From the Desk of William Pauley III
Here are the seven dreams I didn’t have this week (in no particular order):
DREAM #1: As the airplane was spinning, speeding to the earth, I heard a sound. My son came to me and muttered something before disappearing completely: “How?” I thought about the word, how powerful it was–enough to be a complete sentence. I started to answer, but he was safe in bed and dreaming all of this.
DREAM #2: The glass was cold and she held her face against it, knowing it was sharp and dangerous. She dared it to move, to slide inside her. It seemed easier than doing it herself. It remained still, and her pain grew, so she walked into the flames and only there was she able to find peace.
DREAM #3: There was a strange light coming through the leaves and when she saw it, she couldn’t look away. He told her it was Eye, that it would sometimes manifest as bright rays of light, quick and sharp, and enter the psyche of onlookers through their pupil. She wouldn’t have believed it had she’d been her.
DREAM #4: “I see your problem right here,” the doctor said, putting away his otoscope. “You’ve got a giant hole in your head.” “Oh yeah,” the man said, not asking for an explanation or offering his own. The man went home, lit a candle and slid it inside the hole. Next month’s electric bill was dramatically lower.
DREAM #5: A swarm of bees carried me over the water and into a land with an abandoned landscape, where empty skyscrapers lined the horizon like soldiers in a halted march. Whispers hung in the air, though I couldn’t decipher the words through all the buzzing. Not knowing haunted me for the rest of my days.
DREAM #6: Purple lightning strobed across the glitter night sky, connecting with the earth, as close as twenty feet from me. Holding the wheel tight, I sped through the rain, straight into the heart of the storm. There was a misunderstanding, a miscommunication that could only be rectified by skin, so straight into the heart I drove.
DREAM #7: “I’ve spent the last three years of my life being devoured,” she said. “And a decade before that, but by other dogs.” He nodded, remaining silent. “I’ve heard it all before, you see,” she continued. “Beasts, they know the same words as you, dear.” He’d spend the next three weeks sniffing, before he was finally able to sit down and feast.
“Evil Dead 2”
- hand possession scene -
dir. Sam Raimi
Last Week / This Week
My new story “Prelude to a Dream” drops on 3.14.24 for paid subscribers only!
This week, I wrote my first one-act play! It’s based on my short story “Black Friday,” which can be read here. It’s now in the hands of a local theater group. Hopefully they dig it. Keep your fingers crossed for me!
Last week, on Storytime!, we read ‘a true experiment in psychedelia’ with the story of an astronaut who curiously encounters an abandoned church while stranded on the moon.What? Haven’t had a chance to listen to “The Church of Death & Nothingness” yet? No worries! Check it out here.
On this week’s episode, we’ll be reading a truly bizarre murder mystery, concerning an amnesiac who wakes up next to a melted body... and a disembodied voice who claims to know exactly who did it. Be sure to check out “Holus Bolus” when it drops on Monday! Be sure you’re subscribed so you’re notified the moment it goes live:
The Doom Magnetic Trilogy is now available to read/stream in the DOOM FICTION library! Click here to get started.
Check out this excellent review of Automated Daydreaming! Thanks, Bradley! Pick up a signed copy here. (By the way, Bradley is a fantastic writer with his own Substack. Please check him out here.)
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The Island of Dr Moreau is a 1996 American science fiction/horror film directed by John Frankenheimer.
Synopsis: After being rescued and brought to an island, a man discovers that its inhabitants are experimental animals being turned into strange-looking humans, all of it the work of a visionary doctor. (IMDB)
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