Reading The Tea

Last night I dreamt that Dustin and I were pulling up in front of “home” (which turned out to be a huge Victorian) and saw, on the porch, a little girl ringing the doorbell in frustration. We realized that it was Halloween, and that we had forgotten to buy candy. I felt horrible, since we’d forgotten and left the lights on, so I ran up the stairs to give her a green popsicle that I had with me. Dustin left to grab some candy so we’d be prepared for the rest of the night. I’d no sooner gotten to the porch, when I heard a horrible sawing sound issuing from the basement. The girl and I looked at each other in terror, and I said, “We have to get into the shelter of the house.”

She looked torn, as did her brother, who seemed to be with us now, and said, “We’re not allowed to go into stranger’s houses.”

“Quite right,” I said briskly, “but these are extenuating circumstances.” They were still hesitating, when we saw three enormous monsters climbing up the stairs. We all ran into the house.

For some reason the door was really heavy, and I could only get an inside, flimsy one close, without locking it. I leaned against it to keep the monsters out. “I’m not sure how long I can hold it,” I gasped. There were two another adults there, someone who was sort-of-Dustin and sort-of-not and a women who was fretting about packing. She kept insisting that the children put their shoes into the suitcase in the correct order (Because evidently they lived there, now.). The man passed me my “wand,” but it snapped, since it was made out of a shishkahbob skewer. I called that I needed another, more sturdy one — why not a knitting needle. My plan was to hold the door for as long as I could, while the others got the children out.

As I slumped against the door, I contemplated death calmly, and was sure that it was nothing that “Miss Julia Edwards” couldn’t handle. (Not sure why that was my name.) However, I could feel the door starting to open in, despite my best efforts, and the children were still there. In a last effort, I stuck my white nylon 10-inch needle through the mail slot, not sure what spell I was trying to cast. Suddenly there was a flash of white light, and the three monsters turned into a frog, an otter and a duck. A river began to form in the driveway, washing them away. They managed to call, before they disappeared, “We’ll be back!”

“Get in line,” I retorted. Then, turning to the rest of the people in the house I asked, “Or should I have said, ‘take a number’?”