And Now This Perfect Machine Must End in Dreams (standard:other, 433 words)
Author: kendall thomas	Added: Nov 06 2002	Views/Reads: 3501/1	Story vote: 0.00 (0 votes)
A man wakes up in a woman's dream.

~And Now This Perfect Machine Must End in Dreams~ 

by Twisted Wabbit 

Bix Miller awoke and sat up in bed.  Something was wrong.  It was too
quiet.  He couldn't hear any traffic from the street.  His alarm clock 
had turned the radio on, but there was only static when he turned the 
dial. 

When he went downstairs to the kitchen his wife was not there.  He
called out her name, but there wasn't any answer. 

He looked out the front door.  The paper boy hadn't delivered.  No
people were coming out of the neighboring houses going to work as they 
should have been. 

When he turned the TV on, like the radio, there was only static -- none
of the channels responded. 

The phone was dead. 

He drove his car around and around and into town, but no one was about. 
The streets were deserted.  No dogs or cats or birds -- or anything, 
not even a fly. 

He glanced down at his feet wishing, foolishly, to see a pair of ruby,
red slipper so that he could click them together:  “There's no place 
like --” 

And then suddenly, magically, he was back in his bed, sitting up,
yawning and rubbing his eyes.  The alarm had turned the radio on; music 
was playing; the news came on; the stock market report -- and it was 
all back to normal.  It had just been a bad dream. 

He hurried downstairs and heard the sizzle of bacon in the frying pan
and his wife singing along with the muppets on Sesame Street. 

God, it was so wonderful to be alive.  He pinched himself just to make
sure.  It hurt; he was real. 

“I'm real; I'm real” 

* 

“Hey, Carol, are you still with us?”  Barry snapped his fingers. 

“Sorry,” Carol said, sitting her coffee cup back down on the black and
white flecked mica table top of Harry's Diner. 

“I was recalling a dream I had last night.  A strange one.  It seemed so
real.” 

“Uh, huh,” Barry said, with an amused expression.  “I've had those. 
Looked like you were in a trance for a moment.” 

Carol smiled. 

“I didn't mean to ignore you.  What were you saying?” 

“Oh, it's not important; can't even remember now.  What was your dream
about?” 

“Well, I dreamed about a man who woke up one morning and found that he
was the only living being on earth.  But he was only dreaming because 
he woke up again and everything was back to normal.  He kept saying 
‘I'm real' over and over. He was so happy.  Funny isn't it?” 

fin 


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