Perchance to Dream

Jake opened his eyes and, as sleep-blurred vision reluctantly focussed, he stared up at the clouds in the night sky. There was something odd about the scene that his normally sharp brain refused to register. Raising himself up on both elbows, he shivered and was a little irritated as he realised how chilly the balmy midsummer evening had suddenly become. Vaguely, he wondered how long he could have been asleep.

A break in the clouds allowed the moon to briefly shine at full brilliance and Jake was mildly surprised by how big and orange it appeared. Glancing quickly around, he frowned, for he did not recognise the meadow in which, basking as he had been in the exceptional warmth of the late evening sun, his eyelids had earlier become heavy and then finally closed. The moon disappeared again behind the slow-moving clouds and then, no more than half a minute later, reappeared, but now it was somehow smaller, no longer looked the least bit orange, and more strangely yet, it was way over towards the west. Jake blinked and rubbed the last vestiges of sleep from his eyes. “What the hell?” he murmured, his frown deepening and furrowing his brow way beyond his hitherto remarkably untroubled twenty eight years.

Feeling suddenly unsure of almost everything, Jake got up, brushed perfunctorily at the back of his clothes and started towards home. The frown returned as it seemed to be much further in the dark than it had been getting there in daylight; and where was the gate he had climbed to get into the field in the first place? Peering ahead into apparently deepening gloom, he stumbled on some loose rocks or stones and stopped at once, staring wildly around him in gathering bewilderment that was rapidly approaching panic. Once again the clouds parted momentarily and cold fear gripped him as he made out the unmistakable reflection of moonlight coming from the surface of the sea, far below him, beyond the very edge of the cliff on which he was standing, no more than a small step from a long fall to certain death. “It can’t be,” he breathed, stepping hurriedly back from the brink on which he was perched, for the sea was more than a hundred and fifty miles from the meadow where had fallen asleep, only a short while ago.

Nervously, his heart pounding, Jake turned and slowly began to retrace his steps. After a hundred yards or so, he became aware of a deep rumpling sound behind him and the ground beginning to shake beneath his feet. Turning rapidly, his eyes full of fear, he peered into the gloom and could just make out movement in the distance. Bewildered, he continued to stare until he realised the movements were getting closer and the noise louder. Suddenly, incredulously, he understood and turned once more, breaking into a run, the cliffs continuing to fall away at an alarming rate behind him. “Earthquake!” was all he could think of by way of explanation while he ran headlong.

Presently, just when he thought he could run no further and the crumbling ground behind would finally catch and swallow him, Jake became aware that the noise had given way to an eerie silence and the ground no longer shook below him. At about that time the sky at last cleared somewhat and the huge orange moon bathed the area ahead in an other-worldly glow. Jake was hardly able to take advantage of the increased clarity of vision for some minutes. Bent double, with hands resting on knees that trembled weakly, his chest heaved desperately in an attempt to draw breath through a throat that was raw from the effort it had sustained and into lungs that screamed their pain at him. Finally, as his breathing eased and heart rate slowed to bearable, he stood up and surveyed the scene before him.

As far as Jake could determine, he was in the middle of a small field almost surrounded on all sides by a dark and forbidding forest. A distant movement silhouetted against the great disc of the strangely coloured moon caught his eye. Clearly it was a bird, but its motion appeared odd in some indefinable way. As the bird got closer, he realised that it had originally been further away than he had thought and was thus much larger than he had assumed. It grew steadily in size until he could make out a bizarre flying creature that looked like a cross between a giant bat and a huge lizard. Suddenly, its harsh, squawking cry loudly shattered the silence that had descended. Then it was only a short distance away and he saw, as it swooped directly towards him, that its appearance was as ugly as its call and he froze momentarily. His gaze focussed on the evil talons extended towards him and his blood turned to ice. Jake turned and ran for his life once again. The creature’s huge claws flashed out as it overtook him, slashing at his back and trying to grip him. He wrenched himself free and felt the claws gouge through shirt, skin and flesh, but at least it failed to hold him. Still exhausted from his previous exertions and now injured, Jake was unable to run very far or fast before he stumbled and fell face down in the damp grass of the meadow. He turned agonisingly onto his back to face the huge birdlike creature swooping in for the kill and, as it landed its crushing weight on his chest and he smelt the stench of its vile breath on his face, he passed out.

Jake fought off consciousness for as long as he could, but it eventually overwhelmed him and he opened his eyes to see his beautiful fiancée, Laura, smiling down at him. She was kneeling astride him there in the pale moonlight in the meadow and, the evening being so warm she wore only the thin dress that always made his pulse race. In an effort to wake him, she was alternately shaking him gently and kissing his lips, at which times he could feel the yielding softness of her very desirable body pressing down on his chest. He raised himself up on both elbows, just as he remembered doing earlier.

“You’re impossible,” she murmured, wrapping her arms around him and kissing him some more. “Fancy falling asleep like that! I was worried about you.” She cuddled him even tighter and giggled seductively and Jake realised with relief that it had all been a dreadful nightmare. Then she pulled back, staring at her hands. “Oh, my God!” she exclaimed in wide eyed alarm. “Jake! What happened? There’s blood all over your back!”

 

© Copyright Adam Frayle 2004 all rights reserved