Zero Feet Apart

CHAPTER ONE

COLD SWEAT

I woke up suddenly, my heart racing and pounding. It had been the same nightmare for weeks and each time the feeling of despondency was the same and even though the air conditioner was on full blast mode, I was hot and drenched. My nightgown exposed my Arabian shorts and cup-shaped breasts.

I began to ponder the dream. It has been the same one and even the shrink had no idea of the meaning. The psychiatric examination was completed. I was going mad and the doctor recommended a vacation. Money was no object so I landed in the Bahamas where I was currently in beddrumloadrum load of Pills by my side. I reached for the bottle and selected the red and white capsule gulping it down with two shots of French burgundy as I was instructed. The face of the woman came back to me; wrinkled with chopped hair as if a rat had been her hairdresser. She was unclad except for a piece of loincloth around her waist. Her sagging breasts revealed years of aggressive assault by men.

As she walked towards me she smiled. It was repulsive that her two front teeth were the only remnants while her tongue was pitch black and her eyes glistening bright red like the hot flame from the goldsmith's fire. There was disdain in her eyes and suddenly she tried to hug me. I recoiled like a snake whose tail had been touched but instead of attacking her, I ran as fast as my legs could carry me.

I heard her voice behind me as if calling from a hollow spectrum and she was yelling at the top of her baritone voice saying no matter where you run to you will end up like me.

It was at this point I woke up. The time was five minutes past two in the night. The exact time I had woken up each of the fifteenth times I had had these dreams previously. The beep on my phone distracted me momentarily. It was a message from my nine-year-old daughter Anita who was just checking up on me. What a lovely girl I thought.

She must have inherited my mother's kind spirit. I fought back the tears that were welling in my eyes. I'm a strong and very determined woman and if the woman was wrong I would not end up like her.