Awake - Short Story

Awake

by: Aleta O'Brien

She woke sometime after midnight with the distinct feeling that her subconscious had been drinking without her.  Her eyes remained closed, as if keeping them that way would retain that delicious feeling: the soft caress on her shoulder, the attentive look in his eyes, the soft breath on her neck.  But the sound of the CPAP machine took her dreamland away.  She desperately tried to grasp the disappearing dream, but the memory eluded her once she opened her eyes and saw her partner sleeping next to her. 

The CPAP machine was a constant sound, the iPad was still on, and he farted in his sleep.  There would be no return for her.  She closed her eyes tight.  She tried to reconstruct the dream and, without realizing it, squeezed her thighs.  The dark room and fuzzy feelings allowed her to piece together more… the breath near her ear, the anticipation of a touch that hadn’t quite happened yet.  She remained perfectly still, begging her brain to bring it back. 

But her brain decided to start thinking and ruined the mood.  Why had she had this dream?  Did she read something or watch something before she went to sleep?  Was it something she ate for supper?  It felt so real.  2:17 a.m.  Dark bedroom.  CPAP on,  yet he still managed to snore-not even in a rhythm, but a disgruntled snort here and there.  Mood killer, for sure, she thought.  She sighed, “Apparently my subconscious has developed a sex life and it neglected to consult me.”

She tried to recall what he looked like, the man whose breath she could still feel near her ear.  Dark eyes.  That much came through.  She thought of men she knew with those dark eyes, but none fit the experience she had.  She still ached and needed more.  Her body was tense.  She shifted, trying to ease the tension… “What about...” she thought, and almost reached out.

At that moment the machine decided to whistle.  It was a high-pitched sound that should have made a dog’s ears perk up, but Ambien made him oblivious.  She considered removing the alien mask hugging his face, but turned away instead. He probably wouldn’t appreciate it.  Snuggling into the blankets, she begged for the dream to return and closed her eyes…

The next afternoon, after she cooked and her partner critiqued her culinary skills, she cleaned up, took a shower, and sank into the mattress. He was there already, watching YouTube short videos.  She had no interest in that, so she turned on her side and faced the wall, hoping the glare of the iPad wouldn’t shine through her eyelids.  The bed rustled as he turned to adjust the CPAP and put it on properly, along with the chin strap he’d found on the floor.

Somehow she fell asleep and dreamed again, but this time, it wasn’t the man from last night.  It was her partner.  He was going down on her.  The anticipation was lovely, but the reality of it made her fake an orgasm just to make him stop.  The dream fast-forwarded to him getting dressed and she saw the tattoo on one arm.  She was shocked, because he disliked tattoos.  It covered his entire arm from top to bottom.

She moved closer and traced the red and white roses at the top of his arm.  They twined together, flowing down his arm toward two women.  One of the women looked like her, but the other didn’t.  She looked at her dream partner and said, “Don’t tell me she likes roses too.”  He huffed and grunted a response she couldn’t make out.  She startled awake.  The CPAP was at it again, this time leaking air directly into her face.

With a gasp, she pushed the tube away from her, then looked at her partner’s arm.  No.  No tattoo.  No roses.  Still just a normal hairy arm.  She dropped back onto her pillow.  What was her brain trying to figure out at night?

The next morning, she sat at the kitchen table.  She sipped her coffee slowly, allowing the steam to settle across her lips.  The question had followed her into the morning: What was her brain trying to figure out?  Not the tattoo.  That was ridiculous.  She knew that.  Tattoos didn’t appear overnight, no matter what her subconscious seemed to believe.  But, she admitted to herself, she had checked his arm again before he took off the alien mask.

No, what was replaying in her mind was the woman.  The other woman woven into the tattoo.  She had blonde hair and green eyes.  Her own hair and eyes were brown.  She could see the tattoo lady, not clearly enough to describe her to a police sketch artist, which her rational mind pointed out was probably for the best.  “Good morning, officer.  I’d like to report a woman my partner may or may not know.  My source is a tattoo that does not exist.”

She looked at her phone.  Nothing.  She wasn’t sure what she had expected to find. A message from a woman named Rose?  She snorted.  Her partner walked into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator.  “What are you laughing at?”

“Nothing.”  

He stared into the refrigerator as if waiting for it to offer suggestions.  “Did you use the last of the cheese when you cooked last night?  You should always leave at least a little for other people.”

And just like that, the mysterious woman disappeared beneath the considerably more immediate mystery of why a grown man could look directly at a package of cheddar and fail to see it.  “Second shelf.”

He found it.  No apology followed.  She watched him walk away and looked at his arm once more.  Still hairy.  Still tattoo-free.  “Jeez,” she thought.  “Obsessive much?”  She shook her head and reached for her coffee.

It was a dream.  A ridiculous dream.  There was no blonde woman, no tattoo, no reason to turn herself into a detective before breakfast… 

Except for the condoms.

Her coffee stopped halfway to her mouth.  That hadn’t been a dream.  Months ago, he’d come home with a box and shown them to her almost casually.  She remembered staring at the package, then at him.  They hadn’t been intimate in a long time.  A very long time.

“Who are those for?”  She couldn’t remember getting an answer.  Not a real one.  She’d pushed the question somewhere into the crowded closet in her mind labeled Things I Don’t Know What to Do With.  Apparently Tattoo Blonde had found the closet and was playing.

Later, he texted that a group of his friends were coming over after work and told her to have snacks and drinks ready.  

Before the friends arrived, she was cleaning up the area where she’d been working on a painting.  He came in, glanced at the artwork, and said, “You should have painted the sky orange.”  She considered explaining that the bird was going to have orange in its feathers and would disappear against an orange sky, but he’d already walked away. 

Later, while his friends sat in the living room watching a movie, he asked her to get up and make him a drink.  One of his friends told him, “You have two legs, make it yourself.”  He replied, “Why?  She’ll do anything I say.”  She saw the looks his friends exchanged, but she got up anyway.  She took a deep breath. No one had lit a cigarette, yet somehow she felt as though she were breathing in smoke.

Glasses and plates covered the room by the time everyone left.  He carried a few into the kitchen before disappearing toward the bedroom.  She left the rest where they were.  Whatever remained could wait until morning.  He was already in bed, alien mask firmly attached.  There was no conversation.  Again.

She couldn’t help herself.  She looked at his arm one more time.  This was getting ridiculous.  She was allowing a nonexistent blonde woman tattooed on a nonexistent sleeve to occupy actual real estate in her head.  She turned to face the wall and let sleep take her. 

She was dreaming again and didn’t want to wake up.  She was working on a painting, though she couldn’t quite make out what it was.   

“Wait,” she heard him say.  She braced herself for his sigh.  It didn’t come.  “Try it again, sweetheart.”  Those words melted around her.  “I don’t know what I’m doing.”  He picked up the brush and demonstrated the stroke.  “You’re learning.”  Then he handed the brush back.  She tried.  It didn’t work.  She waited for him to take it from her.

He didn’t.  

“Again.”  

There was almost something infuriating about the patience in his voice. She tried again.  This time it worked.  

“There you go.”  

She looked at him.  He was smiling.  Not because he’d been right, but because she had done it.

She felt enveloped in his warmth.  His shoulder was near hers, his hand resting close to her own.  His dark eyes held hers, the look lasting a little longer than it should have.  Something pulled her awake.  

2:17 a.m. Again.  

She closed her eyes and replayed the dream over and over.  She was determined not to forget this one.  She replayed his warmth, his encouragement, the patience in his voice.  The way he had looked at her when she’d finally gotten it right.  Somehow, she realized, she wasn’t only comforted.  She was turned on.

Was something wrong with her?  Why would a dream like that make her body ache?  She looked at the loud snoring machine next to her and decided he wouldn’t notice.  She reached into her nightstand drawer and pulled out the new toy. 

It was smaller than the rose and supposedly quieter. She turned it on and jumped.

“What the fuck?” So much for discreet. 

She settled back and gave it a chance. The moment it made contact, the thing got louder.

“You have got to be kidding me.”

Then something started moving at what felt like ninety miles an hour.

“Ouch! Ouch!”

She shut it off. Apparently the women writing those glowing reviews had very different interests.

File 13.

She sighed and reached for the trusted red rose tucked farther back in the drawer.

“Don’t be smug.”

With the dream still warm in her mind, she eventually drifted back to sleep.

The next morning, the dream was still fresh in her mind.  She wrapped her hands around her warm mug and thought about the night before.

Nothing he had done in the dream should have felt particularly intimate. He had been patient. Encouraging. Kind.

So why had it affected her so much?

This time she wasn’t trying to remember his dream face.  She was trying to remember how it felt to be treated that way.  “Oh God,” she whispered.  “I’ve missed that.”

Her partner walked into the dining room and glanced at the glasses still sitting there. “You leaving those for later?”

“Yep.”

“Okay.”

He poured himself some coffee and walked out.

She didn’t look for a tattoo this time. She wrapped both hands around the warmth of her coffee.

She was awake.