Published 'Whispers From The Dark' 1995
The house had grown overnight. He was sure of this if of nothing else. That must explain why his own body seemed smaller than when he fell asleep.
Waking up from dreams, one usually needed to spend at least a few mental somersaults to acclimatise the self to reality. However, it was not long before one accepts the dreams for what they were: simply that, dreams.
Today, he woke from a dream which seemed like his real life and into a real life which seemed like his dream. Disorientated, he lifted the covers to look at his naked body. But it still seemed trapped in the dream.
His wife had left a crumpled dent beside him. She was evidently stepping somewhere in a distant wing of the terraced house, by the sound of it.
He tried to recall the whereabouts of the bathroom. The noise of rain on the window reminded him that the summer had been one long drought until now. He remembered the droplets racing down the ancient panes of childhood windows. But that seemed like a memory of someone other than himself. The past is not a foreign country but an alternate world.
These thoughts were untypical of him. He doubted his own identity even more than his sanity... until he recognised his wife for what she really was, coming in with a raised poker filched from the companion-set in the main living-room.
He got up, knowing in his heart of hearts that all scullery maids like him should have been hard at work long ago ... or else earn more ugly red welts on the smart end of her body.
