A Nightmare for Halloween

I’m walking around Chatfield’s campus, down by the heart shaped pond, where the Canadian honkers congregate every fall. Sam is with me. Out of the corner of my eye, I see a snake, but I don’t take alarm. It doesn’t look venomous.

In fact, I think I’ll have a closer look, so I pick it up, and only in that instant, when my hand closes around its middle, do I realize the snake is poisonous, the worst kind. It whips around and sinks its teeth not into me, but into Sam. He screams, and then the snake bites me. Sharp, bruising pain runs up my arm where the fangs sink in. No blood. Rather, my skin turns instantly purple and shrinks away from the wound.

I have to grab it behind the head if I’m going to stop it. But the snake is out of control. It thrashes and bites me, three, four, five more times, then leaps away into the pond. But I have to catch it. I need it to make the antivenin. If I’m going to save Sam, I’ve got to mix the cure. I’m not so worried about me. I’m large enough. Even with six total bites, I can get to a hospital. But Sam is only four, and his time is running out.

So I dive into the pond, and instantly the snake surfaces, seizing me in its suddenly giant jaws before I can grab it. Inside the mouth, I stand up, smack my head on the putrid, dripping roof with a bone-jarring rattle, and push with my whole body until the fangs pry apart. I jump free, but the snake strikes. Its fangs penetrate my back, and it engulfs me. But then I seize it and begin choking, choking, until it shrinks away, dissolves into nothing.

The snake is gone, but I am still poisoned. And it has bitten Sam. I grab him and run towards the sacred heart chapel, where my Mom is waiting. The hill is long, the climb seems unbearable, and Sam’s weight is growing as the venom runs into his blood.

“It’s already bitten Sam!” I scream, when I finally crest the hill.

“The post office!” Mom says. “They know how to make the cure.”

So we race to my car, where she drives and I cling tightly to my child. Even as close as the post office is, we won’t make it. And so I leap into the air, through the roof of the car, and yes, I can fly. And if I can fly, then this is a dream, and I can leave. But Sam is trapped, and I’m floating away, swimming against the air trying to get back to him, but he stays in the car, which will not make it to the post office in time.

I sit up in bed, breathing hard, my body too hot for a room this cold.

When I go to Sam, he has wet the bed, and he tells me, “Mom, I had bad dreams. I don’t like snakes anymore.”

And I look out his window and see the snake, giant once more, staring in at us,  ready to strike, before I finally, finally wake up.

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Thanks to those who find me by following the link on the Lightning Bug flicker of inspiration linkup.

This post was written in response to The Lightning Bug’s Flicker of Inspiration prompt #22, which asked us to share our nightmares. As I said last week, my dreams have always been vivid, and they have an annoying habit of capturing little bits of reality to fool me. I can also typically roll right over and go back to sleep even from the most horrible ones and not fall into nightmares again. Mostly. Happy Halloween.

Rabbit Run

I don’t understand why people run marathons. I have runner friends competing in everything from 5ks up through the real thing. (Bloggers, too.) I always tell them “Great job” when they share successes. I understand that this is a difficult goal they have set for themselves. I recognize that physical achievement is lauded in our society and that some people get an endorphin high from cardiovascular exercise.

But I’m really thinking, “Wait. The original marathon runner delivered his news and dropped dead.” Why do we want to repeat this? Why is doing so a feat of excellence?

I have walked in a couple of 5ks in pursuit of physical fitness. I consider them hot, miserable affairs that leave me dehydrated and sore. Weight loss is the only possible benefit. And I have to do cardio work to get ready for even those. I do not get an endorphin high off of exercise at all. For the most part, exercise actually makes me more angry, and I’m apt to snark Scott’s head off for an hour or more after a supposedly good workout. I force myself to do it, since I do believe I can increase my lifespan by improving my health. But running? Really? I have tried to run a couple of times in recent history, and the results were nausea from my hot feet, along with sore knees from jouncing along on my own weight. I hate running more than walking, because I wind up gasping for air sooner and it makes all my floppy bits jiggle extra flappily.

And all of this is relevant because The Bitch wants us to run a 5k. Not walk it. Run it. Why? My body doesn’t need dancer’s curves. I haven’t got a secret desire to stand on a podium holding up a medal. (And it’s a good thing, because even The Bitch admits we’d be starting near the back of the pack and finishing dead last.) There is no logic at all to this impulse, but she’s been yammering about it for weeks now.

The only purpose I can see to running a 5k is to demonstrate your physical prowess while building yourself up to suffer more. (Or possibly to skitter, in Updikean fashion, away from a problem.) But the bitch wants a piece of the action, and sooner or later, she’s going to get demanding. I hope she lets me wait until the first of next year to start training.

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This post was composed in response to the Write on Edge Red Writing Hood:Athleticism prompt. Please post comments and discouragement below. If you must encourage her, I probably need to know about good shoes, knee braces, and plus sized sports bras (G cup).

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Thanks to the readers who found me on The Lightning Bug's weekend linkup

If you’re getting here from The Lightning Bug’s Dare to Share weekend, here’s a note. While this is my most-commented-on post to date, I feel like that’s really because I’ve just figured out the art of blog sharing, and this is one of the first ones I’ve written in response to a prompt and shared with the blogging (and blog-hopping) community. Before this, my most commented on post was this one: Dawn. I wasn’t sure which one to link to. And I never feel like I’m following any given set of instructions quite right. So this is my way of linking to both. Cheers, and thanks for stopping by.