into my lungs was whiff of people around me. I knew how they smell when they wake up, how their bedclothes smell like and with this knowledge I knew a lot about them. Surely much more than I could have ever gained from talking to any of them. While I was thinking about this strange mystery, I realized that our queue moved quickly and we were near the entrance.
"Where are we going again?" - I looked into my friend’s face, but I saw it blurred. Was I drunk already?
He didn't look at me, just answered in plain, unemotional tone: "It's this famous gatsbial party. We have been waiting for it for weeks".
"So where is Mr Jay-G?", I joked loudly.
No one answered, neither my friend. He remained silent, only his bushy eyebrows stood up in "halt, there!" pose.
His reaction didn't creep me out, I treated it as natural conversation. I gained information and it was all I cared about that time.
There weren't any guards, we just came in and swiftly left the group of people that was floating inside after us. Surprisingly it wasn't crowded at all, we were at large open space, I smelled the barbecue, there were many voices, laughs and screams, and soon the mystery of this emptiness was solved. This whole space was in fact old bridge and the main party was going underneath us, in the place where once a river was, but now there was only a large garden. I looked around and didn't see my friend, as if he disappeared into thin air. I decided to go down, the stone stairs were large and I had to be cautious not to fall down. I managed.
Suddenly I saw some girl, who was walking alone between groups of laughing people. She tried two or three times to join their conversation, but there was no connection, like her thoughts were somewhere high and far away. She was wearing a white dress made from material which looked identical as crepe paper. I have a feeling that one sharper step and her dress would break. She was acting as if she knew this, she was walking very slowly and with every step she reminded me rather of some ghost than a human being. Maybe she also could disappear at any moment... I noticed that now I was sitting on a bench with a drink in one hand and my other hand thrown on the backrest with maximum nonchalance. Next to me there was a free space, and next to it sat my friend, who I named Tisserand, because I couldn’t remember who the hell was he. The girl walked before us, only now she was with some other guy. We were sitting, nothing was happening, we didn't talk, the only activity took place when my glass with vodka was reaching my mouth. Time was slowly passing and the girl was coming back, alone. For a millisecond we glanced at each other and next I knew she was sitting on my right. I touched her hand and we both felt something, we both had shivers. Like we put something big and important into work. She laid her blond head on my knees, we talked almost in silence. Suddenly Tisserand decided to join our conversation, he interrupted her, tried to be funny, but all that he becomes was a pitiful example of a man. After few too long attempts he finally walked away.
I turned my head and saw that she has on her palm bunch of something like M&M's and she eats them one after another. I also noticed that she leaves brown and salmon colors, so I asked:
"Can I take one? I love the brown ones". She laughed.
When I put it in my mouth it was already a citrus jelly bean, not a chocolate one. Tasted great. In a few moments we finished all of them and now she had a lollipop, but it didn't have a stick - no matter if you turn it upside down, it was always a lollipop. Both sides to lick. I grabbed it, unpacked one side and put it into my mouth.
"Aren't we going too far?" - she asked with caution.
"Mmm" - with mouthful it was hard to say anything more sophisticated.
She unpacked the other side and put it in her mouth. The distance between our lips was already very small, and it was becoming even smaller with every second. Finally we kissed with passion, with that sweet lollipop being a transmitter of our infinite emotion. I closed my eyes for a moment and tried to say everything by that kiss. I also began to "hear" her, as she was speaking in the same language of love. The world around us disappeared, nothing else mattered, those moments of paradise are always short, but I knew that I will remember it for the rest of my life. We were talking through our whole lives with this kiss and we were only more and more curious about each other. I opened my eyes and saw that the girl is in fact Isabella. And that it was her all the time. I tried to kiss her again, but her eyes functioned for me as a teleport to reality. I woke up, but didn't want to open my eyes, because I still felt her lips and I wanted this feeling to last longer.
I checked with my hand if she lays beside me, maybe silently sleeping. I didn't fully remember what happened, I just had a hunch that there is small possibility we are together even in the morning. The bedding was cold and empty. I sighed in silence.
INTENSIVE SILENT TREATMENT
I opened my eyes, it was another sunny day behind the window. The light wasn't too strong, it was only warm - it felt like you couldn't get sunburn even if you lay naked outside for ten hours. Weirdly enough, my windowsill was wet. "Has it been raining a moment ago?" - I looked outside, but the pavements were dry, cars were without the slightest bruises, so something wasn't right after all.
I went to my bathroom to wash my hair. I stood under my shower and normally put shampoo onto my head. I never keep it on my hair as the instruction says: 5 minutes or so. Without further ado, I leaned and began to rinse this foam and closed my eyes, I heard a sound of a shampoo dropping down on the tray. Splash. Splash. Splash, splash. Suddenly I felt that it is my brain is detaching. That I wash my hemispheres and large patches are falling down. Do I need them at all? Probably not, if they can split so easily. I knew that if I wanted to properly cleanse my mind, I should use a pumice. Tons of very hard pumice. And rub it all across my head, wait until the first blood would go off and then rub more. There were too many moments, when I felt that my hemispheres are smooth, that alcohol killed the majority of my cells and every thought came in and came out of me without leaving anything inside. And now I was putting all of my dirty thoughts into a hand-operated brainwasher. I sighed and finished washing all of my head, everything that was useless dropped from me, I was ready. My mind was clean.
Then an image of empty snail shell appeared before my eyes. Actually, I was that empty shell on the ocean floor, maybe because too many times I didn't do anything with my life and let it go on without any hesitation. The current moved me from place to place, but all of them were near each other and in reality I wasn't doing anything. Eventually I was being buried in the wet sand and drowning, but on the other hand I feared to breath and didn't try to move the shell on my own. This snail was paralyzed, unable to wake up without large, not just a little, push. Without a strong kick in the ass. Out of the blue my eyes remembered what they are for and I saw my real hands, I stared at my palms like a moron and a feeling of lucid dreaming finally came to me. I've never had such visions earlier and the thoughts have never been so vivid and valid. But that didn't matter, now I knew that I was dreaming, not drowning. It was time to confront some ideas about Isabellas.
It struck me that I don't really know anything about them. Them. Plural. Of course I've heard about theirs Spanish roots, but maybe that was something I made up by myself, I just couldn’t reconcile the whole thing. I guess it was only normal, you don't get to know other people accidentally, you can discover their past only by asking them about it. It's sad, but it turns out that we all are caged in our brain boxes and we share only what we want to. Also, my relation with Isabellas worked both ways, they didn't know anything about me, anything at all. They didn't ask - "Why?" - and I didn't tell them. Simple. I can't imagine how wrong-headed is an attempt of trying to solve your real life problems within a dream, but I did it for a very long time. So long that I couldn't remember, when it all started. If I had anything on my mind I was going to sleep, but not to sleep it over, but to get to the bottom of the problem. This method has always worked out, so hopefully Isabellas case won't be a significant example. OK, let's try and make it in a hard way. If you said "A", you have to s
ay "B". Itch.
Brain was doing its best at lucid dreaming, it was utilizing everything nature gave him for these special occasions. No drugs, no medicines, plain ecology. Only one thing was coming into my mind, mind clear of any filthiness and numbness. The idea to confront both Isabellas, to watch from a close distance how they interact, what would one Isabella tell another. It was the safest path to stay as a spectator of the whole scene. To watch, learn and try to understand. The both characters were nearly the same at the beginning, but I have been watching big changes between them. I thought that I have an alter ego in my dreams, but it turned out that my egos could be divided at first, but entwined, equaled even, at the end. Nowadays I couldn't name any difference concerning my real or dream persona. Isabellas were becoming an unbearable mystery for me, they were occupying thoughts in my free time and lately these problems were mirrored even in my dreams. I've never had such complicated thoughts in this state - it is lucid, but it is still a dream, most things aren't supposed to be clear and based just on emotions rather than real, solid