At Least They're Committed

I awaken from a dream with cars and lifts and a born-again, rounded Rocky housed at the top of a tall, spindly building that tips dramatically as the wind blows and makes me wonder if it will snap off the spire at any moment and plummet us all to the earth.

“Bother with reality!” I think this as my mind comes round and my eyes blink in the darkness. But that’s the thing. It is very dark and not the cloudy, starless night-type of darkness one is used to, rather the disorienting blackness that one is privy to maybe once or twice in her life.

And I’m sitting. I’m not nestled in my bed, I’m on the floor and my back is against a wall, and I am on something of texture, no many textures, soft to course to fluffy, to . . . . oh! I reach out with my right arm and shift to my knees, waving the hand wildly in the darkness until it finds something . . . a soft, thin, cotton fabric that rattles a bit as I grasp it — it’s on a hanger. I stand and face where I’ve found the clothing, running both hands back and forth across the rack of apparel hanging in front of me. As I disrupt their symmetry I can feel the icy cold held captive behind them snaking through. Yes! So now, if I can make my way past them, to the back, then burrow through until . . .

A light strikes up behind me, illuminating the small space I’ve found myself in. I whirl around, startled to find myself face-to-chest with someone, something. Were I not who I am I might find this quite the fright, instead I step back and behold the creature — from horns to cloven hooves. The thighs are bowed and covered with thick hair, the chest bare, the horns of a goat and the face and eyes of a man. Well, no, not a man. It’s Gabriel holding a large, white, lighted candle. Of course it is.

“Ooooh, Gabriel, you’re a faun!” I delight and grab him by the non-candle-bearing hand. He rolls his eyes. “Hold the flame up! Look closer! We’re in the Wardrobe!” I am bursting with excitement — I’ve seen that phrase before and always thought it rather silly but at this moment it is a completely acceptable description of how I feel — and the elation of upcoming adventure. “We’ll only have to work our way through, maybe on hands and knees and . . . . oh!”

I’m cut short. As I asked, he’s held the candle higher and the room comes to life with its glow.

“Oh dear,” I take a step back, pressing against him. “This isn’t a lovely wardrobe at all. Look at these garments, Gabriel! All  gray and black and . . . abysmal.”

He says nothing, standing as stoic and silent as the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come. I fumble through racks of clothing around me, quickly glancing behind him to see the closed door to my world, then back to the dark and shapeless attire ahead, looking for the opening, for the escape beyond them.

Nothing. Nothing but textured wall at the back, circa late 20th century. I plop myself down in resignation on the mass of upturned clothing dumped mindlessly on the floor even before I’d awakened there. I cross my legs and sigh. “Why, Gabriel, this isn’t a wardrobe at all, is it?”

“No,” he replies, maneuvering to sit next to me in the cramped space and blowing out the candle. “It’s your closet.”

“It’s dark and dreadful.”

In the pitch darkness I can tell he’s smiling. “But, you’re working on that, aren’t you?”

I sigh deeply, “Yes.”

There’s a long silence. “You know, it’s just as cold and dreadful there as it is here.” I am silent. “And there is great danger and witches and . . . ”

“We have those here, too,” I whisper.

He chuckles. “Yes, I suppose you do.”

Another long silence. “I’m still dreaming, aren’t I?” I finally say. He says nothing, which I take as a yes. “I want to be away from the endless winter, all the responsibility and the pain and the incarceration . . . ”

“Confinement is a better word, I think,” he chimes in.

“I don’t mind responsibility,” I whisper. “I’ve just grown weary of mine.” He waits. “And the Super Bowl. I’m totally done with all of that bluster and bravado and hoopla.”

He laughs out, loud and deep. “They’re trapped on this desolate field of ice and snow, too, you know. They need an escape just as much as you.”

I find myself feeling groggy, almost drugged, but in a much nicer way, euphoric. “I suppose,” I say and as I nestle in closer and close my eyes, he blankets himself around me. The blackness feels good, really. It feels like I’m . . .

A song about winter I’ve never heard before plays in my head until the dinging of the alarm causes my eyes to pry open in the morning light. Ah, the medicine alarm. Time for more drugs. I take them like a good girl and cuddle back into my sheets and comforter.

I’m trying, really I am. The hope, the adventure, the spirit, the escape. Well, it was real for a moment anyway and maybe it will be again someday. In the meantime, I suppose I’d best keep working on that ghastly wardrobe.