Chapter Three

Chapter Three

Immediately after being told my subconscious may be a fuzzy phone line to my old self, I started paying more attention to the dreams. I'm not allowed pencil or paper, but I've been allowed access to a word processor, sans internet access, as part of some government sponsored project for rehabilitating the mentally mental. And apart from recording thoughts like these, I've taken to transcribing my dreams in the off chance that they might actually mean something. Not that that is at all likely. In fact it's far more likely that they are another symptom of my grip on reality being loosened like a mountaineer's last hand hold crumbling into earthen grains.

My first transcribed dream, but not exactly the first dream since arriving at Carstairs, took place the night of that psch evaluation. I'd been wheeled into my cell, de-chaired and unfettered, but not before they slipped my meds down my throat. It was the small nurse, Archie that did that. Technique over size, but I wasn't exactly resisting and in any case, I think they make the dreams better, more vivid. When the curtain of the world rolled back and I went into the land of nod the following is as exact as the day after can make it.

Dream 1 – The Recorded Dream of Daniel Young dated 16/01/2009

I am in bed and it is warm. It is safe. The blankets are pink and a single shaft of light from the skylight above catches my eye. I shift out its beam, flexing my toes, curling them against cotton.

But the beam shifts too.

I scrunch up my eyes and flop my hair forward. But the light is brighter now and turns the back of my eyelids scarlet. I'm too awake to get back to sleep. So I yawn and throw the covers aside and the light explodes.

I clench shut my eyes and throw an pyjama'd arm up as a shield. A yelp breaks free from my lips, but the instant it does so, I am not here. And I feel a force propel me forward.

I open my eyes. I am riding a bicycle. It is two wheeled, no stabilizers. My hands grip the blue handlebars as I see the grassy slope wobble underneath. No pyjamas now, but worn, holey jeans and chunky black trainers. There are tents and caravans dotted around me and a voice from behind is shouting: “Go Sam. Pedal. Pedal.”

I do it. I turn the pedals, catching jean in chain. But, they turn and I pick up speed.

Underneath, the grass stops wobbling. A scream bursts from my throat. The sun hears me and eats the world. And I pedal into the sun.

Analysis of Dream 1

I don't know what I'm supposed to make of this, but I thought I'd give it a go. Started off a bit scary, but probably just a typical anxiety dream. Clearly, some kind of wish fulfilment stuff going on. Breaking out of the looney bin into the freedom represented by the light of the sun and the bike. But in the first part I seemed to be a girl – hope that's not wish fulfilment related. The second part definitely was. At least at the level of learning old skills maybe representing getting my memories back like learning to ride a bike again.

I've had that particular dream a few times now and each time, the change from bedroom to field gives me that same rush of fear. I'm not totally sure my analysis is right.

The second dream, I recorded just about the same time. But I was interrupted by my computer time running out and the next time, I just couldn't quite remember it fully.