Too Foolish too Late

      It was a dark and stormy day. It was a dream.
      It had to be a dream. Yet, even now with the window rattling,
      Meghan could remember every detail. She lay staring up at the ceiling fan.
      She had seen last night recur in her mind.

                        There was an alley. The brick walls. The ankle deep snow.
                        A dumpster passed by, long and grey.
                        The men on the loading dock. ...

      Endlessly replaying the same sequence in her mind. The thunder shook her.
      Sandy stirred beside her. Sandy was everything to Meghan. She made their
      shady rooming house a home. "If I tell you about my dream, will you tell me you
      still love me?" Meghan asked her girl friend. Her voiced dropped to a deep creek.
      Sandy sat up and hugged Meghan. She nodded and hugged her tight.

                          "I was sound asleep, but I could feel the snow on my bare feet.
                          I wasn't scared, but I started running down this alley.
                          There was a long grey dumpster and then some men working.
                          Oh, God, they raped me. They tore at my nightgown ..
                          I could feel their fingers and smell their breath. They reeked of
                          cigarets and beer. They came all over me."

      Meghan showed her torn nightgown and stains to Sandy. "S-sick." Sandy cussed.
      She felt the damp gown and sniffed. "I can smell it. The beer and cigarets and
      cum." Sandy stood up out of bed and pressed her forehead with her hands.
      "You slut! You never could stop fucking with men!" Sandy raced to the toilet by
      the sink and vomited into it. She got a beer from the tiny refrigerator under the
      sink. "It was a dream! I-I couldn't wake up." Meghan knelt beside Sandy and wet
      her lovers face with a scrubbing towel. Meghan felt a lump in the pocket of her
      nightgown and pulled out a wad of cash. "Oh! You filthy whore!" Sandy slapped
      Meghan across the face. Meghan's nose began to bleed.

      Meghan looked up from the toilet to the tiny shrine of the Virgin Mary over the sink.
      "I didn't do it! I-I was asleep." she sobbed into her hands full of cash.
      "You are sick!" Sandy growled and tore the cash from Meghan's hands.
      "Fuck! There's over a thousand dollars here!" Sandy blurted and kissed Meghan.
      Meghan smiled with tears rolling down her face. "You keep sleep walking and
      will get out of this dump." Sandy pulled off Meghan's torn nightgown and washed
      her with the scrubbing towel...

              "A dream." Meghan repeated as she went to bed, "It was just a dream."
      But, she didn't believe it. Something had happened that night.
      That terrible night on Christmas Eve.+


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        V