2. Turning

The night's work begins by standing in a antique elevator. Dressed in my most basic attire, black shoes, black trousers and a white shirt with silver cufflinks, this is significant as I usually ignorant of how I am clothed, if I am visible to myself at all. I have more than enough time to note the sticky, gum grey floor tiles, the cushioned navy walls with sickly yellow lining and the rusted, grate door to which beyond is rushing like a boiling liquid, distant and shadowed. I look above and see nothing where a grated ceiling should be, I know exactly what it should look like, but it is not present. I rise slowly, the clog-spun nature of it reminiscent of a roller coaster as it reaches the peak, at least to my ears.


...


clk clk clk clk clk clk clk clk clk clk clk clack-crssh


...


I expected an instant drop. Rather, the grated door half-opens with a jolt while beyond the surreal steamage a wide-set pair of oaken doors open; at least ten feet in height and twice in width. The doors were two hands thick and covered in carvings with a Greek touch, naked warriors and lions in tessellation. I slip out of the elevator, stumble and crane my neck just in time to see the grated portal crash shut and the whole abomination collapses into the darkness.


...


Emerged, soaking in some burning liquid (I am certain this is a trapped memory of an incident with hydrochloric acid, amplified). I stumble along a hallway, narrow enough to lean this way and that to touch it's plumbless walls, my palm against the wilting wallpaper for guidance as I am near blinded by the vicious substance. I turn corner after corner, calling out names- such names, names of no one I know now or have known. I turn and turn until a piteous revelation is granted toward me.


...


The passage is a pentagon. I can not possibly, physically leave the area.


...


I open my blood-clotted eyes and study the walls for some insight. Wallpaper, what is left of it, a once-white. The wall itself is the colour of a child's bruise and covered in notes, the kind yourself might scribble in glee before decorating. What I found most striking was the clean stamps of missing photographs, parts had nothing but the odd non-photograph, other areas were covered in them, anti-portrait painting of what must of been a great family line.
The carpet offered no clues, again a besmirged white, like road snow. The ceiling was irritating to gaze upon, non-existent.


...


Eventually (I believe I had gone from clean shaved to rugged within this time) I felt no choice but to peer through the acidic chasm beyond the oaken doors. Knowing this is not a way out, surely not a way out, I crept dolefully toward it. These doors, to my shock, were much less ornate and much lesser in size than hitherto established. The doors were closed and required much force to open, I felt muscle strain and tendons pull, but after what seemed like the labour of an hour, I opened it. A gust of wind, like a breathe, was relinquished from the shaft. I gazed.


...
...
...


The dream finished there. My thoughts? I find a great difficulty in writing within the correct tense, my apologises, I both feel as though they have happened, and they are in some other, constant place. I can not describe it, timelessness is perhaps a suited noun? For another explanation, I am not a writer as such.


I awoke from this dream with a nose bleed. I found seeing myself covered in blood visually interesting, and took a moment to let my blood fall into the wash basin. Then I showered, dressed and removed the stains before eating. I find the whole affair most riveting; did I have this dream because my nose bled? Or could this dream cause a unconscious, violent bodily action?