Demon Stories

Diana: The Dream, Date Unknown, Ancient Rome

Diana

The Dream

Date Unknown, Ancient Rome

My mother was going to die. Don't ask me how I knew, but I knew. 

It was as if I knew it in a dream. That was how it felt. When you are dreaming, you know things and those things lead you to other things, to other places.

Her death would lead me to another place. This I knew for sure.

It was the waiting that was the worst part.

My mother was never very affectionate with me. But sometimes she woud hug me. These were such strange hugs. They're not the kind you give to a child, do you know what I mean? No. Her hands would glide up my back, one hand finding the back of my neck and into the caress. Her fingers would go up my front, finding my nipples, and touch them in circles.

It was almost as if she were searching. Searching for what?

In the embrace, she would smell my hair. She'd sink her nose deep into my hair, feeling it on her face perhaps. There was something about it that made her fascinated. 

Within, I was unsure what to think as it was happening. I wanted to ask what she was doing. Why she was doing this. But part of me, just very small inside, wanted her to continue. Continue to touch me, continue to love me. Look at me with her blue eyes, widely and drinkingly. It was almost as if her very eyes could taste me.

I know it was wrong now. Thinking back, a bitter seed of disgust is revolted. But a part of me, that same small part of me from long gone past, longs for it. I want her to touch me again. I want her to smell my hair again. I want to know if I smell the same. I want to know if what she is searching for is still within me. Would she still know?

Over the years, my heart became broken because of these touches. Do you know what its like to be reminded of such touching whenever someone touches you? Just a graze on the arm, maybe someone mistakenly tugs your hair as they reach for the pole on the train. I don't like trains. I don't like being in crowds. I can't stand their touching. No, because any touch reminds me of her. And I can't stand it. When I am touched, even by mistake, the digust in my heart and the longing within it together make me want to scream.

I remember when I was little I would join her at the window, which was her favorite spot. She would look down at me with her wide blue eyes, and they would look as if they'd seen a ghost. 

"What are you doing here?" she'd ask, as if she didn't know who I was.

It was always the same. 

My father told me that he thought my mother had lost her mind. She wasn't normal, not anymore. "Its a shame," he would say quietly, for he was a man of very few words. "She was lovely, your mother."

I had six brothers and sisters. My eldest sister remembered my mother the best. She had been born to our mother when she was only sixteen. Mothers were young in those days, marrying young. "Mom used to be sweet and kind, like a child herself. She was the best playmate," she'd say. "I guess she just grew up. It had to happen some time." But the faraway look in her eyes told me she thought otherwise.

But always, no one could tell me why she had changed. What caused her to change? 

I wouldn't know for some time, but one day the answer came bright and clear. 

It was right after one of our loving sessions. My mother had touched me like she did, and then abruptly her hands were at her sides. She hung her head, her face blank. This was my cue to leave. 

But as I was leaving, there was something very different. 

Without warning, there was a crash behind me. If I had known better, I would have run out of the room at that point. But what did I know? I looked behind me.

From the doorway, I saw such a strange sight.

"You can't take her away," she was suddenly shouting out of the window. "She's not your's! You don't belong here! She belongs with me!"

Here, I entered a dream. A dream reality. There had been no other explantion. Such things don't happen unless you are dreaming.

For here, out of nothingness, formed a bright figure in the air in front of the open window. I couldn't make out what it was. It was just a bright white light, taking an unfamiliar shape. The weirdest thing about it, the thing that made the least sense, was how the light did not enter the room. It lit nothing but itself. 

As the unreality took hold, the light began to speak.

"Stop," was simply all it said.

"I don't understand you," my mother answered simply, calm now for no reason. I could not understand why.

The light began to laugh, a soft laughter. It made my heart filled with an unexplained warmth, a feeling that everything would be okay. Yet, the feeling was foreign and made me feel uncomfortable. Like it didn't belong.

"Do you think I didn't see what you were doing," the light asked. 

"I don't understand what you are saying," my mother replied simply again. 

"Iulia," the light breathed, taking on a concerned tone. "Don't play a game."

My mother said nothing now, choosing to look at the ground. 

"There is no game to play," the light continued. "I would not come back if it were a game."

As my eyes watched, the light went completely dark. This filled me with such fright, I can not express. To this effect, I cried out and with my cry the reality snapped back. 

My mother was standing at the window, in exactly the same position she had been in. The cloth was drifting into the room at the slight wind. Nothing was out of place. 

But what I had seen. 

Before I could react, my mother's face slowly looked back at me. Her blank eyes studied me for a moment. Then she closed them. "What are you doing here," she asked.

But as she spoke to me, suddenly I knew. It was as if the dream had not snapped back entirely. There was still something there. The uncomfortable feeling was still in my heart. 

And as I stared at her questioning face, I knew.

My mother was going to die. And it would be the light which would kill her.