WAYAN'S JOURNAL

On a road trip to San Diego, I stop to sleep in Santa Barbara, in my cousin Barbara's dorm room.

She tells me she was jumped and raped on campus one night. Recovered now, and says the women's center seems to want her to dwell in the role of victim, encourage her to relive it on & on, and she doesn't see the point.

I meet her roommate Martha. She grew up in Southern California. Has a happy, sexy glow. She hears I'm interested in dreams, and tells...

MARTHA'S DREAM: FALLING

Martha's big sister and cousin are both very athletic, run on the mountain above Whittier where they live. In the dream, she's there too. The road shrinks, the slope becomes a cliff. It's dark like iron. First her older sister falls off, but the other two grab and save her. Then her cousin starts to topple over the brink, but the sisters grab her too, just in time.

Then Martha slips. They just miss her. Martha sees their faces soar up away from her--not devastated or grieving, just disconcerted: "Oh shit, we missed her." Even as their faces float out of sight she hears their voices yelling "either WAKE UP or LET YOURSELF DIE!"

She agrees to die! Hits the ground and dies, and her spirit rises. She can see and hear everything--land, people, their emotions inside--clearer than in her body!

WAYAN'S DREAM: MARTHA'S IMAGE

Night. The eighth floor of the UCSB dorm room Martha and Barbara share. Martha and I are in Barbara's half of the room, which is bright-lit. Martha's half is dark. Martha and I are talking... seem nervous and restrained. We hesitate... then suddenly give up and embrace. We kiss, both get very excited--and then, just as I'm unzipping her pants and starting to kiss and lick her clit, I see a slight motion in the dark side of the room! With a shock I realize a figure is watching us intently. It begins walking forward into the light. It's Martha! And I instantly realize that the Martha in this dream, up to now, was my image of Martha. I'm making love to Martha's image, but from the shadows, the real Martha watches us both.

And then I wake.

BARBARA'S DREAM: FAREWELL

I am riding a bus going strange places, but it wouldn't stop and let me return to my dorm to say farewell to Chris...

WAYAN, YEARS LATER

Farewell was right. Barbara wouldn't be seeing me for a long, long time. Martha's dreams caught it too: the fatal fall, the advice: "WAKE UP or LET YOURSELF DIE!"

I was on my way to San Diego for two weeks, to help my ex-girlfriend Kay through an abortion. But whenever she had a doctor's appointment, Kay picked a fight and wouldn't go, until it was too late for an abortion; she carried the baby to term, gave birth in a bathroom, then lived with me in my van (and baby makes three) for months until an adoption could be arranged. Day by day the two weeks stretched to more than a year.

I came away skeletal, shaking, sleepless, shitting blood, broken-nosed, and broken-trusted. She didn't mean to nearly kill me (not even the broken nose; batterers often don't mean it); and I didn't mean to nearly let myself die. Yet I did.

My own dream? Easy enough to read. Giving Martha head meant I longed for someone I could please: cheerful and easy-going like Martha. But I saw only a mask this girl wore for the public. Not Martha, of course--Kay. Lurking in the dark. Like my cousin's rapist.

I ignored the warning, and dove on in. And fell.

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