat faster. In the evening she cuddles into his side and imagines the house empty, Kate gone, the children asleep in bed and John with those needy eyes, loving her. The waking dreams are the best, and she can squirm and giggle and stifle gasps under his hands when he tickles her.

Those are the best dreams.