Most of my life, I have been plagued with nightmares. Sometimes daily. This “nightmare” I just woke from an hour ago, but I still feel as though it is not done with me. The fear is so real that even now as I write these bothersome things to the internet, just to rid my mind. So come bare the load for me. I need to take it out of my consciousness and provide someone, at this point anyone that may care, the dark and dreaded corner of my subsciousness that haunts me in wake and sleep.

At first it was a struggle to sleep, since my mind was busy with failure and heartache. I wanted to sleep my worries away, sometimes my dreams can be a more than pleasant reasoning away for the “wake” reality that I step into, sometimes endless. Instead, I chanted a meditation spell and envisioned painting a sun with acrylic paint colors of orange, red, white and yellow. Strangely, I must have finally drifted…because I found myself abruptly waken to darkness. Delivered to the darkness of the room, I groggily sat up in bed and made motions to get out of the bed. The darkness was still there, but it was a dark, dark blue darkness staring back at me. It had no eyes, but it stared right through me as a sat at the edge of my bed. I sat frozen, paralyzed in fear when I realized I wasn’t actually in my room. It was another room, one from my childhood, but the bed I slept in was still the twin sized bed I sleep in every night. And that is when I realized…I’m dreaming…or nightmaring? The dark, dark blue darkness with no eyes, hands or feet, was at the bedroom door, perpendicular to where I now stood in the opposite end of the room. I was terrified. I was so mortified that I held my own throat with both hands, because I couldn’t scream as the dark, dark blue darkness came hurtling at me. Instinctively, I still gripped my throat. “What’s the matter voice, have I lost you.” I heard. It wasn’t from the thing that rushed me, it was from around me. Someone wanted to shut me up. No time for thoughts, because this time, the dark, dark blue was up in my face inspecting me with no eyes and this time I could see it for what it was up close. A monster.

Then, I woke up again. Startled by the nightmare I just had, I jolted awake. My god, that was terrifying and I thought I couldn’t, wouldn’t get out. So, I shook it off, but before I got to sit up in the bed of my dark room, in the dim light of my computer screen was a white egg the size of the Walmart variety egg in the dairy section. The egg was right where my tummy was as I laid on the left side of my body. I only lifted my head from my pillow to look at it in the dimly lit room. I looked around and I was still in my room where I slept. Curious, I propped myself up, still lying on my side to look at this thing that I was sure was not there when I fell asleep. I wouldn’t have an egg in the bed with me. It could break…I reached for the egg to feel it, gingerly. The egg was very white, even in the dark glow of the computer in the room. This is when the realization came that I was in a dream again. Waking from one nightmare into another illusion of my mind. While I held the egg, unconsciously I used the force of my fingers to crush the egg in that one hand and my hand was cut by all the pieces of the eggs shell…though the egg was hard boiled!

Another jolt, sitting up in the bed this time, with my heart racing and my eyes moving to all corners of the room. Still the dark glow of the computer screen. The computer screen had a picture of my sisters and myself, all staring back at me. Stories in their eyes. I caught my breath, comforting myself, which was self taught. I wondered about the dream, what was that about? I got up to go use the bathroom. Looking in the mirror only for a second before I plopped down on the toilet to pee. The relief of the streaming of these life fluids soothed me further. Once complete, wiping myself to then turn to the sink to wash my hands. No soap. Damn. I looked up to see myself in the mirror. To my surprise, there was nothing. No image at all. Just water running from the sink, hot and steaming the bottom portion of the mirror. At first I was so stunned I just stood there… I could feel my eyes widening but couldn’t see them for proof that they were probably bulging in disbelief! My consciousness began to fabricate reasoning at this point, as I panicked. No image in the mirror, oh shit! Outside of my head, at this point, I began palming the mirror, then scraping the mirror with my nails and fingers. Trying to tear through the irrationality that I was not there…I was not there at all. Then, in my panic and horror I started to beat upon the mirror. Pounding on it, but it had not broken, just bending like mirror and plexiglass hybrid. Then, something emerged. Something crawled from the corner of the mirror before me. It was something…something I have never seen in my life, but it was the cross of a slug larvae and spider so massive as though it was almost half my body. Black purple skin and the larvae parts had something withering under its skin. I screamed and sat down on the floor by the sink, out of the view of the mirror. I was shaking and frightened hoping it had not seen that I saw it was coming…oh god. For moments it seemed, I just sat and waited, sat and waited for an eternity. At this point, nothing rushed me or attacked. I got on my knees in front of the sink and peered up at the mirror. The creature was halfway through the mirror…it seemed to be coming from another dimension, a frightening scene as it slowly pushed its way through to my side of the world. It’s spider’s appendages, the pedipalps, were eagerly reaching for me and I fell back on my bottom, then quickly leapt to my feet. My body was up against the bathroom door and as soon as I had an opportunity, I grabed for the door knob, flung the door open and ran, but not before I felt a deep, sharp and painful slice across my back!

Awaken again…this time no jolt, just clear pain. Pain in my heart like the beating of my heart was a ticking bomb. Awaken to pain. Pain in the chest. Before I could open my eyes, I felt my chest. I could not feel my breasts. They were numb…that scared me awake. My eyes fluttered open in deep protest of my body. My mind left me tired even from sleep. What could ease my mind from the horrors? The horrors in sleep and in this reality? This time it was realtime, where you and me are on opposite ends of this computer screen. Me writing, you reading. Hoping you can understand why I needed to share this with you.

Disclaimer: This nightmare crawled out my ear and onto this post by my own doing. All photography and original art for this post was created or captured by Hetheru Mer Djehuty.

This is an original and was written and copyrighted by Juana M. Gumbs. All rights are reserved by her.