For
three weeks after the operation on the nights when she could sleep she had no
dreams at all, not even nightmares. Attributing this to her new surroundings,
to her mind being so busy decanting fresh detail compared to which dreaming was
mere trivia, still she often found herself wishing for the abstract patterns
and nonsensical situations frequently enjoyed in previous sleep; but when her
dreams did eventually return she found they had also changed.
They
began to speed up, faster and faster still so she could no longer discern their
exact content. She lay asleep amongst this rushing blur, frustrated in her role
as straining spectator of events that moved so quickly as to be beyond
comprehension.
On
the nights when she could not sleep she would construct dreams from memory,
whispering them at length into the vinyl belly of her E.T. doll. Her fingers
picked at the loose brown flakes of his back while her condensing breath spread
a damp across his stomach, wishing only to wake with him propped again upon the
familiar pillowslips of home.
