Dreamland

Is there somebody with whom I could talk about my problems? Only talking about my tattoo almost brought me to a mental clinic to be analysed throughout, and I spoke only with my best friend about it.

If I were to talk with my parents about my problems, their first action would be to forbid me any use of the dream interface and then send me to a doctor.

What else could they do?

What will the doctor do? He would probably think I have some sort of paranoia, craziness, or disorder, even if one may explain things later in a normal, natural,... witchy way.

If I am really a witch, by some weird chance, what would happen to me? Hm, somebody who can make things happen only by thinking of them? In the best case, I'll end up classified as a potential threat and get locked up for my protection... In the worst case, as an imminent threat... and get locked up for their protection.

Either this is real, and then I am a threat, or this is not real, and then I am crazy, so crazy that I cannot discern imagination from reality. I get locked up in both cases.

Wow, I have the winning ticket in all cases!

There is also the possibility this can be explained logically, but I cannot stretch my imagination to find out the answer now. I'll need time to find out, and the best chance to do that is if I do not get locked.

Having arrived at this conclusion significantly reduced my desire to talk about myself.

Once we entered our home, Lola started to talk again. She has been strangely effusive before with the officer, but maybe this is her way of coping with the shock.

“I was so afraid… I saw fire all around me… but I did not feel anything. I could not move. It was that thing you see in horror movies when you see fire right near your face and you cannot move. I was frozen. Then you came and took me out. Only after that could I move. How comes you got burnt, and I did not?"

“There was a fire outside, and I had to open the door to reach you. That's when I got burned.”

I don't know how I managed to say this. I did not know what to say.

She was nodding, trying to understand.

“I wonder why I could not move?"

I shrugged, not knowing what and how to answer. Should I tell her what my inner voice had said? That her neck was broken? I hesitated, too afraid to tell it:

"Maybe you were in shock? Or maybe it was simply the seatbelt? I had to release it."

She nodded. She had seen me opening it.

There was a mix of emotions swirling in my chest. I felt guilty: this would not have happened without me wanting to show her my tattoo. I felt fear, fear of what would happen to me if more people learned what I could do. Santa Dolores is healing your wounds! No, it would not go like that. How much can I heal? What are the consequences? There is nothing in this world that happens without a countereffect. No energy comes out of nothing; it only transforms.

So what are the consequences? I'll need to take a test person and see.

I felt anger that she wanted to bring me against my will to a doctor, but I also felt gratitude that she tried to do her best.

As I went towards the living room, I realised she did not follow me.

I turned to look back.

"What are you doing?"

She must have gone into the kitchen. I hurried there, a bit worried. What does she want to do? When I entered, I saw that she had already turned on the gas and wanted to put her hand into the fire.

I yelled:

“What do you do?"

“I want to see it like it was? Like I saw it happening?”

I sighed, grabbing her hand:

“This is nonsense Lola; you will burn yourself!!? Now look, you have not been in the fire; the fire was around you but not on you. It was luck that you came away before it burned you!”

"But what's this on my clothes?"

"Soot. Lucky only that is burnt..."

"And some of my hair strands are gone!"

"Hair does not feel pain."

She turned and put her other hand over the fire; the strong smell of burned skin and hair struck my nostrils...

She screamed at the top of her lungs, retiring her hand.

“Oh damn, it pains! It pains so bad! … But, but, why did it burn so bad?"

“Fuck Lola, what do you do? Let me put some medicine on your hand.”

Incidentally, a few hours ago, I just received a great dose of balsams to use over burned skin, so I applied it on her reddened skin.

Fuck, I screwed Lola too!

My thoughts were still running in circles around what she had previously said. Her story and behaviour did fit with my story, but I will not say anything as of now, maybe later.

She watched her hand, crying as if waiting for a wonder to happen:

“It hurts. It hurts so bad!”

I sighed, not knowing what to do. She continued:

“I came out of a huge fire unharmed and managed to burn myself at the stove at home... Don't tell ma I did this, please... don't tell anybody...”

“Sure. You were still under shock.”

I said that, feeling guilty as fuck. At this moment, the door opened, and a fiend spewing fire entered the kitchen:

“My car! What have you done to my car!!!”

Clara, Lola’s sister, was here, and it looked like she'd just found out her car's condition. Lola tried to protest weakly:

“But, but...”

“You! Wait until ma is here!”

“You did not tell her?”

“Of course I did! You cannot hide this under the carpet!? She will come with the next plane, and your ma too.”

She added that, looking at me with a wicked grin.

I looked into Lola’s eyes; then, I turned towards her sister:

“What did you say to my mother?”

She raised her shoulders:

“What happened. I told her the police called me for your accident; the car is a total loss and has been removed; I can go to the car graveyard and check for valuables! You took my car without asking me!!”

Finally, Lola managed to mumble:

“It is also my car?!”

“You are not allowed to drive without me! You are still a minor. It is my car!!”

Fuck, I did not know that. Lola started to cry. She put her head on the table and covered it with her hands. At this moment, her parents must have entered the apartment; I heard the entry door and their voices.

Clara, the fury, screamed:

“Ma, we are here in the kitchen!”

How the fuck did they make it here so fast?

Lola cried further with her head on the table when they entered. Her mother was first:

“Oh dear, oh dear, what happened? Are you all right? Is Lola alright?”

Lola moaned something, and Clara answered:

“Yes, ma, we are alright!”

Mrs Robertson went straight to Lola to watch her closer, hugged her then hugged Clara. How did they make it come so fast? She was now examining Lola.

“Oh dear, oh dear, how do you look like... let me see, let me see, dear!”

We still had our partially burnt clothes on, and judging from her father's pale face, we were not really looking good.

“Are you sure you are alright? Don’t you need to stay in the hospital? Clara, you said nothing happened to her?”

“But ma, she is all right!”

Their father hugged them one after the other.

“Oh dear, look at her burnt hand! Oh dear, oh, dear!”

She hugged Lola again, who only cried louder, which bugged Clara more. She protested:

“That's a small burning...”

“Oh, shut up! Please shut up!”

Her mother admonished her before she turned towards me. She hugged me shortly and then asked:

“Oh dear, let me see your hand, oh, oh, oh.”

She put a hand over her face. Lola explained dutifully:

“She burned herself when she pulled me out of the burning car as my seatbelt was stuck, and I could not move.”

Her father approached me, hugging me at his turn:

“I phoned your ma. If they catch the first plane, your parents will be here in about half an hour. I told them what I heard from Clara as she heard it from the police: you two had an accident and are both lightly injured.”

Her mother turned to Lola:

“How did it happen?”

Lola raised her head a little and started to speak, sobbing after every word:

“I… I… wanted to bring Dolores to….”

I decided to leave them alone. I said an excuse of some kind; I said I needed to rest and then left the kitchen. Mr Robertson asked:

“Sure; do you need anything?”

“No, nothing, thank you. I am alright.”

I still heard Clara whispering:

“Sure, you played taxi for Dolores. I told you not to drive my car!”

“Clara!”

I went to my room. It was maybe a bit dastardly of me to leave Lola alone, but I could not stand her sister. Lola called it the Dolores-Clara law: If we two happened to be at the same time in the same place for longer than one minute, the result is fireworks. So one of us had to leave, and that one was mostly me.

I was thinking about my parents and felt ashamed. They were having a hard time; pa’s discount shop was not going well; all they needed were more problems. I would have informed them only after a couple of days, once I knew the outcome and how I could fix it, or better, once I fixed it already; now, who knows what they believe happened! I had just managed to change my clothes when I heard the bell ringing, as they did not have our key. I ran to the door.

“Pa! Ma!”

“Dear, dear!”

They hugged me one after the other.

“Let me see you…. Does it hurt?”

“No, ma, almost nothing.”

“Is, is,… is this the cream, these hard bubbles, or your skin?”

“Yeah, It's still me; it happened after the burned part of the skin was removed, but it will recover.”

“But, but… what did the doctor say? Will there remain any scar on your face? You… so much of your face is covered.. ah….”

Pa's eyes could not leave my tattoo:

“What is that? A tattoo?”

Ma interrupted him

“Not now dear, not now, you… you had some serious burnings… is it not hurting?”

“Yes, a tattoo, pa. No, ma, only some first and second-degree burnings on my face and hands.”

Ma hugged me again and then looked again at my hands.

“Oh, dear! Only second-degree burnings? Only?”

“It is alright, ma, alright; the doctor said that it will heal completely; almost no trace should remain.”

“Almost... And Lola? Is she all right?”

“She is fine. She has nothing… I mean, one hand with some burnings.”

Lola’s father entered the room. They greeted each other warmly. A moment later, Lola’s mother came in too. She approached my mother and embraced her. Since we were small, our parents have known each other; the Robertsons lived just across the street until Lola’s father got a new job, and they moved from town a year ago.

He approached me:

“Lola had told us how brave you have been. You saved her from the fire!”

He embraced me.

“What would we have done without you?”

I said nothing. What could I say? I am not good at words; besides, I thought about what Clara would have said if she were here: 'nothing, nothing, this would not have happened if she hadn’t been here.'

Glad she was not here to say it.