#12.16.21

[thefakejeffreyazoff]

Jeffrey posted on his Instagram stories, 12.16.21

[thighlerseguin]

Injury updates: Hintz, Radulov, Kiviranta, Heiskanen | December 16, 2021

[whatever-dude]

I hope primeau is ok

[bumzu-is-my-everything]

[bumzu-is-my-everything]

[bumzu-is-my-everything]

[bumzu-is-my-everything]

[nightmule]

I'm in my car but I'm in the back seat, which even in the dream registers as odd. My coworker Z is in the front passenger seat and we are in a parking lot near a mall. I think we're waiting for someone (presumably the driver) but I'm not sure who the other person was or why they got out of the car. Before this I think I was driving but I don't remember that part of the dream well, I just know the mall wasn't our actual destination and that we were lost and stopped there to reorient ourselves.

I'm looking out the window reading a billboard when I hear yelling. "Do you hear yelling?" I ask and turn to look at Z. She's frozen with her eyes locked on the rearview mirror (how I know this sitting behind her I'm not sure, it was a dream). Obviously I follow her gaze to see what she's looking at and realize what I'm hearing is a man standing at the back of the car sort of mumbling and yelling. Whether he's talking to us or to himself isn't clear and I can't understand a word he's saying but he clearly isn't happy. I can see him in the rearview pacing back and forth 2-3 steps in each direction behind the car with one hand gesturing towards nothing in particular and the other down past where his image is cut off by the edge of the window. "Um, Z--" I start in a quiet voice to ask what we should do but an almost imperceptible shake of her head cuts me off.

I watch the man in the rearview for a view seconds longer, discomfort building, when suddenly the man falls silent. He stops pacing and raises his hand toward the back window. In his heretofore unseen hand he's holding a handgun and even in the rearview mirror I can tell that handgun is aimed at Z and me.

The first thought through my mind is "there's nothing I can do." I can't reason with the man if I don't know his motives. I can't give him what he wants if I don't know his demands. If I can't understand him what reason do I have to believe he could understand me? Any move I make could be enough to set him off. Maybe if I was in the driver's seat I could get us away from him, up over the parking lot divider with its scrawny trees. Or maybe I could put the car into reverse and run him over in self defense. But I'm not the driver. No one is. In the back seat I'm a child again. I am neutralized. The fear burns away my insides, I can feel them crumble into ash. I squeeze my eyes shut wanting to be anywhere but here, not wanting to see, not wanting to know.

But then I open them again. If someone is going to die I want to bear witness to that death. Even if the someone is me. If I am to be killed I want to die with dignity, not consumed by fear and worrying that makes me a coward. No, no I have to watch. That observational faculty lets me remain a subject rather than an object in whatever time I have left. I stare into the rearview mirror and the dark opening of the barrel seems to grow larger and larger the longer I look. It's almost as if I'm falling down into it, into the gun and into my waiting death. The black hole of it grows to fill my entire field of vision and when not even a glimmer of light remains the feeling of falling stops. I realize that I have been dreaming, and that I am now awake. I open my eyes and sure enough I'm in my bed. Check the time and its 1:53am meaning I've been asleep for a maximum of 20 minutes. I Google what to do if someone aims a gun into your car but the results do little to put me at ease.