The house where I lived in the bad dream I had last night was here in the city, and it stood close to the street. I was renting an upstairs room there. The tiny front yard was paved over, and it was filled with shopping carts; the woman who was my landlady used them or maybe rented them out. In the story of the dream in my head, the lady would stomp down the front steps and shove the carts together or else against the chain link fence; she would move and rearrange and struggle with them every morning.
I didn’t know the landlady. Somehow I had never spoken with her. I supposed I would, someday.
Then it was night and I was in bed, listening to the sounds outside–the little wheels scraping around, the carts agitating; somebody was pushing them around hard, then harder. The landlady must be upset, I thought. And then suddenly I could hear her downstairs. She was screaming. First, one wordless, hysterical, angry sentence of a scream. I wanted to block it out as soon as I heard it. Then the screaming continued. She was completely losing her shit. I didn’t want to be where I was.
It seemed she was coming up the stairs with that voice of hers. She was screaming something but I couldn’t make out what. My head was foggy from sleep, and but I knew I had to figure out what was going on. I didn’t know what I was going to do when she got to my room but I would have to act quickly. She was definitely coming up the stairs and I could hear her feet. My head was so heavy and it was all I could do to lift it, and my mind pushed and pushed until it woke me up.
And how was your Sunday night?
