Graced

Her feet were on fire.

It was the burning that had disrupted Grace’s sleep so abruptly this morning, but it was the realization that today’s event had come to fruition so quickly that made her bolt wide awake. As she lay on her back in bed, she could feel the burning through the sheets but didn’t bother to turn on the light or lift the cover to look at her tortured feet. She knew she could no longer deny what was happening. And to her, the problem wasn’t what was happening but rather why.

Just like every morning for the past couple of days, Grace stretched one arm out toward the nightstand and felt around for her small black notebook. When her fingers touched the cold spiral binding, she clasped it tightly and brought it to her chest. With the other hand, she fumbled for the glasses she had discarded in the bed the night before. Putting off her morning routine as long as possible, she reached up and pushed the curtains to the side to let in enough light to reread the first day's entry.

As I walked into the bank and looked around, I realized it was not my bank, but yet it was familiar. But why? How did I know this bank? I stood resolutely still taking in as much as possible of the scene, then began turning around in place to see every angle. As I made a complete circle, my eyes came back to rest on the teller’s windows at the back of the bank. It was only then that I heard the raised voices and saw the three men in blue business suits, red ties, and rubber Donald Trump masks. The men were brandishing weapons. The bank was being robbed.

The bank teller, who looked exactly like Vanna White - no - was Vanna White, seemed scared and fumbled as she loaded the money into a black Michael Kors handbag. I have that bag. Strange choice for a bank heist. There was more money in the drawer than could possibly fit in the bag, so one of the robbers started grabbing the extra money and shoving it in his suit pockets until the sirens started wailing low in the distance, then all three men turned and ran towards the door.

The first two robbers whooshed right by me as if I wasn't there, but the third one cut too close and our shoulders collided solidly knocking me to the ground. Stunned by the impact, I tried to regain my senses. I reached for my purse, which had landed a few feet away, and pulled it to my side. Before I could get to my feet, however, the security guard, Pat Sajak, was helping me up and asking me if I was okay.

Grace didn't glean any new insight from reading her entry again. In fact, she was even more frustrated. What did all of this mean? She had eventually remembered that the bank which seemed so familiar was actually the bank Cassie, her childhood friend, had worked at before their falling out. She hadn't thought about Cassie in years. The last time she saw her, she was screeching away in her car from the front of Cassie’s house and screaming through her car window, "You're dead to me!" Grace didn’t like thinking about that incident because it certainly wasn’t her best moment. But she had made peace with their split years ago.

There had to be something else. She raised herself up on one elbow, carefully maneuvering as to not disturb her feet which now felt as if someone was actually stabbing them with hat pins. She leaned over the side of the bed, reached into the Michael Kors purse that was the same as the one the robbers had used, and pulled out the neatly bundled $20,000.00 dollars. It was still there.

Grace was baffled. How did that money get in her purse?!? It was just a dream. She hadn't been in Cassie's bank. She hadn't witnessed a bank robbery. And those game show hosts weren’t bank employees. But yet... the money was still there.

The days after this initial dream had baffled Grace even more. She dreamed among other things of playing dominoes with Willie Nelson on his tour bus after one of his infamous Fourth of July picnics and woke up to find a bag full of pot in the refrigerator when she opened it to get creamer for her coffee. She dreamed of hitting a rather large dog after coming home from a bowling date of all things with Matthew McConaughey only to find the front end of her car completely crumpled in the next morning, and she dreamed of being caught in a blinding snowstorm at her family's old homestead with Idris Elba only to wake up this very morning with severely frostbitten feet.

Grace was thankful that today was her day off. She hobbled out of bed and slowly made her way to the couch, settling in to make her notebook entry chronicling last night’s dream. She listed as many details as she could remember. Winter vacation. Blinding snow. Drafty cabin. No electricity. Cuddled Idris. Feet frostbitten. Tremendous pain. When she finished the entry, she closed the notebook and leaned her head back on the couch. She felt sure she had missed something but was too tired to think about it anymore.

She spent the rest of the day on the couch pampering her feet which were slowly returning to a somewhat normal state. She watched movies and tried desperately to avoid sleep in any form. Although she was sleepy, she didn’t want to sleep, and she definitely didn’t want to dream. She had become progressively afraid of her dreams, especially since the last one had affected her physical well-being. When darkness fell, she limped back to bed feeling some relief that it wasn’t as painful to walk as it had been that morning.

Once in bed, Grace opened her nightstand drawer and took out a bottle of sleeping pills. She hesitated briefly then opened the bottle, poured out two pills, and swallowed them without water. She thought she might possibly be able to sleep a dreamless night with a little help. As she lay there waiting for the meds to kick in, she began reviewing each dream, mentally connecting the dots, trying to make associations she had perhaps overlooked.

Cassie worked at the bank in the first dream. Okay…possible connection. She and Cassie smoked pot for the first time listening to Willie Nelson’s Outlaws and Angels album. Was that something? Cassie had hit a dog when they were coming home from a party one night. They lied and told her parents they had gone bowling and someone hit them in the parking lot. Was that a stretch? But what about the frostbite? How did that fit in?

Her eyes were getting blurry and she felt sleep creeping in. She was trying to fight the feeling but was quickly losing that battle. She needed to make that last connection…if there even was one. Frostbite. Frostbite. Where does that fit in? Maybe it wasn’t frostbite. Maybe frostnip? Maybe hypothermia? Nothing. Maybe cryopathy? Wait! That was it! The Cryopaths…that was the name of the band Cassie’s boyfriend had been in… the boyfriend that had hit on her numerous times… the boyfriend that had…

With that last incomplete thought, her eyelids fluttered, and she was asleep.

It was unreasonably quiet as Grace walked slowly down the aisle on the short red pile carpet that ran between the pews. The air was cool and the smell familiar. The music was soft and piped in over speakers in the ceiling. Something about this place made her uneasy. Grace wanted to stop moving forward, to turn around and run, but she couldn’t. All she could do was keep moving forward. As she looked past the last row of pews, she saw numerous pink and purple sprays lined against the back wall and shiny potted plants squeezed in between them on the floor. In front of the flowers and foliage was a beautiful brush nickel coffin with rose velvet lining. Grace slowly approached the coffin, leaned over, and peered inside tentatively. She breathed a short sigh of relief when she realized it was empty.

She stood back up straight and wondered why she was here. It was only a few moments before she had her answer. The voice behind her was immediately recognizable, and it made a chill go up her spine. Before she even had time to turn and face Cassie, she heard her old friend say, "No my friend, you are dead to me."