we dream of raised fists and spin moves. ice rinks and peanut butter.

In the dream, I am sitting there in my room. I hear a noise, at the window. There is a light and I do not like light or noise when I sleep, so I have to stop. I sit up. I am sitting up and, when I look over, I see my shadow on the wall, because of the light.
Yeah, well, and here's the thing - the shadow gets up and grabs a shadow knife. It makes its way to my parents’ room, where I am pretty sure they are having sex. I see my shadow pull back the covers and I can see it on the floor and going up to my parent’s room. Because my parents room is upstairs, and I can hear their bed hitting the wall, and it's my fucking dream so of course I know what's going on.
I hear voices in the living room, and all the boys I’ve ever kissed are just sitting there, as my shadow goes by killing all of their shadows, ,and I feel like I’ve lost control of the dream. Then I laugh, because there they all are, and now my shadow will never let them get into Never Never Land. There are no cars outside. We can never escape.

I start to forget this is a dream when I look out the window and realize there are no cars. I see my uncle there under a tree, completely inebriated and totally appropriate: his penis is out. He is peeing nutragrow on the lawn.
Then the dream changes. I’m in my car. I worry I’ve fallen asleep driving again, and that's when I see it. A deer. It's standing in the road, illuminated by my headlights like spotlights because they are on the front of my car to show me the things in the dark I cannot see, and I freeze, and I panic because this is a fucking deer. It is standing in my headlights. It is the only thing I can see because everything else is fucking black.

Then it jumps. Straight at me.

As I see its head go through the windshield, I know how it will break, the windshield. I know it is a girl deer and not a boy deer. Because of antlers. I know that they’re not there, and how this is probably somebody’s mother and how that is worse than somebody’s father. I know then that this is all clear even though my hands are covering my eyes and mouth because I forget how to close it, and I might be peeing a little.

When I wake up, it's more to remember that I was dreaming than anything else. I pick up my phone and send Allen a text message to see if he's up, because I’m not him and I don't call people at three in the morning, just because I’m lonely. I say I had a bad dream and now I can't sleep. I say, “foureyes.”

He calls. "So, wait, what happened?"

"I had a bad dream. I can't sleep now. I will soon though."

"Well, hey. I'm real proud. I am glad."

"Yeah? Why?"

"Because it's good. That you can overcome this terrible obstacle. That something bad happened and now I get to feel like I’m important."

"So this is about your vanity."

"This is always about my vanity. What was the dream, Ada?"

"Why do you care?"

"Was I in it? I was. You had to wake up and tell me you dreamed about me. It's ok."

"Oh yeah? Dreaming about you would be a bad dream."

"Which is what you would say to raise my concern."

"Mmm."

"So I expect to know when you dream about me."

"I won't dream about you."

"Ada, you had a bad dream and now you're talking to me. While it's true that I can
lull people to sleep, let's face it."

"Thought ends there?"

"Right there."

"Good."

"Yes. Hey. How's your bones?"

"Ache-y."

"At least you're consistent."

"Mmm. Allen, I'm going to sleep now."

"Sweet dreams, Ada."

And when he texts me the sound of a raspberry, I think it's cute. I don't know that I understand this.