A Dreamer's Season: Part Two

PART II:
A large crowd surged around me, pushing shoving. Through the commotion, I could feel an excitement; a bloodthirsty excitement. Whispers floated through the crowds that someone was going to die today. It made my heart jump and pulse with anticipation. Who was it? What had they done? The crowd pushed me into a big enclosure. At one end, there were stairs with a soldier sitting at the top. He looked like he was somewhat important, like a Commander. Beside him was a man in chains who was obviously being condemned. The soldier man rose up his arms and the crowd quickly hushed.
“Why do you bring this man before me?” voices broke out at once and the man, a little irritated, hushed the crowd again, bellowing “Silence! One at a time! One at a time!” He muttered something to himself, and then turned motioning; a man with a big white hat spoke up.
“He has blasphemed our God!” the crowd roar. I found myself yelling at this injustice with them. The white hat man put up his hand and continued, “This man is accused of conspiring to overthrow the temple!” We, the crowd, yelled again. “He has been seen with thieves. He is a thief!!!” another yell. The accusations came more steadily and then a faint whisper was caught like a wildfire and soon we all screamed,
“Crucify him!”
The Commander seemed shocked by this. All of us railed and demanded, “Crucify him! Crucify him!” I screamed at the top of my lungs. That evil man deserved to die and pay for his ways! “Kill him, kill him!” we yelled in unison.
The man looked at me from the top of the stairs. I stunned into silence, his eyes, they were so piecing...I quickly looked away. I could not handle the intensity of those eyes; it was like he saw right through me. My face burned red and again I was caught with crush of the crowed and I yelled...
I woke up to the sound of my voice screaming, “Crucify him! Crucify him!” well hitting Calvin.
“What!! Ouch! Stop it!” he cried out, the in a grumble added, “Will I never sleep through one night without you waking me up?” I grabbed for him, but he rolled away from me. He looked at the clock “Its 3:30 in the morning! Go to sleep!” I jumped on him.
“No! I can't! I won't!”
“What do you want then?” he said groaning.
“I want know what these crazy dreams mean. Take me somewhere where someone can tell me what they mean!”
“In the morning...” he muttered.
“Now!” I yelled, he looked up at me and sighed,
“You’re not going to give it up are you?”
“No!” he sighed again and got up. We got dressed and begrudgingly Calvin took me to a 24 hour physic. The sign also said palm reader and dream interpreter. I dragged Calvin in.
A middle-aged woman sat behind a small intricately carved table. The room was dimly lit and the smell of incense overwhelmed our senses as we entered. Books of magic, voodoo dolls, crystal balls, potions and many more mystical items lined the shelves on the walls. I was about to turn and leave, but the woman stood greeting us, “Why hello, what brings you here? Palm reading perhaps? Maybe a child-bearing potion?” Calvin and I both made a face. “Maybe one to get rid of an unborn-child then?”
“No, she,” he said pointing at me “has been having weird dreams and she wants you to tell her what they mean.
“Yes, yes, come, come,” Her black dress dragged out behind her as she led us through a door of beads that I had not seen. Motioning to a table, she moved around the other side and sat down. This room was filled with similar items as the room we just came from, but looked more like a living area. “So dear Zoey tell me your dreams,” I was not surprised by her knowing my name. I figured it was probably just part of some stupid trick.
“Well-”
“When did they start?” she said cutting me off.
“About three or four nights ago,” I looked at her expecting more questions, but she said nothing, so I continued. “It started with a dream of being in a forest...” I told her everything. When I finished, she sat silent. I thought she might start chanting or something, but she remained quiet. It stretched to awkwardness and when I was about to talk, she said,
“The dreams only mean one thing.”
“What?”
“Well it's as plain as day. It just means that the man in your dream is really you and you’re trying to punish yourself in some way, like make peace with yourself, come to some sort of closure.” I did not feel guilty about anything! I could not believe this woman. I was about to argue when Calvin jump up.
“Well, see Zoey, its nothing! We can go home and go back to sleep!” he concluded happily, “How much do we owe you?” he asked turning to the women. She named a ridiculous price that I didn’t think was nearly worth the one line explanation she gave me. He paid her and we went on Calvin's ‘happy’ way back to our apartment.
Calvin had no troubles falling into a deep sleep, but still I didn’t feel right. That guilty feeling slept with me.

Blood. Blood. BLOOD! I could the iron in my mouth, my vision was blinded by sometime dark and sticky, I reached for my face but I could not grab anything. I had no hands; I tried to force my eyes open but the dark liquid pushed into on every side. Then something filed my month and I could not breathe, I was being suffocated. Then I saw myself from an outsider’s view, I was lying on a bed with black sheets, and I saw that there was blood all over my face and body, it pressed into my month. And it looked like someone was over top of me focusing this torture upon me. But no one was there. The blood suffocated me until my body quit moving...
The scene changed and now I stood in the shower and Calvin stood underneath the shower with his back to me and was washing his hair. Then the flickered and blood started coming out, I grabbed for Calvin to tell him to get out of the blood but he didn’t move. I yelled his name but he ignored me, finally he turn to me. I screamed. Blood was running down his face and over his whole body, his eyes looked blank and the color in his eye disappeared, along with his pupils. He begins to laugh at me, but it wasn’t Calvin’s laugh it was deep and evil laugh. Black flies start coming out of his mouth and I screamed.
“Wake-up, wake-up!” I opened my eyes and Calvin face was over mine. For a moment all I saw was the Calvin from my dream, I screamed again and jumped from the bed. “Whoa, whoa, it’s ok, calm down,” he holds his hands up. I looked around me and it was dark and then I looked at the clock and watch as the number change from 3:29am to 3:30 am. I fall to the ground and started crying. Calvin comes over and holds me, “Shhhh...” he said as he rocked me, “Bad dream again?” I nodded.
“Calvin I just can’t, I just can’t do this anymore. The dreams are getting worse!” for the last week and a half I’ve been having these nightmares, and I was tiered of them. “You just have to help me, please, please help me!”
“We’ll figure something out ok?” we go back to bed and he holds me. I fall asleep crying in his arms.

The next day was Saturday and I went to a drop-in clinic. When my name is called I walk into the one of the patient rooms. In the light of day the dreams do not seem so bad. I almost want to leave but the doctor walks in before I can leave and say, “Hi, Zoey, how are you?”
“I have been better,” I answer quitly.
“Of course,” he looks down at his charts, “It says here you’ve been having trouble sleeping...nightmares?”
“Yes, really bad though, and I always wake-up at 3:30 in the morning.”
“Same dream?” he asks as he writes something down.
“No they’re always different but always about blood,” he asks me a few more questions and then says,
“Ok, so I’m going to prescribe sleeping pills, if those don’t work come back and I’ll see about sending you to a sleep specialist.” He wrote some more things down then handed me a slip of paper. I thanked him and walked out of the office.
Calvin walked along side me as a left the building.
“So what did he say?” asked Calvin.
“Nothing really,” I answered him, “Just gave me some pills and said if the dreams keep happening to come back and he would send me to a sleep specialist.” He nodded his head in understanding.
“Look Zoey,” he said quietly, as he got in the car and turned it on.
“Yeah?” I asked when he did not continue.
“Well, it just I don’t know what to do anymore,”
“What do you mean?” I asked sympathetically.
“Well it’s just that you never sleep through the night anymore and you always wake me up and then I’m so tired at work and you’ve been so crabby lately, well...never mind”
“What are you getting at?” I can tell he knows I probably will not like it.
“I think that...well I don’t want to be too hasty, never mind.” I am to stressed out to worry about it. He will talk when he is ready.

Later that night I wake-up from a nightmare again, my body is cold and clammy and I am shivering. I moved over to Calvin’s side of the bed but find he is not there, I reach my hand out and feel around some more, nothing. I get out of bed, “Calvin? Calvin?” I call. No answer, I flicked the light on and that is when I saw the note by my pillow. My heart began to race and my stomach churns. I quickly opened it up, and read it. Oh all the cowardice things to do!!! I was livid! He said that he could not put up with the stress and my bad attitude anymore. So he went to stay with his brother Ace. Grrrr! I threw the note down and went back to bed, but I was shaking with rage.
Hours later I slept and again I dreamed...
I stood in the court room and the Judge sat before me, he said, “Fornication!” his voice boomed, forna what? I thought...
“What's that?” I blurted out.
“Fornication is the misdeed of having sex outside of marriage.” I scoffed what a joke! Who waited until marriage? I laughed, “Do you find that misdeed funny?” he asks.
“What is this place, honestly?” I asks as I laugh some more. “Who in the world gets married before sex? Nobody! I’ve never even heard of such a thing nowadays.”
“The laws of this court are not swayed by ‘popular opinion’ it is the right-”
“It a joke! This whole little court thing is a big fat joke!” he said nothing but went on with his list of my many great ‘misdeeds’!
“Uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery-”
“Idolatry? Sorcery? When have I ever done such a thing?” the scene flickered to life again and I was a 6 year old child looking up at my daddy silently bagging and wishing he’d pick me up just once and love me. Hot tears burned in my eyes, I remember that day well because that night he left us that. How was that sorcery or idolatry? And immediately I understood that the Judge was saying to me that when I looked to my dad that day I looked to fulfill me instead of...God. What the heck? Where did that come from? I hated when he did that speaking inside my head thing.
The next thing was sorcery and I knew I was safe on that one, I had never...the scene changed to showed when I rebelled against my mom at 12 or 13 years. What did that have to do with sorcery or idolatry? Again the Judges’ words in my head, ‘For rebellion is as witchcraft and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry.’ I was outraged! Absolutely angry! It sounded so finale! But these rules were made-up or something. The scene now was me looking at horoscope, looking to various men to fulfill me ‘instead of God’. Then it showed when Calvin and I when to the physic.
“This is simple un-fare! Its un-fare!”
“But I tell you that men will have to give account on the Day of Judgment for every careless word they have spoken, and for every action.” I started to feel sick again, really sick...what if this was real?
“But wait,” I called out as the Judge was about to pick up more papers. “I never heard of these ‘rules’ so isn’t that un-fare to judge someone by rule they never heard of? And when did I ever hear about God?”
“Never heard of the rules?” I shook my head no, he took off the spectacles he had just put on and look sternly down at me, “I think not. They were told to you, you just choose not to listen. Not my fault.”
“When?” I cried out. Scene of my life played, sitting in church with granddad, a friend at school trying to tell me of Jesus, a track I threw away, notices and sigh about God I chose to ignore, TV evangelist I silenced, radio stations, internet ads of God, people knocking on my door, the list went on and on, obviously I had been told. And like he said every time I had closed my heart to it; my gut lurched what if this was all real?
OH MY GOD! What if it was? That...that would mean I’d have to own up to what I had done! No! No! No! There is no God, there is God, there is no God! I screamed in my mind. No it simply can’t be true!
I woke up and all I felt was remorse, remorse for every wrong thing I had done, and regret! I regretted so much! It seemed so fun at the time but that is worth it now? And if there really was a God and really did have to answered for my sins what, oh no I didn’t want to think of it. What was my punishment going to be? I feel sick to my stomach I run to the bathroom and threw-up. Somehow I knew it wasn’t going to be slap on the hand and be done with it. I was in serious trouble.
Where should I go? What should I do? Granddad would know. I would find him, and I would find the answers.

END OF PART II


Picture found at:
http://www.emergingtruths.com/jesus_and_barabbas/jesus_and_barabbas.html