The dream unfurled with a flickering light, like old film warped in the projector. Everything shimmered. Confections sat in pairs, more sculpture than food. Pastry swans poised for a flight to a bygone era, silly doggie cookies grinning eerily, and fish-shaped cakes glistening as though pulled from a river of honey. These sweets seemed sculpted from an opulent fantasy, existing only to remind the dreamer of a beauty that flickered magnificently before vanishing.
Two women loomed out of the velveteen darkness, luminous, like familiar stars from an old film. The younger woman had her eyes wide open in an arresting gaze, intense with untamed energy. Across from her, the older woman reclined, poised and effortless, beauty sharpened with wisdom. Her eyes, closed as though savoring an unseen melody, suggested detachment—but not surrender. Beneath their dreamlike glamour, they carried the unmistakable essence of ordinary lives—resilient and luminous despite the world’s attempts to dull them.
“You don’t smoke,” the younger woman said.
“Not in the waking world,” the older woman replied.
When the enamel lighter flicked to life, the flame twisted upward into a serpentine blaze. Confections melted into ruin—each succumbing with languid grace into sugary pools. As the flames danced around consuming the confections of sweetness and conformity, the women were immune to the inferno—two figures carved out of flame-proof defiance.
As the dream dissolved into velveteen noir, the younger woman clutched the lighter, its twin fish circling through smoke and memory, bound to the endless cycle of creation and annihilation.
The dreamer awoke with her hand curled as though still holding the lighter. Smoke lingered faintly in the air, though nothing had burned—only the quiet promise of transformation, waiting to be realized.
