Candice

I haven't been sleeping very well... that restless kind of sleep again.

I open my eyes to the starry night sky. It's that clear kind of sky, more navy blue than black, with very thin and pale whisps of clouds cutting through. The moon is a thick crescent and bathes the clouds in a silverly light. I finally become aware of what's really going on. I'm on the back of an indigo lion and, sitting behind me, is Candice. We're bounding through the clouds and we smile at each other. We pass by schools of small turquoise and orange fish. They swim around us and blow bubbles as they go.

The lion comes to a halt and we dismount. He leaves us in this cloud landscape. It is at this moment that I realize the ribbon tied around my neck is floating all around us and there is a red ribbon tied around Candice's neck as well. All the loose ribbon floating around makes it impossible to tell if she's the other end of the ribbon tied to my neck, if, perhaps I am tied to her and she is tied to me but our ribbon branches out to others, or if these are two separate ribbons entirely. The red ribbon dances around us but keeps out of our way, we don't get tangled at all unless we reach out and wrapped the ribbon around our hands... which we both do simultaneously. We look at each other again and laugh. A shift in the wind draws our attention to a carousel that forms from the clouds. It's one of those old-fashioned carousels with different coloured horses in ornate tack. I don't know how long it is that we ride the carousel, watching the stars, laughing, watching the ribbon and the great cat chasing the little fish.

After the carousel, we sit at a bar and order drinks. Martin, Lisa and a slew of people I should know, from out of nowhere, join us. They have ribbons around their necks too and I wonder again. The glasses are all twisted with a slice of purple fruit on the rim and intoxicating mist rising from them. The colour of the liquid keeps changing from anger, to fear, to depression, to falsely hoping, to doubting, to anger again. The skeleton behind the bar in a sharp vest and a bowtie seems to smile at us... somehow... and continues cleaning glasses. Afterwards we settle down with some weird puffy pastries with the words "Eat Me" sewn into them and play some video games. One game was a crazy tea party, another game we were both dragon riders and another game was like that recent side-scrolling dream I had... we were on horseback and trying to dodge huge worm things and tentacles. After that, we chase the fish with the indigo lion.

The lion trots up to us when we're good and tired from the run and offers each of us a pale pink rose. We take the gifts and then there's this moment where we're floating, the ribbon all around us, the great cat bounding after it... and just this serene moment...

Then I woke up.