A penny for your dreams

“He will be fine with a good night’s sleep.” I heard my mother whisper to my father, outside my bedroom door. I heard them leave.

‘A good night’s sleep.’ I thought, scornfully. Ironically, that exactly is the problem. A good night’s sleep. Something I can’t have.

And suddenly I plunged into a memory of my usual nightmare.

The dilapidated steps. The broken piano. The run down hallways. And the noise. I hear it. The locked door I could never open.

It has been a month since these.

I don’t want to sleep. The dream is strange, it gets on my nerves. I don’t want to sleep.

I kept mumbling the words to myself as I fell asleep.

I stood in the same hall, the one I visited every night. It rang of mellifluous silence, it stunk of slyness. I sighed, knowing I had yet not encountered a relaxing bout of sleep.

I began walking forwards. As usual, heading towards my usual room. I always stayed there. It was filled with books of blood and gore, food worthy of pigs and walls hosting an alarming print of skulls. Yet, I felt the safest there. At least I could read the books. (Liar, liar, pants on fire!).Though it had a bed, I couldn’t sleep. For my head begins to throb as soon as I lie down, and it ain’t your average headache. I didn’t like exploring the building. Once I had opened a wardrobe to find a pile-load of dead snakes fall on my face (I am still traumatised by that, if that tickles your fancy.) Another time, I had punched the wall in extreme boredom (don’t ask what I was thinking on that one, perhaps I wasn’t thinking at all...), and I ended up going through it , to find a dark forest, where I found dead bodies piled up in the corner at various stages of decay . It dawned onto me that this place had something nefarious about it. So after testing it out, I took hold of a room.

I never saw anyone in the building. Ever. I ,sometimes, heard voices, people fighting amongst themselves, and yet saw no people and they vanished as soon as I opened my door.

So I headed to my room.

Only to find people.

For the first time.

There was a grumpy looking old lady, and a small boy. They were pushing the couch from my room. My room had been stripped of its contents. All the furniture, the table,even the wallpaper was gone.

I coughed.

The lady stopped, glared at me, and continued pushing the couch. The boy looked ready to cry.

I coughed again.

“Water is at the booth near the reception. It costs money, though.” Said she, without looking at me. Even then, I got a you-are-the-scum-of-earth vibe from her.

“Where are you taking my stuff?”

“Your stuff?!” She lamented, livid. I flinched and backed away. The lady had a walking stick. There is no way in hell I take a risk with that.

“Your stuff? I mean, Andrew, look at this lad!” She bellowed. Poor Andrew turned to me, couch abandoned, wincing.

“Own the stuff when you pay for it! The whole month gone and no rent, are we giving rooms for free?!”

“I-”

“ Have you ever went to an inn and stayed for a month WITHOUT PAYING THE RENT and act like you own THE STUFF?!”

“I-”

“ We give you food and drink and books-”

“Lady, wait a minute!”

She stopped rambling, and glared at me.

"What rent?"

"Well the rooms aren't free!"

"But I don't wanna come here!"

"That's what they all say! Every Time!"

Between our spats, poor Andrew looked at both of us turn by turn.

"If you don't want to live here," shouted the lady, "Get out."

Andrew paled. "But-"

The lady glared.

Andrew shut up.

"Thank YOU!" I said, gratefully. Andrew showed me the door.

One step outside and I realised that the inn was a way better choice.

The scenery outside was filled with a morbid smell of dead rats. It was black, painted crudely. The tree were upside down: the roots were outside the earth and a car zoomed down the pavement, only there was a fish driving it , holding the steering wheel sitting over the car. I saw a man with the face of a dog and it grinned at me.

I took a step back, and closed the door of the inn.