“Oh fuck me now I’m hot”

There’s some punctuation in there. A comma, maybe. A period. Not things normal man considers once such sweet sounds of sluttitude slither into your consciousness.

But I am no normal man, and I lay there wondering what kind of punctuation she had intended; who was the subject of her imperative?

I was half asleep when I heard her. It was the first night Debbi stayed over and we crashed innocently, sleeping next to each other, spooning. She smelled so good, felt so warm, and it’d been a while since I’d been laid, a long while. It’s no surprise I slipped into a dream filled with Debbi performing various adult situations. I woke to find myself grinding against her backside.

I’m not necessarily a prude. I prefer to consider myself polite, so I hoped to all hell she’d slept through the humping, and then, just as I was hoping, for the sake of politeness, that she hadn’t noticed the vibrant swelling pressed against her ass, she called out:

“oh fuck me now I’m hot”

I really wasn’t sure what to do. I mean, I know what I wanted to do. But, did she mean “Oh! Fuck me, now. I’m hot.” She said it in a distant manner. Had she wakened to some timid, undersexed, fool dry humping her ass and felt pity, casting off some dirty talk so I’d spend myself as soon as possible and she could go back to sleep?

Or maybe the pseudo-apathy was because she was half asleep, and she really did mean “Oh! Fuck me now! I’m hot!” I let this thought dance in my head, and though I don’t like to admit it, I pressed against her closer, seeing if she would send some secondary signal. Like maybe something equally slutty to really get me going.

And certainly, if she’d meant “Oh fuck me now! I’m hot!” and she’d have rolled over and presented herself there would’ve been no question, but the night was hot and humid, the end of summer in Houston…

What if she’d meant “Oh, fuck me. Now, I’m hot,” as in it’s hot and humid in here; and not, some non-aggressive loser humping my ass turns me on.

Was it “…fuck me now. I’m hot…” or “…fuck me. Now I’m hot…” Or worse yet, I was half-asleep, when I heard her. Had it been her, or had it been Adult Situation Debbi from my dream, the fantasy bleeding over into reality during those twilight moments between sleep and waking. And then an even worse realization tip-toed into my mind: what if she’d been dreaming, and called out in her sleep. What if it was she having the erotic dream? But, then again, I was struck with punctuation and whether “fuck” was used imperatively towards me, begging sweet, hedonistic action, or more colloquially, intended for an uncaring world and the oppressive humidity.

The room was turbid, and I was turgid. Her breathing remained deep, slow, and the humidity drew a thin skein of sweat over our skins. I leaned across and hovered over her, glancing myself across her thigh, watching closely for any sense of waking, any sense of desire, any longing stretching across the distance to meet mine.

I reached my hand out and turned on the air conditioner. As the window unit shuddered to life, I lay behind her and inched my groin a polite distance away from her ass, smelled her hair once more, and drifted back to sleep.

Gene Loves Jezebel followed. After five decades on the stage, the lead singer played the crowd like another instrument.

Fantastic energy. And despite the age gap, the kids seemed to know the catalog, surprisingly.

Third time I’ve seen them and best show yet.

This Cold Night was next. Sad old beanpole (in a beanie!) was surprisingly spry and chipper.

Just him on stage, so the energy lagged a little.

DI played “Blasphemous rumors” after his set, and I think that God has a sick sense of humour.

First band: Rosegarden Funeral Party, dark rock from Dallas. Took the sound peeps half the set to de-muddy the sound, but they were great regardless. (Still couldn’t hear the guitar.)

I’ve wanted to see them for a while and am glad I got here early. Hopefully they’ll play Houston again soon.

I’ve been having these horrible nightmares.

When I dream , I know I’m dreaming, and a nightmare happens when I can’t control what’s going on, but the entire time, I know I’m dreaming, and if the nightmare gets too bad, I can thrash around and scream loud enough so that someone will hear me from across the aether and wake me.

Lately however, my dreams have changed. I’ve moved into this new house, an old-fashioned, pier and beam, two-story house with wood siding, and a front porch. The siding is the old fashioned kind, thin and laid up overlapping like fish scales. The front porch has four posts holding up the roof, and three wooden steps painted in a weathered, worn, barn red. I’m renting the house or a room from some woman.

It has one staircase. If you go up the stairs from the front, it starts near the front door, goes halfway, and then makes a turn to the left and continues up to the 2nd floor, but if you go up the stairs from the rear, the stairs are straight.

During the day, the house is white inside as well, flat, matte white on walls with no texturing, and the floors are wooden, dark, caked with ages. They haven’t been refinished in a long time. But at night, the house interior changes to dark colors, deep reds, burgundies. The white walls are covered with dark panelling and a patterned burgundy carpet with intricate paisley-like designs covers the floors.

Upstairs, there is only a hall that connects two doors, the one to my room, and the one to the other room. During the day, a banister forms the hallways right-side, looking over into the living room and front door downstairs. This is where the stairs come up. At night, though, hall is just a hall that leads to the other door.

During the day that door leads to another room, but at night, it leads to the front door, and there’s alternately an anxious woman, a quiet man, or nothing behind the door. The man will open the door and look down the hall toward my room, but the woman won’t.

The change in my dreams has been that I do not know that I am dreaming. I always know when I am dreaming, and waking with the sudden realization that what was real wasn’t is odd. And more weird, in my dreams, I fall asleep and dream, having nightmares in the house (where it’s no longer the day white but the night burgundy), and knowing I am dreaming I wake. But I’ve only woken in my dream and continue in the dream world, and I only wake slowly if at all, sleep pulling back like a slow tide to reveal the shore.

One night, the woman was banging on the door, screaming, pulling on the handle to the screen door and ringing the bell. I leapt from bed in my dream and in person and ran to the front door. In my dream I opened the door but kept the screen door shut, and the woman stood there, her hand on the screen door, mouthing somnething to me. In reality, I stopped somewhere in the hallway as I noticed the tides of sleep recede.

Another night, I stood at the door to my room, looking down the hall and the quiet man opened the door and looked at me from down the hall. I know the woman some how, but I do not know the man. He’s older, broad shouldered and thick-chested, wearing a white undershirt, receding, greasy hair, light colored pants. His arms are thick and covered with dark hair.

The woman has short hair and intense eyes and pleading fingers. Last night, the woman was outside the bedroom window with a drill, drilling and banging. I woke in the dream, and it was Debbi fixing the blinds, but as sleep crept away, I realised I was laying in bed with my arm around Debbi.

The woman is both the woman I rented the house/room from, and not that woman. She does not scare me, but her anxiety is like a sickness I can’t bare to look at, but the man has a slow, dark reek, like old sweat at the end of a long, summer, Texas day.

The dreams seem to be coming closer and growing more intense. Last night, in the dream, Debbi was struck with a terrible pain in the stomach. When the woman could not come through the windows. Oddly, though, I do not think the woman means us any harm. It’s the man, whose big hands I’ve seen clenched around Debbi’s wrists, that I fear. But I do not fear him for myself.

Debbi has been waking me as she notices I am more agitated. It’s always odd because I am supposed to know I am dreaming, and I am supposed to get her attention so she will wake me. But I don’t even know I’m dreaming. I’m glad she wakes me though.

I haven’t been sleeping well.