Dreamscapes: Only You Can Prevent Rage Fires
No sense crying over weaponized espresso
I am painting with espresso from a little paper cup. I keep dropping a pair of earrings on the floor. My brothers are crowding me while I’m trying to paint, because they want to paint too, but without me. My stepfather walks over and asks what the ruckus is. I tell him, “I am almost done painting and then they can have a turn,” but he says, “Oh, just let them paint.” My brothers try to elbow me out again, and I grab the cup and throw it. Coffee splatters everywhere. I regret it at once.
My stepfather flies immediately into a rage. I race out the door, my painting clutched in my fist, and he chases me. I am several steps ahead of him, and as I look back, I throw my painting on the lawn. With barely a thought, I shoot my hand out toward it and use my powers to set it on fire. I feel hot rage rippling through me as the flames curl the edges of the paper, and as I continue running, I see that all around and ahead of me are trees. I am terrified that in my untempered fury I will set the whole forest ablaze. My fear and anger are nearly choking me, and then I see waves crashing on a small beach, and I charge into the water, still shaking. This will help. The water will prevent a fire. Suddenly I am naked.
I realize this is my punishment for throwing the coffee, and I am trying to hold in my rage, but I say, “How am I supposed to sleep with all these fucking paint cans around me?”
A group of people at a picnic table between the ocean and the woods seem to be ignoring us. I look behind me at my stepfather. I say, crying, “I’m so afraid I’m going to catch everything on fire.” He says nothing. I step out of the water, and I am about to turn back home when I see a hand reaching out to me. The hand is made of tree branches, and it is coming out of a tree. I reach my hand out and take it, and it has me follow a long arm snaking through the tops of a line of trees, leading all the way to the entrance of a cave. There is a plaque there that bears a woman’s name. This is her dungeon. My heart suddenly goes cold and I think, ‘No, that place is bad, I will not go in there,’ and I run all the way back to my home. I am clothed again.
The house is a now a new house that my stepfather has just purchased. He opens the door and I apologize to him for throwing the cup of espresso. “I never should have done it,” I say, and he forgives me and welcomes me back in. I begin to look for my room. I see a room with someone painting a still life of flowers in, but it is not mine. I look at a few more rooms but I still haven’t found it. I finally say to my mother, “I can’t find my room.” She points at a bed on the floor, surrounded by paint cans, in a tiny block of space. “He took the walls off your room,” she says. I realize this is my punishment for throwing the coffee, and I am trying to hold in my rage, but I say, “How am I supposed to sleep with all these fucking paint cans around me?” My stepfather begins to get angry at me again. I run outside to cool off, and after a while, I come back in to try to sleep.
I get into my bed, but my mother’s bed is right next to it, and she snores loudly. I realize I will never be able to sleep with that noise, so I get up out of my bed. I pass my brothers in the living room; they are watching cartoons. It is supposed to be nighttime but it is still light outside. I step out the door and walk for a while until I come upon large rocks. There is a woman there, and we begin to talk. The last thing she asks is, “You haven’t been to the dungeon yet?”