nightmares

It's been a while since I had a dream I could remember. I must have had a bad one, because my sister woke me up last night to see if I was ok. I was calling out and crying, so much that she was scared. And when she woke me up, I couldn't remember why.

I fell back asleep had a series of dreams where I was responsible for things, children, possessions, that didn't actually belong to me, but that I cared about, That were... not important, important is the wrong word...precious? Precious, maybe.

A friend's baby from a bad birth. She was bleeding out and handed the baby to me as they wheeled her away to surgery. How could I take care of this? How could I keep it safe until she came back? I cradled it, called for help, regretted calling for help... a doctor from a competing hospital came, tried to take her away, saying he had to, he was the only one who could fix the baby's heart. I couldn't move as he left with her. Numb and panicking. Helpless. Distraught. Then her family finally showed up, and I couldn't speak to them because they only spoke Spanish. This huge barrier to understanding and communication as I struggled to tell them my friend was in surgery, there was a lot of blood, it was bad. Desperate. I watched their faces, as I tried to tell them. The confusion, horror, desperation. They wanted to know where the baby was. A doctor, I wept, a doctor from another hospital took her. I couldn't stop him. I just needed my friend and the baby back. I needed to fix it. I needed everyone to be happy. I needed to put it all back together again.

I panicked and wandered blindly out into the street, which was a church parking lot. I climbed tall steel rafters, in tow: a small Sunday school class of 5 young boys. Not mine, but, again...precious...and I was responsible for them. We were supposed to go to a certain room and wait for something. It was like herding cats. We were up like twelve stories. The room was unfinished, a wall missing on the side. Steel girders and beams criss-crossed the walls, the floor. I was trying to stay back from the open ledge, paralyzed by my fear of heights. The of the boys kept playing by it. One in particular kept hanging into a framing beam that went from the floor to the ceiling, and was spinning around it, out over the giant open drop. I was holding the other boys close to me. Pleading for him to stop and come back and wait. Trying to tell him how scared I was that he would fall, that we would all fall. That something horrible would happen. He swung around again, laughing. I lunged for him, but his hand slipped and he was falling. I had failed

I was in someone's basement. Well, not really a basement. The ground floor of a split level house. I went to open the door to a room, and realized I was in heels. But not just... normal... heels. Silver fetish heels. There were people upstairs who weren't supposed to know I was there. One hand was on the doorknob. The other was closed around something. I looked down at what it was. A silver riding crop. I was in black lingerie. I opened the door. The room was dark. A giant bed was in the middle of the room, but it was covered in all sorts of things that don't go on a bed, stacks of books and a trunk. A chest of drawers. Boxes of puzzles and games. Sealed boxes. I heard a low laugh and a hand grabbed at me in the dark. Slapped me. I turned and bit at the arm. There was no face, it was too dark, despite being able to see the things on the bed. I only saw parts of his body. Arms that pulled, clung, wandered, locked tight. I whipped him. He laughed, whimpered, enjoyed it, cried for more. I was weeping. I felt sick. But he wanted it and he mattered too much to say no. I was chased from the room by someone else, someone who was really going to hurt him. I was clawing at them, kicking, screaming to get back, to get in the way of him and the hurt. I was thrown to the ground, my ankles twisting in those stupid shoes. The door slammed in my face. I could hear him whimpering, pleading with whoever was behind the door now to stop. I banged my head against it. Pounded. Screamed. I had to stop what was happening. My legs wouldn't work. I was screaming. He started screaming. I was frantic and immeasurably upset, guilty, regret momentarily drowned out by panic and terror at what was happening behind the door.

I woke up.