July 24, 2003. 9:05 am
This is by far the most clear dream that I have had in a while. A bit weird though, but not at the same time.
A brother and sister and Saffron Burrows.
The brother and sister were jumping bridges, traveling. They had just gotten off a plane or a boat. They were jumping a long distance, the sister didn’t do it as much as her brother and she kept foiling her brother sometimes, grabbing on to him, almost making him miss the bridge to hit the water instead. There were other people around farther behind doing the same thing. It was kind of a sport. Saffron Burrows was there she was only the one that kept up with him. The brother was annoyed at the sister she kept complaining about how she couldn’t stay in the air long enough and how she sucked at it and how she needed help. The brother just said it was because she leaned too much to her left and that she had to lean more to her right. If she wanted to stay in the air longer she should rotate her arms. Each time they landed on a bridge the would build up momentum again to jump up and try to stay in the air the longest to travel farther, sometimes skipping some bridges.
Eventually they landed on the streets, a harbor, maybe Richmond. There were trucks passing by on the road. The brother had to stop the sister so she wouldn’t go straight into the street. By this time they had gotten to know Saffron a little better, it was just the three of them now.
“Where are you going?” he asked Saffron.
“I don’t know yet,” she replied.
The ground was muddy. They began to travel by ground, sliding along, kind of like skating but you didn’t have to move your legs as much, it was more of a gliding. They knew what they were doing, but the sister again wasn’t as good.
“The thing is, the best thing to do is try to stay still and just let the vacuum the truck creates when it passes you to pull you along, crouch a bit so you won’t just get pulled over,” he explained to her.
Saffron was happy about the way he treated his sister, he wasn’t overly annoyed by his sister when she kept nagging, he just tried his best to be nice.
“I really like Saffron Burrows,” he said. They hadn’t formally introduced themselves but now he knew that she was her.
She laughed at the cheesy line.
“So where do you want to go?” he asked her.
They were deeper in the city now, buildings were all around.
“I want to go to Parallel Café,” she answered.
“You want to go Parallel eh?” he replied.
His sister was disgusted by his joke but they still laughed.
“I know the way,” Saffron said.
“Then lead,” he replied.
She led the way to the café, when they were approaching it, he and his sister realized that they had gone to that café before, they had actually gone there several times. The café sat right next to the water, a little cement walkway was next to it. It was 2 floors and the walls were just windows so you could see everything. There was a bridge nearby, a little higher up on cliffs.
“I love the water here, it’s so thick,” Saffron said.
The water was dark, it was wavy.
“Really? My mother died here, she fell in the water. She fell off the bridge,” the girl replied.
There was silence, and they entered the café. They went to the second floor, it was strange because occasionally the water came up in waves up the stairs, a different pair of stairs, and the water would become level with the second floor so you could see what was underneath in the darkness.
“There are sting rays down there,” the girl said.
“Really?” Saffron questioned.
“The biggest sting ray in the world is down there,” the guy replied.
There was some sort of hint that he knew that the sting ray probably killed his mother. It made no sense that she would drown. I just noticed that they were holding packages, packages denoting that they were pros at some sort of sport.
“How do you know about the sting rays?” she asked them.
“You can see them, out the window,” he said.
She looked out the window, peering into the dark water, it was becoming night time. She saw the school of stingrays that passed nearby.
“Is the big one just a myth?” she asked.
“No it’s not, I’ve seen it, I swam down here before cause I wanted to know something, and I saw it. Quite frequently it appears in here I always watch it, it moves with the waves,” he said.
“Are you serious?” she asked.
“Yes, just sit and wait, my sister has seen it too,” he said.
His sister nodded. They sat for a while in the leather chairs and watched the waves that ascended and descended on the stairs. Then it appeared, just a part of it, it had a pointy head, different from other stingrays. It was just the head though that appeared at the top of the stairs, rolling up and down, it hooked itself onto the sister but let go as it descended the stairs. That’s how close it got. Saffron was shocked.
“Does it do that a lot?” Saffron asked.
“Yes, it’s happened to me, I don’t know if it’s conscious of it, or if it’s just automatic,” he said.
It continued ascending and descending from the stairs, it eyes sometimes open sometimes closed. When it hooked onto Saffron its eyes opened. It noticed her. It let go and descended the stairs. It ascended again and hooked on to her again and didn’t let go till the last minute this time. The guy stood up and walked over to her.
“Move over, I think it’s noticed you,” he said.
He was right when it came up next, it came up higher and to the spot where she would’ve been, it noticed where she had gone next. They moved further, and the sting ray came up again this time almost getting her but he shielded her from it.
“I don’t understand…” Saffron said.
A painter came into the café, he was supposed to be the owner? He walked down the stairs that the water ascended and descended from. The sting ray didn’t reappear then. The painter looked at them up and down, he sat in a chair at the bottom of the stairs, taking out his paint brushes that he had just bought. Saffron and the guy switched seats. The painter ascended the stairs with a young man, he went towards the guy but stopped and turned to Saffron.
“The boy wants to challenge you,” the painter said.
“Challenge me?” Saffron asked.
“Yes, challenge you, out there,” the painter indicated.
The water had risen past the windows now, they were under the water now. It was just the deep blue surrounding them. The guy stood up.
“No don’t, it’s unnatural,” the guy said.
There was hate in the young man’s eyes as he looked at the guy.
“I’m not sure what you mean by challenge out there?” Saffron said. She looked over at the guy looking for an answer.
“A fair fight, no time limit, just till you’re beat,” the painter said.
“She can’t fight you under the water, she doesn’t know how,” the guy said. They were hiding the stuff they bought that indicated that they knew how, but the painter noticed them.
“Then whose are those?” the painter asked.
“They’re mine,” the sister replied.
“Really?” the painter questioned.
“Yes,” the sister replied.
“Then we can challenge you, you cannot refuse, the water is all around now, and we will fight you whether you accept the challenge or not, we just want a fight,” the painter said.
Saffron remembered how the sister was still an amateur at everything, “No, she won’t fight you, those things are mine, I will,” she said.
“Good good,” the painter said.
“No, you’re not natural, it’s not a fair fight for her,” the guy said.
“Not me, the boy,” the painter said.
“The boy isn’t natural, I know who he is,” the guy said.
Saffron was a bit confused, but not at the same time. She was starting to understand.
“Fine then, you two can help her when you think she needs it,” the painter said.
They could only agree, it was true, that had nowhere else to go, the entire place was surrounded by the water.
“Mother died here, she drowned, but that wasn’t possible,” they guy said quietly to himself.
“Are you ready to go?” the painter asked.
“No time limit?” Saffron asked.
“No, I will be the referee,” the painter said.
Saffron nodded, the painter and the boy swam out. Before she stepped out the guy stopped her, and she waited for him to talk.
“I don’t know if I can help you out there, I should tell you I have a horrible fear of sting rays, my sister doesn’t though. I don’t know, it’s hard to explain, I once came down here swimming I was searching for something and I saw it. It terrified me, but I continued towards it, it was sleeping, I walked on it’s back and I can’t explain the feeling,” the guy said.
“It’ll be okay,” Saffron reassured him.
“That boy is somehow related to the stingray, they will help him. I’m not as worried about him, I’ve met him here before, and I think I’ve met him out there before,” the guy explained. “I will help you, but I don’t know what I’m going to end up doing, I don’t know if it’ll be part of the rules, or if it’ll change the rules. I’m not going to let my sister out there to fight, I’m going to get her out first. You understand?”
“Yes,” she replied. “But you might see something unnatural out there that you might not understand yourself.”
“About you?” he asked.
She nodded.
“No, I know, I can feel it,” he said.
She was confused.
“I won’t change,” he said. “Neither will my sister, she is still too young to have anything.”
“Give her my gear,” she said.
He nodded, and his sister started putting on the gear. They looked out into the water, the water didn’t enter through the doorway, the painter and the boy were waiting for her. They nodded to each other and she went out the door, she didn’t need oxygen, none them did. He watched her meet up with the boy and the painter. The painter raised his hands and as they went down they quickly disappeared. Two magnificent monsters reappeared instead, the boy was a giant killer whale, somewhat malproportioned, a little longer than usual. The other, the other had to be Saffron, she was an unexplainable monster, golden, a little white, it looked like a dragon. She was smaller than the boy. They were moving quickly through the water, thrashing around, twining around each other. It looked like she had herself twisted around the boy. The guy indicated to his sister that it was time for her to go and he guided her way, but never removed his eyes from the fight. When he resurfaced with his sister he told her to go home and that he would see her there. From the surface of the water, there was no trace of a fight happening underneath, it was strange. When he went under again the fight was still going, and she had herself wrapped around the boy again, but there was something strange this time. She stopped moving for a bit and the painter went to them, he placed his hand on her back. The guy was angry, was the painter allowed to do that? What did he do? Did the painter do something? Was this the time for the guy to do something. He started swimming towards them.
And then I woke up!