A Convoluted Nightmare. Poem by Christie-Luke Jones

A young woman showers next to me. Her limitless eyes scan my thoughts with clarity of intent, enough to melt the mask right off my face. The way the shampoo glides over her hips will haunt me on some far-off day, when everything else becomes unrecognisable. She turns, smiles her bludgeoning smile and motions for me to touch her. Naked and terrifying. And she wants me inside her. But I’m only ten years old; my fragile head spools anxiously at the thought. And I look awful, although clearly she doesn’t think so. But I do, I always do, then all at once I vanish down the plug hole.

Florida. I’ve never been, but here I am. A space shuttle is parked by a palm-lined boulevard, behind are vast hotels with M.C. Escher-like staircases. I stand accused, of adultery no less. I rush around covering my tracks, erasing evidence and conjuring up alibis. My decade-old clothes are wet through with panic. I climb aboard an aeroplane like no other, a retro-futuristic Concorde of unfathomable origin. My loved ones occupy the seats around me, all share the same painfully disappointed countenance. We depart, with dreams of one day waking up.