Excerpt from "Myth of Myself", Chapter 2 "Daughter of Dionysus".

I woke up to the sound of a baby crying. I keep having this recurring dream. I am a young girl dancing around a maypole with my friends. Our mothers are lounging around watching over us in between drinking and laughing. Then, they all leave except my mother. After she falls asleep, a man in a dark suit beckons me to come over to him. He says he wants to show me something. I want to stay with my friends but he keeps smiling at me, telling me I can trust him, that I am supposed to listen to adults, “You wouldn’t want to upset your Mommy, would you?” I don’t want to go, but I listen and follow him into a golden colored room. Then, the room turns black. I realize the room is bad, and the man is bad, but it’s too late because the door closes with me locked inside.

Each time I have this dream, I wake up to the sound of a baby crying. Of course, the cry comes from my dream because I don’t have any children. I live alone. And this is the morning I have to drive back to my hometown. I haven’t been back in years. I haven’t talked to my mom in years. I guess I won’t ever get the chance to talk to her again in this lifetime. All I have now are memories...bittersweet. I clench the steering wheel pausing to pull myself together. Before I put the car in drive, I slip in a tape that Scott made for me when we were young. As I listen to it, memories flood in and I am taken back...to as early as I remember...

(c) 2013 Kelly Cook