The space between dreams and nightmares

I have a lot of nightmares. They come and go as they please, only serving to bring me suffering in my wake. But it’s not like killer clowns chase after me in nightmares of animated horrors. No, my dreams are never like Stephen King novels. Rather, they resemble the real world a little too closely for my liking.

In my dreams, I’m met by familiar people. Whether they are made up of fragments from my memory or they are demons wearing the faces of my friends, I am unsure. I know it’s the paranoia talking. The interactions are never sinister, but the ominous nature of my dreamwalks torments me so. So what happens when you are woken up from something else? Not quite sweet like dreams should be, but not like a threatening ordeal either.

Can I even call it a nightmare? I didn’t wake up in a state of mental frenzy and rushed breathing. But I can’t rightfully call it a dream either. Because what kind of dream would suspend me in a state of… longing? Or maybe even bereavement. Or constant despair over a past desire.

I was woken up. Not in a shockwave of agony, with a heavy heartbeat booming in my ears. It was more subtle than that. Like a psychological strain, leaving you wondering. And I’d argue that the subtlety is worse. But I am no stranger to questioning my own reality. For too long, I ruminated.

I was in the habit of obsessively examining my own behaviour. Why? To make sense of why I was put through the gaslighting and the repeated betrayals. After all, it seldom starts with sinister intentions. When it begins innocently, you really do think you’re being insecure. But when multiple attempts are made to express discomfort in the unfolding scenarios with no recompense, can you call the apathy—the inaction towards you anything other than abuse?

I once lived in a string of what seemed like never-ending nightmares. For a long time, no matter my state, awake or asleep, I fought physical and psychological battles. My body waged war on me as I tried so hard to be healthy. Looking back at it, I’m certain my mental state was the reason I was in poor health. But I also know it wasn’t all bad. For me to even be happy about what I had to beg for… doesn’t that make me the fool?

My own brain forsakes me. It continues to inflict repeated psychological horror upon itself in the space between dreams and nightmares. While ordinary, this strange dream has left me sombre, and in spontaneous bursts of tears over the past few days. I can only laugh at myself. Not out of pity, but in a why-did-I-have-to-dream-about-this kind of way. And who else was there but… him.

I was disappointed in myself, in my subconscious, that I had this kind of dream at all. It was like a betrayal. A betrayal to the girl who suffered at the hands of this indecisive and cowardly man. Dreams like this are like a cruel kind of fantasy, too closely resembling the world I know to be true. So which is it? Do you, my readers, have any input as to whether this is a dream or a nightmare?

She looked down at her left hand, where it sat on her fourth finger. A ring adorned by a dull pearl where a gem would normally sit, and on a band to which my mind’s eye was a forgotten colour. Both an ugly and ordinary ring. Nothing like anything she would have ever chosen.

All I could think was… how did it end up like this? And a rush of relief came soon after. In my confusion, I wondered if this is what God meant when He last spoke to me. But that relief was also mixed with feelings of disgust and discontentment. Because the ring wasn’t what I wanted. Yet somehow, the entire scene brought me back to what one of his sisters-in-law once told me, I always thought you were settling.

It was like any other day. But also not. She wore a phthalo green dress, a wonderful shade, and a headband to match. The outer layer of the skirt was made from chiffon with a more opaque material underneath. And she looked very elegant. Not quite the typical attire for one’s own wedding, though.

Upon my waking, I’m left in an even bigger state of confusion and deep sorrow. A melancholy, touching even the most hidden of memories locked away in my heart. Truly a dream for the ages. One to remind me of what I have lost. What I walked away from. Whatever it is—desire, longing, grief, loss—I don’t know where you belong. Perhaps drifting in between. In a strange pocket of being, existing between dreams and nightmares.

“I never expected to get married,” she said with a reassuring calmness about her. It was in response to a friend asking how she felt about it. She couldn’t quite put it into words. She was neither happy nor sad. But she wasn’t indifferent either. It would be most accurate to say that what she felt was a sense of comfort. She finally felt safe.

So then, how could I ever call this a dream or a nightmare? When the content itself seems like a nightmare to the one who suffered, yet also presents the perplexing paradox of safety and comfort, it’s impossible to classify. It was a dream where I finally felt safe. But it was also a nightmare, forcefully reminding me of the pain I’ve endured.