Curious Tales: The Dreamscape

The Dream-Dweller

I am in a strange land. The night is dark . Miles of desert spreading out to the horizon with ruins of a city visible far away. I feel thirsty. As I step forward, I find a giant well looming in the darkness. As I keep lowering the bucket I find that it can never reach the water, even with the rope fully uncoiled. Exhausted as I finally lay down on the cool sand, I am haunted by your memories from an entirely different world which we call reality.

I am reminded of the first time we met and the impact you had on me. You seemed to be everything I had ever desired for. Why didn’t you feel the same? Why is this world so unfair? Sometimes I feel that you would do better to hit me or insult me rather than regard me with this cold gaze, making me feel as if I am unworthy of you. These thoughts come back to me and I grow thirstier.

As I close my eyes, I become aware of a presence -- your presence. When I open them, I am unable to spot you. But somehow it feels that you are somewhere very close to me. I only have to find you. As I make a resolve to set out on this task, I find myself back in this gruesome world of reality. I really long to go back.

As the sands sparkle in the unearthly moonlight, your unseen hands draw me towards my destiny. The occasional sense of your presence has kept me moving through this arid desert night after night(why is it always night here?) and the destination has always seemed further away.

Today I have reached the edge of the city. It had looked deserted from a distance, but this notion is dispelled soon enough. I spot a tall shabby looking man coming to greet me. He looks very surprised and tells me that they have been waiting for me since a long time. When I tell him about you, a cloud passes over his face. He tells me that I await a great destiny. But the very next moment I am sadly called back to my waking state, this harsh world of reality.

The Roommate

I know him for about 3 years now. I have been sharing my room with him (how pathetic!) for that long. Frankly speaking I did not care much about him and I believe neither of our flat mates did. Nobody could really stand the supposedly intellectual aura he seemed to carry about himself(all rubbish). These are times when one needs to take things casually, think less and act fast. People like him who attach so much importance to thinking and trying to grasp depth and meaning in everything, should ideally go and live in another decade(why bother us?)

I never had any interest in knowing whether he was in a relationship. Seeing the likes of him I would bet he wasn’t. It seemed at times that he was devoted to some woman (in the old fashioned way!), but I am certain he did not get much success in that direction. What else can you expect? Women these days don’t give a dime to intellectual humbugs like him(especially when there are eligible candidates like me around). I really pity him.

The Dream-Dweller …contd.

I am back in the ruined city. As I take strides through the city and meet its few inhabitants, I come across an old man who tells me the history of the place.

This city was conceptualized long back by some individuals who had strength in their dreams. They were the first people who found this desert. They build this place in the hope that this would serve as an abode for fellow dreamers, who sought a little relief from their burden of reality. They named it “Oasis”. These forefathers would reach out to them in their dreams and guide them to this place, where they could cultivate their dreams. These dream-dwellers had constructed their dream-realities in this city out of nothingness. The city had grown and flourished over the years as the dream-dwellers grew in numbers. After being convinced that their efforts have bourn fruit, the forefathers had decided to move on. They handed over their charges to some older residents of the city and set out on a journey beyond the city. They have never been heard of again. It seems they have slowly faded into oblivion.

The old man says that he was one of the young inhabitants who had been handed over the duty to guide new dreamers into the oasis. They had fulfilled their duty to the word for many years. But slowly and steadily tentacles of reality had crept in and they had begun losing faith in their dreams. Some had found out that reality could not be kept at bay and that the dream-realities have become meaningless to them. Some others had given up their dreams for certain material aspects of life. Eventually most of them had disappeared and had been unable or unwilling to come back to this place. Their dreams have crumpled over time. The Oasis has become an “Oasis of Shattered Dreams”. He is one of the few people who had not been able to give up on their dreams and continue dwelling here. But for many years they have not found any new dream-dweller. It seemed that the whole world was running a race with itself and no one had time for thoughts, emotions, and dreams. They had almost given up hope.

He tells me that they were all very surprised to find me. It has been ages since someone had found their way to this city. It is even more surprising that I have been able to come here on my own, unguided by any of the dream-dwellers.

I have given them new hope. They have been overjoyed to know that there are still people who dare to think differently, dare to dream.

As they all gather around me, I feel a kind of fraternity with these people. For the first time in my life, I open my heart to them.

I tell them how you had given meaning to my life. How you had become the sole reason for my existence. This makes me delve into unhappy memories.

I had believed that you would be a perfect receptacle of my thoughts and aspirations, my devotion. You alone had the kind of sensitivity and depth to understand me. Have you ever noticed how similar we are? But alas! My lamentations have fallen to deaf ears. If only you would have considered me for once, given me an opportunity to shower you with my love, my caress, maybe you would not have found me disagreeable after all. It is even possible that you would have discovered that behind this shell of obscurity there exists a heart that beats only for you, a mind that holds you in the highest regard and a soul that loves you unconditionally. But you will never know this, since you have never ever tried to know.

Have you ever judged a book by its cover; decided that it was not to your taste even before reading a single line? Then why did you decide my fate, cast me into this doom even before trying to know me? Your ignorance torments me; makes me denounce the waking-reality. How wonderful it would have been if we could choose our own reality. These thoughts sadden my heart in my waking state. I feel as if I belong more to the desert land of my dream-reality where you seem to be the very personification of my expectations, rather than this cruel waking-reality where these expectations would never be fulfilled.

I spend long hours in The Oasis of Shattered dreams. I do not know any longer which one is my dream and which one my reality. Is the waking state really a bad dream and the Oasis the true reality? My fellow dreamers tell me that dreams are a manifestation of the subconscious. But reality is also a manifestation of the conscious mind. Do we really have the capability of discerning the conscious from the subconscious? Hadn’t an ancient school of philosophers believed that the world as we see it is an illusion. Then how can we say that this dream land is not a reality. The old man admires my reasoning and tells me that I have the true spirit of a dreamer, just like the forefathers who founded this city. He tells me I should follow in their footsteps and voyage beyond the oasis. I have known this in my mind for long. I say farewell to all my fellow dream-dwellers and set out in pursuit of my greatest dream – You.

The Roommate…contd.

For some days now, I find him asleep most of the time. I spot a lot of sleeping pills

in his drawer(I often ransack his drawer in the hope that I find something interesting which gives us an inkling of what is going on in his mind, it can be quite a good means of entertainment for us). It seems that he deliberately wants to remain asleep. Even when I find him awake, he would be very drowsy. There is a strange sort of look in his eyes that makes me doubt his sanity at times. It looks as if he has finally become aware of his antiqueness and is unable to come to terms with it and hence is taking means of sleep to escape the confrontation with reality. Well, who really cares? We all have our own lives and own challenges.

The Dream-Dweller…contd.

I drag my feet through the sand. Sometimes I grow weary, but a glimpse of you, or the sound of your voice far away, gives me new strength.

I sense a storm coming. Soon a strong gust of wind invades the landscape. The atmosphere grows very cold. Sand is hurled into my eyes. My eyes hurt and tears roll down my cheek. I am enveloped by a huge curtain of sand reaching up to the sky. My sense of direction is baffled. Suddenly I sense the warm touch of a hand– your hand. Your warmth flows through my entire body. You grip me strongly with your soft hands and guide me forward. I resign myself to you. Slowly the storm settles down and I sense your hand relinquishing its grip. The stars come out and the terrain is bathed in light. I see you in the distance more beautiful and radiant than ever. You beckon me to follow. I oblige without a second thought. But my progress is hindered as I come across a huge abyss. There is no way forward. I look around but cannot find you. As I look down in to the abyss I see a nothing but a void. An irrational fear grips me. It is then that I spot a brilliant white light originating from the bottom of the abyss. As I look downwards again, I see your smiling face and my fear is replaced with an unspeakable joy. Your eyes speak a universal language that does not require any word. I understand the choice I need to make. Either I turn back from here and give up on this reality, or I step forward into this abyss and embrace this reality forever. As if to give me more time to decide I am thrust back to this world of bad dreams, which is no longer a reality for me.

I have pondered over this for a long time. The inability to choose one’s own reality has always frustrated me. This is my chance to embrace the reality which I desire. Realization dawns upon me and I understand that the forefathers of The Oasis had made this choice long before. This was the end of their pursuit, their quest.

I have made up my mind. I will step forward into the abyss and finally, I will be united with you, forever.

The Roommate…contd.

What a mess! We found him dead today morning. The doctor attributed his death to an overdose of sleep inducing drugs. He never did any special favor to me when he was alive. But his death may bring me real publicity. Soon there will be a lot of media people and newspaper reporters swarming in our little apartment and who would be the centre of major attraction, the receiver of a volley of questions from all around? No one but the deceased’s roommate. I can make up stories about how I found out about his personal problems and always stood by him, consoled him and provided him moral support, but was unable to prevent the inevitable. For some months now, I will be quite sought after. It feels good in a way.

But no matter how much I am elated, there is one thing about this corpse that really intrigues me. Even in death, his face has retained a strange smile, an expression of tranquility, as if he has come out victorious in a fierce and enduring struggle. I cannot comprehend its meaning. I have heard about rigor mortis and the effects of stiffening of body muscles after death, but somehow my intuition tells me that this is a different case altogether. I feel that I would not be able to generate any concocted story about this aspect, and hence will prefer to avoid any discussion on this. The serene countenance on his lifeless form unsettles me somehow and I realize that I am afraid to think about it. Although an object of derision for us, I cannot deny that he was a strange fellow indeed. It is best to accept the fact that there are many mysteries in this world which are unfathomable to a rational mind.

Riddhiman Basu

Note: This story has now been printed in Volume 1 of 'Kolikata Letterpress' Journal