Sliding Away

I'm part of an internship called The Honor Academy. Today we have traveled to a large field with a 32 story slide. The interns slide down the massive structure. I take my turn. The ride is thrilling and fast.

I'm standing out in the field with a group of friends when I notice a sliding intern flying from the ride. Their body imitates a ragdoll as it falls through the air and crashes hard into the ground. Before our eyes, bodies of interns fly through the air and land in different parts of the field. I run to the nearby woods and hide behind trees avoiding the out of control bodies.

When the falling stops, we the living run to the opposite corner of the field where there is a door. The door lets us out.

I wake up

Sleep Talk Halloween Special

For the first time in the history of the Sleep Talk blog, I am going to document another person's dreams, my mothers.

In the year 1996, my mom and me were sitting on my bed talking and she decided to tell me of a series of nightmares that she had had several years earlier, before I was born. When she told me the dreams, I was so unnerved that I jolted out of my bed and left the room. Since that night, I have never forgotten them.

The series of nightmares occurred within a week in the year 1987. At the time, my father worked nights and my mom was home alone with my older sister, Kristen,  a newborn.

The following is told by my mother's perspective.


First Night

I'm lying in bed late at night. My husband is at work. I am alone. I hear the front door slam downstairs. Dream ends.

Second Night

I'm lying in bed late at night. My husband is at work. I am alone. I hear the front door slam downstairs. I hear footsteps trudging up the stairs toward my bedroom. Dream ends.

Third Night

I'm lying in bed late at night. My husband is at work. I am alone. I hear the front door slam downstairs. I turn over in my bed and through the darkness, see a man sitting on a stool in the corner of my room. I can't make out his face. I hear footsteps trudging up the stairs. I hear someone come into my room. He walks over to my bed. I turn over, look up and see a man standing by my bedside. He gets in bed with me. Dream ends.

Fourth Night

I'm lying in bed late at night. My husband is asleep next to me. I look and see a man standing in the doorway to the hall. Dream ends.

I wake up



On the fourth night, my mom was so startled from her dream, she woke up screaming. My dad calmed her. They then walked through the house and prayed over each room. After that night, the series of nightmares ended.

Happy Halloween From Sleep Talk

The Body

A Dream From The Past

A man similar to Jesse Pinkman - from Breaking Bad - walks into my work area. We are the only people here. For some unknown reason, we get into a fight and I kill him. I try to think quickly on how to hide the body. A man from the business next door comes over to talk or ask a question. I quickly throw a tarp over the body and try to hide it the best I can. Part of me thinks the man from next door saw the body. When the man leaves I dig a shallow grave and bury the body in the corner of a junkyard. The police are called. They come and search the premises. The body is found. I am handcuffed and dragged off to prison. Dream ends.

I wake up.

Dialysis Massacre

Nightmare 4/1/2017

I'm inside a dialysis center. My treatment is going when my nurse practitioner asks the other nurses and techs if the police are dealing with the situation outside. He talks about it like he is trying to hide something from us. As time goes by, we come to realize that there are several men outside with guns shooting at people. The police have arrived and are trying to defuse the situation.

At one point, we are told to get down on the floor and not to move. I am lying in between two other men, one is Chinese. At one point, I lift my head up and look over at the window. I see one of the gunmen with his face up against the outside of the window looking in. I immediately freeze in fear. I try to stay down and not move a muscle. BOOM!!! He shoots inside the room. I hear the gun go off several times. He is shooting at the dialysis patients. BOOM!!! the man beside me gets shot. I am waiting for the bullet to hit me. BOOM!!! A bullet hits me in the lower left side of my back.

After several minutes of terror, the police finally take down the gunmen. When I walk outside I tell someone that I've been shot. I can feel it when I rub my fingers across my back. It feels like a bump but I can actually feel the bullet inside of me. The person asks me why I haven't told anyone until now that I was shot. Dream ends.

I wake up.

Escape

Dream 2/21/2017

     I'm running through an uptown high rise trying to escape the men chasing me. I make it to the roof. The bad guys are right on my heals. If I don't hide quick, they will see me so I slowly start to shimmy down the side of the building. The bad guys catch up and one of them points me out. They start shooting. The next floor down has a strange walkway on the side of the building. I make it to the walkway where they can't see me. I hear one of them say to the other, "I think he fell.".

I run.

     The walkway wraps around the building so I run all the way to the other side. I climb back up onto the roof from the other side. One of the goons sees me and pulls his gun. I pull a revolver and shoot faster. He falls to the ground. Dead. The men on the other side must've heard the shot so in a panic I find my way to the escape.

     I meet up with my group of people. We try to make it out of the building together. I see one of my friends halfway down a hallway. Behind her appears a girl who is bad. I aim my gun the best I can and shoot. My friend falls to the ground. I shot her in the stomach. The bad girl gets away. Dream ends.

I WAKE UP

Paperback Writer

Dream 2/11/2017

     The town I am in is nearly empty. Dead. Nobody is here except for the ferry operators. The ferry is a hover ship. It hovers twenty feet above the ground. I take the ferry and tour the ghost city.

     In South Africa, I visit a library. Whenever I visit a bookstore or library, especially one in another part of the world, I like to check if they have any of my published books. I move down the last names of each book on the shelf until I get to "Laverty." Wow, they have one. All the way in South Africa. I grab it. It's my guitar tutorial book. It teaches beginning guitar students how to play chords and then songs with those chords. This particular book seems to have been used a lot. The pages are frazzled and there are papers left inside, probably from the last user.

     The clerk asks if I want to check that one out. I mention that I'm just looking at it because I wrote it. He is pleasantly surprised and tells me that I can just have it if I want. I tell him, "no, it looks like it's getting good use here." I put it back on the shelf. Dream ends.

I WAKE UP. 

Obstacle

Dream 2/2/17

     Today my class has taken a field trip to place with a bookstore inside a gymnasium. A friend of mine, who died several years ago, is back from the dead. I ask him what Heaven is like. He answers, "if you had muscles when you died, you will have those same muscles up there." I say, "What if you didn't have muscles?" He responds, "you can buy new ones." Right then, another friend comes to inform me that one of my stories has been published in a book. I go and buy it. I've spent so much money today on souvenirs. I open up the book and read my story. It's about a military commander during one of the great wars.

     Something else here is a giant obstacle course that reaches as high as the sky. It has so many levels to it and each level is different. There are several pathways to the top. Whoever gets to the top gets a prize. I start. I am determined to make it. I know I was never athletic but this is my chance to show my friends that I'm not a waste of skin. Different people go different ways. At one point I am with one group of people and at other points I'm with another. The obstacle course can trick you as well. It can make you think that a slide will take you downward, something that you wouldn't want, but then it could take you to a spot that has an easy access to the next level. The group I am in hits a dead end or a spot that we don't want to traverse. I take a slide that I think will take me back to the spot that I was just at, but instead, it takes me several levels down. I am so frustrated. But I am even more determined. I climb back up.

     I make it to the trickiest part of the course. It looks like one of those big slides you find at the fair but with the material of a bouncy house. The trick is that the people who have made it up faster are at one side of the slide with dodge balls. They throw the balls at the people coming down and if the sliders get hit, they have to return all the way to the ground to start again. The sliders have to slide on rafts. Several people can slide at once. If one makes it to the other side without getting hit, there is a conveyor belt that will take them up a few levels. It gives you time to rest and breathe. A girl from my class comes sliding from the other side to my side, I don't think she is looking, so I grab a ball and throw it at her. Right then, she turns and catches the ball. That means that I must go back down to the ground level. I am so disappointed that I want to cry. I feel the tears welling up in my eyes.

     There is a giant exit slide that takes you far down. I sit and slide. I pass some others on the way. It doesn't take me all the way to the bottom level, just a few levels above. So I explore those levels and take slides down. When I get to the second level, I find a hidden room with a hole in the floor. I look down the hole, at the bottom is a giant cushion. I jump down. I land on the ground level. I start heading over to the start once again. Everyone on the ground floor is playing a round of paint ball or dodge ball. There is a kid with a running chainsaw. He almost slices me with it on accident. I let a few expletives fly his way, telling him how stupid he is for using a running chainsaw so carelessly. I get to the start again. I remember thinking that It is going to take me hours before I get back to the point where I was eliminated. I begin. Dream ends.

I wake up

The Middle

Dream 1-30-14

Some friends and me are being chased through the woods. I don't know whose chasing us, all I know is that they are our enemy. We come to an ocean. On the banks of the water is a dock. Attached to the dock is a small motorboat. We run to the boat, climb into it, start it up and jam out of there. 

Moving across the ocean, we see an island. We head toward it. When we land on the island we notice that this island is not deserted. People live here. In front of us, just a hundred feet off the beach, are buildings. They don't have the luxury of the houses I know. They look like they were built by natives..

We walk into the village. Were accepted. 

That night, we have a bonfire. In fact, from what I notice, There are several bonfires throughout the village. 

When the sun is up again, we get back into our boat. We start toward the mainland. We make it past the ocean waves to the sandy beach. We climb out. We start walking back through the patch of woodland. 

We come across our people. They are at war as we speak. They are standing parallel to the enemy. Each side is shooting arrows at each other. I run to the middle land of where the battle is occurring. I try to stop the war between the two sides. Suddenly, I am shot through the chest by an arrow. I fall to the ground dead. Dream ends.

I wake up.

The Murder

Nightmare 6-3-13 

I'm in a hotel room sitting with another boy. His heart is full of evil. There are a couple of kids here as well. The evil boy starts to rape one of the kids. I grab the children and run. We escape the room and make it through the hallway to the elevator. In the downstairs lobby, I wait for the boy with evil in his heart. The elevator doors open, and I walk toward him. I start to beat him senselessly. I punch him time and time again. There is blood covering him, me, and the lobby floor. I take one last look at him. I think he is dead. I don't feel bad for what I've done. Dream ends.

I wake up.