Do you dream?
by Meg Worden
“Do you dream?” Ana asked me. Her dark hair wet from the shower, she threads her fingers through it, pushing it away from her face, away from those mad black eyes rimmed with green.
She got the furthest into me, that Ana. I couldn't give her up. She was the most beautiful hyena I'd ever seen, I'd ever fucked. — But I didn't love her. It was more like I needed her. It was a problem, my stupidity. A problem I would pay dearly for. Megalomania is a kind of backwards leprosy. It rots your insides out while your skin glistens and grows tighter around your bones.
“I want to know everything about you, Oscar, do you dream?”
I kissed her mouth instead of answering. Kissed it hard and pressed my hand into the space between her belly and her hip, reached around and pulled her toward me. I gave her no choice but to respond to me because I couldn't give her what she really wanted.
Here is what I could have, should have said: I sleep the blackout sleep of death and drunkards. I sleep the blessed sleep of far away. I never dream of fire or flying. I never dream of losing myself, of wandering the dusty trailer lot behind the circus looking for that part of me that I have lost, my everlasting home.
But I didn't say that, I didn't say a goddamn thing. And now I know what I should have known then. There are no second chances for the soulless.
@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }
She got the furthest into me, that Ana. I couldn't give her up. She was the most beautiful hyena I'd ever seen, I'd ever fucked. — But I didn't love her. It was more like I needed her. It was a problem, my stupidity. A problem I would pay dearly for. Megalomania is a kind of backwards leprosy. It rots your insides out while your skin glistens and grows tighter around your bones.
“I want to know everything about you, Oscar, do you dream?”
I kissed her mouth instead of answering. Kissed it hard and pressed my hand into the space between her belly and her hip, reached around and pulled her toward me. I gave her no choice but to respond to me because I couldn't give her what she really wanted.
Here is what I could have, should have said: I sleep the blackout sleep of death and drunkards. I sleep the blessed sleep of far away. I never dream of fire or flying. I never dream of losing myself, of wandering the dusty trailer lot behind the circus looking for that part of me that I have lost, my everlasting home.
But I didn't say that, I didn't say a goddamn thing. And now I know what I should have known then. There are no second chances for the soulless.
@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }
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Author's Note
This is my first, never been published, Fictionaut story. I've been messing around with writing from a male perspective and this one happened.
Other stories by Meg Worden
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Any suggestions how to get rid of that html stuff at the end? Thanks.
i love this.
That html stuff is very annoying. I usually try cutting and pasting the text into an e-mail and sending it to myself and then pasting it here... if a word doc. is messing it up.
I try anything and everything but sometimes this just happens - but all you really need to do is hit return 10 times or so, and that html code stuff will be so far below the story it won't be seen.
Thanks for the love and the email and returnx10 tips.
Meg, You have some beautiful lines in here: megalomania and the entire dream paragraph. "I sleep the blackout sleep of death and drunkards." These are the interesting things of a lover's relationship, all the things you know about yourself but do not share. There is so much regret in the moment and later, making a "soulless" character both relateable and empathetic. Well done.
I thanked you on your page, Melanie...but am going to thank you here...just because Im so brand new to the site and I'm not sure how we get notifications..since there isn't a "reply" on our own page. Anyway. An extra thanks never hurt.
Ha, thanks for all the thanks! Seriously, though, this story stuck with me, and I reviewed it on my blog's Sunday Fictionaut review. Feel free to check it out if you'd like: http://thethingstheyread.wordpress.com/2010/12/12/sundays-fictionaut-fiction-nugget-do-you-dream/
Thanks again. Great story!
I gave her no choice but to respond to me because I couldn't give her what she really wanted.
LOVE this, Meg.
and this:
Megalomania is a kind of backwards leprosy.
All of it. And congrats on the review, too -- reading that next (thanks for the heads up, Melanie!)
Melanie, I'm honored. Thanks so much for the review. I loved it. It is the places where we humans branch off from conventional thought, the tight spaces where we house the parts of ourselves that we hope to show no one that are the most interesting, don't you think? Thanks again.
Thank you Sara, for your nice comments, and for reading.
Love "those mad black eyes rimmed with green." And the penultimate paragraph is pure blow-away.
So frustrating with the html! Imagine there's a more direct way, but what I do is paste into my email app (other apps might do as well), save, copy, then paste into page here.
If I may be so bold: using a male voice as a female writer, I'd suggest clarification first up, such as "“Do you dream, Oscar?” Ana asked me.
I love this! The soulless cannot dream... Powerful stuff. *
Thanks, Catherine. For the love and the helpful feedback. That use of Oscar would make sense.
Thank you Kim!
Lovely piece. Especially like
'wandering the dusty trailer lot behind the circus...'. *
Notepad can be useful, too.
Sorry it's taken me so long to reply to the...thanks so much for the comment, Mark. Glad you liked.