Poor Choices
“Well, that was an awful birthday present.” With a loud creak and a ringing clang, Lucy shut the wrong gate behind her. She frowned in disgust over her shoulder. “That was just my past. Why would anyone want to go there?”
The cloud zipped through the purple grass to Lucy, spinning in circles as it zoomed around her legs like an overly excited puppy.
Still woozy from the wine, Lucy waited until the cloud calmed down enough to finally let her clamber on.
Dream or not, she was still very drunk—trying to jump onto the cloud like she had earlier would have been unpleasant.
Flying through the glitter grass on it wasn’t any better.
Flat on her back as the glittery fields and floating starlight, aurora bubbles and rosy clouds spun around her, Lucy sighed in relief when it finally parked in its usual spot by the pleasant gates.
“Strange I haven’t woken up yet.” Normally Lucy never slept this long, especially when she’d had this much to drink.
“Perhaps the past is slower than the present. Honestly, every second with Mom is an eternity I won’t get back, and every one of those memories I just stepped into was awful.
Even worse than the first time.” Lucy sat up on her elbows.
“I wonder if there are gates that show my future, too?
Or would the normal gates technically be future gates?
Am I in like, some ideal version of the present?
Is the dreamscape the most present the present can be? And the nice gate is my future?
“I’m asking questions like Esther now.” With a laugh, Lucy flopped back onto the cloud blanket.
“I’m so fucking dramatic. Why am I talking so much?
What was in that wine? Cloud, can you talk?
Or make any sound? You’re obviously sentient, but how sentient?
Does it bother you that we have dream-sex on you every night?
Or since this is my dream anyway, maybe you’re just cool with that?
Maybe you’re not sentient. Maybe you don’t get excited to see us.
Maybe I’m just anthropomorphizing you. Dog-opomorphizing you?
Or would it still be anthropomorphizing since dogs are also commonly anthropomorphized?
” Lucy laughed again. “Now I really sound like Esther.”
In response, the cloud settled deeper into its spot by their canny gates.
Lucy sighed, bored already. It was quiet without Dream Esther here.
Far too quiet. “Esther? Are you hiding from me? I’m sorry I left, love.
I just had a little mental breakdown and ran away!
Can we blame the bougie wine? Can you come back now?
I’ll even talk about my big feelings with you!
I’ll even pretend I’ll do it in person, when we’re awake, if you want! ”
Silence. Only the distant popping of bubbles as the waterfall reached the firmament, splashing aqua shimmer into an aurora, streaming across the rose-petal sky.
“Esther!” Lucy called louder. “Can you hear me? Dr. Voigt! Dream girl!”
Sitting up against the wine-induced vertigo, her brows creased as she looked at Esther’s closet door next to her own cemetery gate. The idea of going through it felt just as wrong as the gate to her past did, drawing out a sinking dread in her gut.
A warning that Lucy was still too drunk to heed.
Determined, she scrambled up to stand before the bifold door. Her gaze followed the unicorn and fairy stickers plastered to the wood grain, and the bright pink E and V hanging in the middle. With a determined nod, Lucy tugged open the handle, and stepped through.
If the nice doors led to the future, she wanted to be in Esther’s.