As a kid, I would always enjoy my dreams. My dreams would take me away from what I felt was normal, and give me new experiences. Even if I had a nightmare I would enjoy it, because it was something different. Night to night, the moon would fall to the Earth, buildings would fall to rubble in front of me and the trees would dance to the rhythm of the crashings.
As an adult I didn't enjoy my dreams. They would be violent and muddled, and start to merge with my life. In one of my dreams I saw my wife brutally beaten, my dog running for a ball off a cliff and my son shot in the head.
Above all, one dream stood out to me. It was a plague doctor. He would stare at me with a beak mask, as if he was expecting something. I couldn't see his eyes, or if he had any. He would just stare, that mask with no eyes would stare at me. Even though I couldn't see it, he had a twisted grin on his face, his real face.
That beak mask would stare with a blank expression. He would grin at me. Red buboes showed up on my skin. I bled out of my ears. The pain was unbearable, but I couldn't move. My skin blotched with a hideous pink. The plague doctor would hold up flower petals of the same color.
I wanted to scream. I wanted to end it. I wanted to wake up. He would just grin and stand there. He watched me suffer.
I would wake up. I would throw up in the toilet.
This dream happened every few days. I went to a psychologist to get help. I wanted to live normal again.
When I described the dream, he turned pale. He told me there was nothing he could do. He asked me to hold my hand out.
I did so.
He put a flower jar in my hand.