Short Story Fiction
A Nightmare Too Real
Scott A. Gese
He knew he had been dreaming but the blood was real. What sort of nightmare was he caught up in?
Oswald Cleaver woke up in a cold sweat. He was dripping wet, breathing heavy and shaking with fear.
He did his best not to move a muscle. As he caught his breath he scanned the dark room as best he could. Nothing moved. Listening intently he heard no sound above his own breathing.
"It must have been a dream," he thought. "It seemed so lucid."
The sheets were soaking wet and so was he. Oswald continued to be on high alert as he pulled back the covers and crawled out of bed. He stumbled into the bathroom and turned on the light. Glancing up at his reflection in the mirror, he was horrified by what he saw.
He was covered in blood.
He immediately started to wash himself off looking for the source of the bleeding. He couldn’t find it.
Feeling sick to his stomach, he sat on the toilet and relieved himself, then threw up in the sink.
He turned on the shower and stepped in, letting the tepid water beat down on him as he sat on the floor trying to recall the nightmare.
Was it a dream or was it real? Oswald was confused. He wanted to believe it was a dream, but where did all the blood come from?
As he tried to recall the nightmare he noticed the shower stall seemed smaller than he remembered. Maybe it was because he was sitting on the floor. Then he realized the design on the colored tile didn’t seem quite right. In fact the color itself seemed a little bit off. He dismissed it figuring he wasn’t quite awake and continued trying to recall the dream.
~~~
He remembered walking alone down a dark street in an unfamiliar town. He was lost and needed some direction. Whenever he approached someone and tried to speak, nothing coherent would come out of his mouth. Just a bunch of garbled nonsense like he had a mouth full of marbles.
He recalled having his cell phone on him but he couldn’t make it work. Every time he tried to punch in a number he would hit the wrong one. Then the thing just went dead altogether.
"Typical dream stuff." The thought helped to reinforce his belief that he had indeed been dreaming. He continued to recall more of the dream.
He kept walking and soon found himself in a bad part of town. No matter which way he went, it only got worse. Soon people were giving him dirty looks and yelling at him, demanding to know what he was doing in their part of town.
He was beginning to get nervous.
He further recalled the people were beginning to look rather pale and moving slow and zombie-like, as if they were the living dead.
Soon they started to crowd in on him. Pushing, reaching out and grabbing at his clothes. He tried to run but couldn’t get his feet to move fast. They began to tear his clothes from his body.
He tried to call out for help, but still no understandable words would come out of his mouth.
Fighting back seemed to be his best option, but his punches were like slow motion and had little affect. For some reason he found he suddenly had a knife in his hand. He didn’t know how that happened but he was happy to have some way to fight back. He lashed out with it as he tried to defend himself.
Several people were bleeding but it didn’t stop them. They kept coming.
He kept thrashing and slashing. An opening suddenly appeared where he managed to somehow crawl through the crowd.
He moved as fast as he could. They were behind him now but not far enough. He was still moving too slow. They were catching up to him.
Suddenly he was in front of his house. He ran inside and locked the door.
This was when he woke up.
As Oswald sat on the shower floor he came to the conclusion ALL the things that were happening to him were those typical things that happen to people in dreams. He decided once and for all it was a dream. It had to be. The running too slow, not being able to call out, the cell phone not working, zombies and the rest. That’s not real life. It was all dream stuff.
But what about the blood? There was still no explanation for it.
Suddenly he heard loud banging at the front door. It was more than a knock. It was a definite urgent banging sound. He jumped up from the shower floor, ran to the window and looked out. He was shocked at what he saw. It was the zombies. They had found him and they wanted in.
Seems Oswald had not woke up from his lucid dream after all. It was a false awakening. Oswald was still dreaming.
© Copyright 2023 by Scott A. Gese All Rights Reserved.
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