Two Dreams and One Call by Mike Bozart - HTML preview

another pSecret pSociety pshort pstory

Two Dreams and One Call by Mike Bozart (Agent 33) | Jan. 2019

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two Dreams and One Call

by Mike Bozart

© 2019 Mike Bozart 

 

 

 

Sunday night, December 30, 2018. I was in a bit of intestinal distress and severe pelvic pain once again, so I started drinking one porter beer after another. (I know, not too bright.) I threw down some antacid tablets in between bottles. When the six pack was extinguished, I popped the cork on a bottle of Merlot that I had received as a Christmas gift. I slugged the first glass down with a lozenge billed ‘the killer of all pains’ according to my longtime musician-friend Les. [of the band White Elephant] In short order, the distressing sensation had moved onto someone somewhere else. Pity him/her. I mused: Ah, thank God, I can finally relax on my extended holiday vacation.

For some strange reason – perhaps my love of irrationally divisible prime numbers, I then started toying with the number 7 on an old, light-powered, scientific calculator at the foot of our queen-size bed. (Monique, Agent 32, my charming Filipina wife, was watching Cebuano videos on her smartphone at the head of the bed.)

I quickly noticed that the same looping string of six repeating digits appeared in all sevenths. One seventh was (and still is) equal to .142857; two sevenths, .285714; three sevenths, .428571; four sevenths, .571428; five sevenths, .714285; and six sevenths, .857142. I was soon conjuring up a ‘sevenths clock’. Maybe in seven dimensions? Or, just six? +3,-2,+6,-3,+2,-6. A natural symmetrical code.

“I’m tired; I’m going to sleep now,” Monique suddenly announced as she hooked up her phone to the charger jack.

I looked at our bedside digital clock. The red numerals blared: 1:42. And 8.57 seconds?

“Ok, I’m ready to crash, too, hon. It’s way past this 54-year-old’s bedtime.” Wow! The time sure flew by after taking that pill. Wonder what the active ingredient is. Must ask Les.

<click> The lights were out in our east Charlotte [NC, USA] basement bedroom. I think I lost consciousness just before Monique. It was a photo finish. Upon further review …

After several months of not having any memorable dreams, I would have a vivid duplet in a single night. In the first one, Kurt Harris (agent no. lost to housekeeping), James ‘Frank’ Rick (Agent 107) and I (Agent 33) were passing around the herbal peace pipe in Kurt’s audiophile-outfitted, album-cover-wallpapered, Lake Forest [an older east Charlotte neighborhood] living room. Then fifty-something, husky, Caucasian, short-blonde-haired Kurt left Frank and I to flip over a King Crimson LP on his high-end turntable. Some lucidity crept in. I looked at dark-haired, slim, Caucasian, forty-something Frank and whispered: “But, Kurt is dead.” [This major prog-rock – especially Steven Wilson – enthusiast died on March 9, 2018.]

Frank bent his wrists, palms-up, and slowly mouthed: “And so am I.” [My best man died on January 6, 2013.]

For a moment I actually thought I was dead, too, and that this was just a gathering of ghosts. Then I abruptly awoke. I had to pee. It was 5:05 AM. What a dream that was! Don’t think that I’ve ever had a dream that involved two deceased friends. Is it a poignant portent? An auspicious augury augering [sic] my perforated skull? What madness I muse.

Once back in the bed beside a peacefully slumbering Monique, I was re-asleep in 1.42857 minutes (85.7142 seconds).

The second dream was surprisingly violent. And most startlingly, I was the killer. I think that it was – yes, I am sure – the first time that I ever murdered someone in a dream. I was shocked when I awoke to the sound of a text alert on my semi-smart phone (which rests under my pillow in a void where nothing can depress the main key).

The just-received text was from my Manhattan-penthouse-apartment-residing pal Al Niño; it read:

Yes, it will be a ‘marry’ New Year for me. Hope you can make it to Hawaii in May for our wedding.

I pondered his text for a few seconds. Did I wish him a ‘merry’ New Year last night? Yep, I sure did. Don’t remember doing that. Must have been wholly inebriated.

I re-texted him.

Would love to, but don’t think I will have the bucks. On a meager budget these days. All the best to you two lovebirds.

Five minutes later, at a gray-gloom-in-the-side-window 8:57 AM, my small form-factor LG phone rang. It was Al.

“Well, hello there, amazing one,” I pompously announced.

Monique just gave me an odd look and shook her head.

Al then spoofed an old answering-machine message of mine from nearly three decades ago. “Thanks for calling Tryke Labs North America. Amazingly, none of our 3,700 employees are available right now, but if you could leave a covert message, we will decipher it back to you at our earliest convenience.”

“Ok, ok. Stop. I’m cringing.”

“Listen, Mykus Trykus, [sic] the reason I called is to inform you that our wedding date has been moved up a week, as our Mauna Kea villa was double-booked somehow.” Somehow?

“Wish we could go, Al, but, well, you know … three-digit greenbacks are scarce these days.”

“Yeah, I know, buddy, but if your cash flow improves, come on out. I’ll buy you and Monique two rounds of tropical mixed drinks.” How about two roundtrip airline tickets?

“Well, thanks. We’ll see what happens.”

“So, tell me, Michael, what is your current story?” Al asked in a nasally, crazy-sounding voice. Ah, the ‘Michael’ bit again. Never fails.

“Well, I had two wild dreams last night. I may write them up.”

“Asian twin sisters and ladyboy dessert?” Ladyboner. [sic]

“No, nothing sexual this time.”

“Ok, tell me your two dreams, Michael. Give me succinct summaries, as I don’t have long. I’ve got a conference call at 9:30, and I will need to get some data together first.” I’ve heard this before.

“First dream: Getting stoned with a pair of old friends in east Charlotte, except that these two guys are both dead. What do you read into that?”

“Typical for over-fifty people like us. I’ve had such dreams, too. Next.” Typical?

“Second dream: I’m in a motley group of a dozen or so rock climbers. It’s a precarious ascent: very steep and craggy – probably a seventy-seven-degree angle – essentially a sheer cliff. One slip and it’s bye-bye.” 77º?

“Ah, another falling dream. That’s not good. Falling is failing, brother.”

“No, I didn’t fall in this one, Al. I made it up to the pinnacle. However, while climbing up this rocky bluff, I had to step over a sleeping climber. He was ensconced in a nook.” Not a cranny?

“Why is someone sleeping on a steep cliff?” Al enquired.

“I think that he was a drug addict. Yeah, that was it. Apparently he shot up [heroin] and passed out.”

“Ok, continue, but promptly wrap it up, Michael.”

“Well, just as I reach the summit, which is about thirty feet [nine meters] above his little napping spot, I hear him yelling: “I’m going to get whoever kicked those pebbles down on me!”

“But, can he climb in his condition?”

“He’s still impaired, but he manages to slowly start pulling his rubbery, middle-aged, Caucasian body over the cubic mini-ledges. About ten feet [three meters] from the top, he makes eye contact with me. His face is engulfed by an insane rage. He screams: “Bozart, I’m going to KILL you! I know that YOU did it!”

“Ok, you’ve piqued my interest. Please continue, Michael.”

“Well, I’m sweating it, because you know me, Al; I’m a conflict avoider.” Or deflector.

“Yes, I know. I am, too. So, what happens next?”

“I glance down and think of something diplomatic to say. You know, a phrase that will defuse the hostility before he alights for hand-to-hand, fight-to-the-death combat on the peak.”

“Keep going, Michael. Don’t trip up now.” Oh, boy.

“Well, Al, I see this twenty-two-pound [10 kg] granite mini-boulder and something snaps.” Twenty-two pounds?

“Wait. How do you know the exact weight?”

“That’s a hyperextended story, Al.”

“Forget it. Ok, finish it up. You’ve got one minute.”

“I immediately pick up the bowling-ball-size stone with both hands and raise it above my head, just like a throw-in in a soccer [football] match. I see him look up at me as I hurl the round rock down with full force.”

“But, you miss. Dreams are like that, Michael. Very frustrating.” Sure wish he would stop with the Michaels.

“No, Al, the small boulder smashes right into the center of his receding-hairline, alabaster-white forehead. I mean it was flush – dead on. He is immediately dislodged from the mountainside. As the worthless humanimal [sic] falls back-first, I see pure shock on his horrified, now-bloody face.” Humanimal?

“And, you feel bad, and your dream resets for a conscience-clearing do-over.”

“Wrong, Al. I laugh mockingly as his body slams into some humongous boulders one hundred meters [328 feet] below at the base of the propitious precipice.”

“Propitious precipice? Are you recording this call?”

“You’ll find out in two weeks. Anyway, instead of feeling remorse, it was supreme liberation. The other climbers were cheering. He had bullied and harassed them on the expedition as well.”

“What did this guy look like?”

“He was a composite, Al, of the miscellaneous jerkwads that I’ve encountered over the decades in Charlotte.”

“You may have a deep-seated anger issue, buddy. It might be good to see a therapist.”

“Ha-ha-ha. No, I’m not mad enough to do anything like that to anyone. It’s just dreamland weirdness.”

“But dreams are manifestations of real-life issues, Michael.”

“Hey now, I’ve seen your oh-so-serene veneer crack, Al.”

<click>