Night Lives
Non-Fiction by Erin Ashenhurst
Illustration by Tia Kilmartin
The kitchen is flooding. I was running the tap to fill a pot, but now it’s seeping out from between the tiles of the backsplash, gushing from under the cabinets. The kids look at me deadpan. Mom, is this dinner? We are standing in the flood up to our shins and it is soup — the soup I was trying to warm on the stove. Yes, I say, and I am holding a sleeve of crackers that I offer to them to crumble into the pool. The broth is barely warm, and the stiff noodles swim off our spoons. But dinner is served. When I wake up, I think I know what it’s about. The freezer needs defrosting and it’s been leaking a few cups on the floor at random intervals. Each time, I sponge up the water and then forget it ever happened. The seven-year-old notices first. “The fridge has peed again, Mom.” We talk like that. The kettle is screaming. This grape is too sad to eat. Everything is alive and vulnerable.
He dreams there is a friendly alien the size of a squirrel dancing around his room.
I dream my friend Elizabeth and I have built marionettes. They are fashioned in our respective likenesses, but they are dressed like grizzled suffragettes. I have booked a night at a bar to perform stand-up comedy with the marionettes and I’m so excited. But now it is minutes until the gig, and we haven’t practiced manipulating the puppets, nor do we have any stand-up material. I awaken and feel relieved to have more time to develop our routine.
The ten-year-old wakes in the night from a dream where he is being electrocuted. He is shaking his arms and telling me he shouldn’t have touched that gate at school. His hair and pillow are wet with sweat. He sips water and goes back to sleep, wrapping himself in the blanket like a burrito.
I dream I am attending a conference for front-end developers, but first I must plant the flowers I am holding in the hard clay of the parking lot, and it is impossible. In the conference, there is a hot tub by the lectern in which several attendees are soaking. One is a doughy man, fully naked, and everyone is politely ignoring him. I know nothing about front-end development.
The seven-year-old dreams we have a cat named Captain Franklin. This is currently the name of our Rumba vacuum.
I dream I am taking a journalism course where the homework is to fill a goal journal. The journal looks just like the agendas the kids bring home from elementary school. I was supposed to have been writing daily reflections all semester, but the pages are all blank. My friend Rae-Anne is standing at our kitchen table, which is in the classroom. She assures me that everything will be fine as long as I’ve finished the needlepoint project. She then produces an intricately embroidered pillowcase from her tote bag. This is going to ruin my GPA.
When he was younger, the ten-year-old used to tell me he didn’t sleep at all, just lay awake with his eyes closed until morning.
The seven-year-old dreams about a donut. It is big enough to float in, but you can also eat it, and it is delicious. He tells us about it at the breakfast table. It was chocolate with strawberry sprinkles.
His brother and I nod solemnly, chewing our envy. »