Terror

Standing breathless, eyes closed, with the smell of rot in my nostrils, I hear in the distance the whistle of the wind over the barren fields. The cold weight in my hand falls to the ground with a loud metallic echo.  The noise distant and fading until gone.  Silence only remaining.

I catch my breath, lift my chin, and I open my eyes to take in my surroundings.  Images of fields of trash, household junk, human waste in piles and hills surrounding me in every direction.  The mud at my feet enclosing my boots in a cementing case holding me captive, and then begins to cover slowly up the sides of my feet.  I am sinking slowly into the muck.  The pipe I was holding still rolling away behind me down into a shallow ravine, and then submerging slowly into a pond of black liquid.

No life, no movement, even the sky stands still frozen in time between sunset and midnight.  Clouds of black billow up outlining the most distant points of my sightline and move higher to join the stillness of the stars. A sense of loneliness being the only proof that life once existed here.

There before me is a distant point of light flickering like a candle becoming brighter, more consuming, and casting an illuminating glow to the changing surroundings as I walk instinctively toward the growing warmth.  In a blink, the scenery changes.  No longer am I surrounded by the desolate fields, the flickering light no longer candle like, and I am not alone.

Sitting with confidence and leisure on a bench, there is a man.  A dirty, tired, suspicious man who has a history of criminal intent written in his features, but tonight he is just tired and wants to go home.  In contrast, there sits next to him a woman, elderly in years, fearful of the man, clutching her handbag and umbrella close to her while she waits.  Neither notice me as I pass by.

Moving without walking, I am transported to another bench behind which is a rushing river of water.  One that should not be there and is not natural.  This water comes form some accident of man, not a spring-fed well of fresh natural water whose course has been running for decades or centuries.  This is an unexpected flood.

Panic over takes me as I notice my son, clothed in a red jacket, the only color I have seen, sleeping soundly on a rock behind the bench.  Gripping the sleeve of that jacked just as he rolls face forward into the rushing water, I am able to pull him to safety and clutch him in my embrace as only a mother can.  With a sense of relief at his safety, I open my eyes and look once again at the rushing river of water which nearly took my son from me.

There, further on past the rocks in the river in a small still pond, floats a small hand and arm sleeved in blue. The relief which erased the panic from my chest at my son's safety, disappeared to be replaced with fear and anxiety as my eyes moved up the sleeve to see floating just under the surface of the only still portion of the river a small blue eye.  Then a sound of terror breaks the silence which until that moment I had not realized was so noiseless.  A voice screaming a name.  Over and over and over, until finally that name was cried out in one final terrorizing death cry.  Not realizing it was my voice crying that name, I reached out to grab the small hand and pull that small figure from the waters clutch.  So awkward did this child move, not the limp puppet I expected, but stiff and cumbersome, almost fighting my efforts to pick him up.  So cold in my arm, so devoid of any warmth, that I could have been pulling a rock from the bed of the river and not a boy of no more than seven.  With a final pull, I latched on to the figure and disentangled him from the rivers hold.  All the while the sound of rushing water becoming louder and overwhelming my senses until I reach the safety of dry ground.

Placing the child down on a dry patch of earth, I push on his chest, and through tears of fright, I work with my limited knowledge and try to encourage a breath.  Those eyes defying me, those eyes reminding me, and that cold form confirming to me that I was to late. Violent sobs shudder through me as I feel hands grab hold of my arms to pull me back.  I open my eyes to look up into darkness again.

The cold chill of the flooding water now gone replaced only by a tightening in my chest and tingling down my arms.  The ticking of a clock and shadows on the walls alerting me of the hour, and the sound of even breathing near me a comforting reminder that I am home, the nightmare is over.  As I lay still waiting for the pain in my chest to ease, I look around the darkened room to anchor my mind in this world and not in the one I just left.

Thinking over the events of my dream, I am left with a disturbing thought.  How is it I was so sure that the child in death would not be limp?