Between Dream and Interpretation
The next morning, as he sipped his coffee, he wrote as he always did. First the time, then the first words, still flickering. While he wrote, details returned, as if the paper itself drew them out. What else had been there? Himself. A friend. Guards. An agent. A woman.
He knew himself and the friend. The others lay beside them like objects without instructions. The guards – he could live with that: roles, functions, order. But an agent? And then this woman. Beautiful, with long dark hair, unfamiliar yet strangely close. Even the thought of her stirred feelings he could not name – a curious mix, lighter than usual. He was certain he did not know her, and yet he had seen her before. Not in daily life, but rather in places where everything carried a meaning he could not understand.
He leafed back. Cinema hall. Corridor. Then the exhibition grounds. Three settings, the same calm in her gaze. No threat, no comfort – rather a presence that defied explanation. He drew a fine line beneath the designation that was no name: “the woman with dark hair.” Next to it he wrote: “recurring.” The word looked harmless but felt like a discovery.
His coffee grew cold; he didn’t notice. Hastily, he jotted down a few fragments: coins, neon, staircase, handover. But what was it she had given him? He felt its weight, its importance. He set down the pen and closed his eyes. The image of the woman remained, as if she had taken a seat in the room. In both hands she held something he could not quite make out. He opened his eyes and closed them again: the image sharpened. A small golden envelope, no larger than a postcard. Its contents remained hidden, but he sensed its weight – as if it held something he was meant to know.
He laid the notebook flat on the table and turned the pages slowly, as if their order might reveal what he had overlooked the day before. Between the notes were small arrows, circles around words that suddenly seemed significant: Hell. Copy. Storm. Control. He drew thin lines connecting cinema, corridor, exhibition grounds, as though mapping a pattern that only appeared once the points were joined. He saw the dreams side by side and knew they were no accident. She was no coincidence. She was a thread.
In the afternoon, he felt the world move faster. The bus arrived too precisely, the supermarket lights shone too bright, and the clouds crossed the sky more quickly than before. The day passed as if it were only an echo of the night. Perhaps he only wished to return – return to the dream, to the woman with the dark hair.
That night he chose no complex technique. Only a simple bedtime meditation, plain and repeatable: The woman steps from the half-light. Her face remains blurred, but her posture is unmistakable. In both hands she holds the envelope. He takes it from her. He does not open it.
Lying on his back, he breathed calmly and let the scene arise without effort. It came on its own, standing in the room like a silent piece of furniture. No counting, no forcing. Only the weight of the blanket, the faint tension in his arms, the rhythm that set itself. When the thought of opening surfaced, he let it pass.
Headlights swept briefly across the ceiling, then were gone. The image remained, softer now, smaller. His breath deepened, his hands grew warm. At last, he fell asleep.
