Dream Journal

Good night, Sweat Dreams

I am weedy in remembering dreams. I normally forget the details just a few minutes after waking up unless the dream is very terrifying, funny, or any on the extreme. Most of the time, I don’t remember them at all.

One of the fortunate dreams I do remember is one I had in January this year, when I was still studying in St. Scholastica’s Academy. Maybe the reason why I remember it is because the plot of my dream revolved around my school, particularly at the High School Library. In real life, I love reading books, and I was a mainstay at our library. I was a library addict that I know the shelves and air conditioning units by heart. Even the ordinarily snooty librarians have memorized my name and have been in pleasant terms with me.

I don’t remember the exact beginning of my dream. What I remember is that I went to the library and it looked just like the library I enter every day. Wearing our blue jumper with white ruffled blouse, I casually entered the glass doors on the right. My persona in the dream was surprised to find so many people inside. It was unusually crowded, but something in my persona’s told me that I shouldn’t be surprised, so I gently made my way behind standing girls who read books and newspapers.

I went to the big dictionary and started leafing through it, but no word was in my character’s mind. I anticipated an event, so I paid only half-attention to the words in fleeing in front of my eyes.

Someone suddenly shouted, and everyone in the library was roused. The students, teachers, visitors, and librarians alike were immediately on their heels, hurrying out of the one-sided main glass doors of the library. Though I didn’t know what was happening, I let the tide carry me.

I found myself crouching along with a few other students in a restroom in front of the right library doors. In reality, there was also a tiny room in that position, but it served not as a restroom but as the library’s stock room.

My companions placed their fingers over their lips, signaling that we keep silent, as if we were hiding from someone. Someone stood and turned off the lights. Under the sink, I forfeited and told myself that I was lucky to be safe with them in that hiding place. At the same time, I wondered why we had to hide there and where the rest of the library goers went. Did they go somewhere to hide, too?

Eerie silence filled the air for a while; none of us dared to talk. My mind then told me that if I talked, the sound might be heard by whoever or whatever we were hiding from. So I just closed my eyes, feeling the hard, cold, moist pipes behind me and my fellow students breathing soft, heavy sighs around me in the dim room.

All of a sudden, a foot kicked the door of the restroom and we found ourselves bathing under the fluorescent lamp of the corridor, looking up at a big man that reminded me of a samurai. His whole body was covered in a blue silk-like cloth and his head cloth revealed only his narrowed eyes and thin mouth. I assumed he really was Japanese: a samurai lost in our place and time.

I don’t know what got into me. When I saw him, I stood up resolutely, stared into the dark slits that were supposed to be his eyes, and then glanced at my companions. They were open-mouthed and not moving as they surveyed the samurai and me standing there at the door. They looked like little children clustered on the damp, dirty floor of the restroom. As I saw their scared faces, I knew what I had to do.

I looked back at the “samurai”. His face was blank. I quickly turned to the left and ran swiftly along the empty corridor. I don’t know what led me to do that; all I knew was that I felt an out-and-out rush of courage. All I wanted was to make the samurai leave my companions and follow me instead. I felt like a heroine as I ran down the long slippery hall of classrooms in my school uniform and black shoes, and in a very slipshod fashion. I heard his heavy footsteps hit the cold marble tiles behind me as he tried to keep up. Without looking back, I clambered down the long series of stairs to the second floor.

When I reached the first floor, I stopped, not to catch my breath (I really felt superhuman after that marathon) but to give chance for my pathetic pursuer to get near. After a few seconds without any sign of him, I thought he must have tripped on the third floor stairs or lost in the second floor. Or, maybe he decided to save his calories and just wait for me to go back up again and face him.

My puffed-up self thought that was a stupid trick. I lost interest in him and walked toward the pergola that led down to the school’s garden and Grotto. It was also the same as in real life. I walked slowly, questioning where everyone is. I saw the school gates and decided I’ll go home, since classes seemed suspended. As I stepped out of the big covered main gate, I found myself facing about ten samurais, who wore the same garments and expressionless eyes as my pursuant. They stood tall and inclined in a semicircle blocking my way.

Like those in the movies, at the back of my mind, I felt more and more samurais gathering behind and around me. I effortlessly gathered my nerves and with no other option, ran into one of the open spaces between two samurais and into the empty street.

I ran and ran and ran without noticing where I was, where I was going, and not caring because I never saw a vehicle along the streets. I ran so fast that the spectacles on my either sides were reduced to blurred visions out of the corner of my eyes.

At a point, a glint of cool brown color caught my taste, and thinking that I’ve gone far enough that I can’t feel their presence behind me, I stopped running. I peered into the cool brown building that caught my eye. I found myself gawking up at a couple of wide, broken steps that led to a high and fine-looking edifice. The first word that came into my mind was Parthenon, even if it didn’t look like the destroyed classic Parthenon we see in pictures in travel magazines and encyclopedias.

In slow motion, I turned my pivot foot (knowing what to expect) and looked around me at all the Roman structures that bathed in the sunlight. In my hurry to get away, I didn’t even make out how everything turned into the capital of Rome. Everywhere around me I saw Roman structures and mythological statues that I only saw as pictures in real-life during my Social Studies classes.

I stood there and took in the grandeur that besieged my character, until the samurais once more appeared in an area around me, but blocking only one way. Again, I ran toward the other side.

It went on like that, me running ahead, them following close behind. When I seem to have lost them, I would stop outside a structure and marvel at its fancy Corinthian posts, then they would appear—out of nowhere, it seems—and the race is on yet again.

I got more superhuman as we continued. I remembered jumping over thick, fallen Doric posts and taking six to seven steps in single strides. Once I even reached a building that greatly resembled a palace and, finding myself being cornered in its highest loggia, I swiftly swung my legs over the railings and dove like a swimmer.

Without any bruise, I continued running, with no sign of exhaust. The next moment, I found myself in my school again, but this time not in the library. I was at the wide spread that enclosed the garden, the butterfly house, the big and old rubber tree, the bridge and the pond under it—all like they are in reality.

I saw a serious-looking boy who wore glasses and who was waiting for me under the rubber tree. He looked like Harry Potter, except that he wasn’t wearing Hogwarts uniform but the Ateneo High School uniform, only with his polo a dark shade of blue, matching our blue skirt.

For some reason, my feet carried me to him and we walked together, not talking. We went up the big steps that brought us to the school canteen. There were many students in the canteen, just like it was on ordinary break times during school days. Everyone seemed relaxed, or at least the normal students who stood chatting with their friends, lining at the canteen stalls, or sat eating their lunches with books and papers waiting on either side of their plates.

At the back of my mind, I suspected where the samurais were, but at that time I didn’t care. I got myself food that took trays to be brought to the table my mystery guy friend reserved. He didn’t have any food so I shared my stash with him. We ate and had a normal (other than finding a boy in an exclusive all-girls school), peaceful meal.

Abruptly, I found myself again climbing the third floor, but this time on the left side outside the library. I saw the feet of usual students scurrying around toward their rooms, with white ankle-length socks toddling gracefully on shiny low-heeled school shoes. As I reached the third floor landing, I looked around to see familiar faces.

But their faces were those of the samurais who were amazingly able to run around hot sandy Rome in those thick covered garments. My schoolmates turned into the samurais that unremittingly chased me all over Rome.

I called on some bravery, but this time, I couldn’t move. They slowly circled me. Closer and closer… But my eyes were already closed.

I awoke just in time. Beads of sweat formed at my forehead and neck. I cannot tell if those were from running or from fear during my dream. I roused from my dream, praying I won’t have a worse nightmare than that, never expecting how the line “sweet dreams” could actually turn into “sweat dreams.”