Day Dream
I almost never write fiction. As I’ve often said, I cannot make sh*t up. But this story came to me in a dream, asking me to commit it to paper. So, now for something completely different:
Day Dream
I met a man in distress.
“What,” I asked, “is it?”
“I see animals,” he said, somber.
I saw animals too. They did not make me somber.
“Not everyone. Not everywhere. Not all the time,” he clarified.
All I could think to do was nod.
“The other day I saw a man become a giraffe from the waist up.”
Another nod.
“And a woman morphed into a monarch butterfly as I passed her.”
Nod. He was hallucinating. People had chosen to share hallucinations with me before. Just another day.
“Do they scare you?” I asked, even though I knew already. He spoke calmly, his tone conveying more curiosity than concern.
“No. They draw me in.”
“Maybe they need your help,” I ventured.
Now it was his turn to nod.
He saw the half giraffe again later that week, in the same busy street. Other passers-by passed by unfazed. He stretched his fingers toward the man’s mane; slowly, not wanting to startle him.
As soon as he touched the reticulated, dense fur, the creature stopped and gracefully swivelled such that its doe eyes somehow aligned perfectly with the man’s.
“I see you,” said the man.
The giraffe nodded and blinked its impossibly long lashes languorously.
“I am afraid of sticking my neck out. My company – what it’s doing is wrong. I must speak up, but I am afraid.”
The man nodded. As he removed his hand from the soft, mosaic skin, it disappeared, replaced by a being as humanoid as he.
He found the butterfly fluttering frenetically looking for a place to land on wrought iron railings flanking brownstone steps.
He extended his arm as a makeshift perch. The gossamer creature alit.
“I see you,” said the man.
“I am afraid to leave. Butterflies fill my belly because I know if I stay, he will hurt me, but if I leave, he will find me and hurt me. I am afraid.”
The man nodded. Mid-flight, the lepidopteran turns into a diminutive woman.
Thus, the man spent his time seeing the animals he saw turn back into human beings. When we met again, I felt relief to see that serenity seemed to have replaced his distress.
“What,” I asked, “is it?”
“I see animals,” he said. “And that is as it should be. Now, when I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror, or passing a plate glass window, I see a deer.”
“That, dear,” I said, “Is as it should be.”