Dreams

I was hiding in the bushes. I was terrified. I knew that I could easily outrun it, but I just couldn't keep my balance.

That thing would grow closer to me, only to find my hiding place. I made another futile attempt at running. The squishy, purple floor wouldn't allow it. I fell again. It reached me.

I was in my bed. I sat up, panting from the very real illusion of fear. There was no unknown danger chasing me through some strange setting. I was safe at home, waiting for this day to unfold.

The house exploded.

I fell down, still safe on my bed, to the ground. There was nothing left. The area where the house once stood only had a bed of grass and a bed. Everything else was the same. My neighbor's brown house, the tree in the yard, the stop sign…

There was something that struck me: it was an empty set. There were no cars in the driveway. I couldn't see anything through the windows of houses. The air was still. Mailboxes had no numbers on them.

Something was definitely strange. That is, aside from the fact that I was sitting in my bed where I knew my house used to be.

Then I figured it out: I was still sleeping. I must have been in some sort of weird dream. The realization hit me like a ton of bricks.

A red mass appeared in the sky. It was falling. I knew better than to sit still. I ran.

A pile of bricks crashed onto the site where I sat, crushing the bed. Now there was nothing left of my house but a pile of debris.

My house appeared again. Completely. Except, of course, for the car and any semblance of life.

I walked toward the door. The inside was weird. It didn't look like my house, but… it was familiar. I could have sworn I'd seen this décor before. It just wasn't my house.

The inside changed. The carpeted floor morphed into wood. The table against the wall shrunk, crawling up the wall to become a picture of a landscape, the same one that I had in my front hall.

There was a noise in the kitchen similar to a microwave being turned on. I ran in.

There was no microwave above the oven. Just a hole between cabinets. Almost immediately as that entered my head, a microwave just like that in my house appeared. There was someone there. I couldn't make out any distinguishing features. She wore a yellow t-shirt with black sleeves. For some reason, that stuck out to me.

"Hey." She remarked, turning back to her empty plate. The plate materialized its own chicken.

I felt like I knew her. I wasn't uncomfortable. "Why are you eating now?" The statement made no sense. I knew that.

She disappeared. I found myself back in my bed. I pulled on my hair. It hurt. I was awake.

All of it had been a dream. A dream that I was aware of. I even had minor control. That ton of bricks. The chicken appearing on the plate. My house changing… That had been me. Those things had come from my mind.

Lucid dreaming. It was real. I would learn to master it.