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This writing was accepted for publication in the 84 page perfect-bound issue of cc&d (v226) (the November 2011 Issue, You can also order this 5.5" x 8.5" issue as an ISSN# paperback book:						This is also in this 6" x 9" ISBN# paperback “No Return” Order this 6" x 9" ISBN# book:

Order this writing in the book Fragments (a cc&d collection book)		get the 322 page September-December 2011 cc&d magazine issue collection 6" x 9" ISBN# paperback book:

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Mud

Amanda Thoss

    She rifled through the leaves of the Dream Book. She had dreamt last night that she had had a baby, and bit her lip as she searched for what it could mean. Her friends had always told her these books were a load of crock, and that dreams didn’t mean anything. She usually agreed.

    Her work was not tedious, and she performed well enough at it. She made sure to nod to Maggie when she showed off the photos of her children, agree when Thomas told her stories about his boss, console Becky about her break up. She ate her lunch at her desk, watching everyone else leave in groups, talking to one another.
    Once alone, she pulled out her dream book. She had dreamed last night that years ago she had had a baby, and given it away. Somehow or other she had found out her child had been mistreated, and took it back. The family had named him “Javier” or something like it, though she was not Hispanic, and hated the name. He hadn’t been able to speak, because no one had taught him to. He didn’t blink his dark eyes when she explained to him that she was his mommy and that she had abandoned him. All he did was stare, and she had woken with tears brimming in her eyes.
    The book told her that dreams of babies generally symbolized the birth of new ideas, or perhaps indicated new possibilities. She scoffed. New ideas? Possibilities? At her age? She closed the book. She had been worried it had something to do with her hormones. Everyone, especially her mother, had told her that women all hit an age where they suddenly want children. She refused to accept the idea that she—and indeed all women—were governed solely by their biology. That they were nothing more than animals governed by the instinct to procreate and spread their genes.
    People began to slowly trickle back from wherever they had all run off to. As she typed, she noticed how thin and bony her knuckles had become. She had always possessed long, elegant fingers, but it seemed to her now that her skin lacked the glow of youth that had made them so. Now her skin was dry and cracking, and her veins obvious.
    Growing up, various people had always told her that as she aged she would get aches and pains, especially in her back. She had never paid them much mind, but now her wrists ached and cracked, and the sciatic nerve in her back was flashing pain through her hip if she sat just the wrong way. Had she grown that old already? Did it happen that soon? One minute you’re a young thing with your whole future before you, and the next minute you’re sipping your decaffeinated coffee complaining about the kids these days? How could time rush by without anyone noticing?
    It reminded her of an article she had read back in college about Easter Island. Something about why didn’t the Islanders stop the deforestation sooner? The article had pointed out it was a gradual process. The forest shrank over time, each generation seeing only the small fraction of that seen by the previous one. And no one would cry over cutting down the last sorry tree on a lonesome little island. They had all gone quietly, unnoticed. Maybe time was like that?
    Her dream bothered her. Maybe it wasn’t just the dream, though. When she had woken, she suddenly realized how all her days had blended together. Monday wasn’t so very different from Tuesday. Tuesday wasn’t so very different from Wednesday, and so on. Had she filled out the report this Tuesday, or last? When had Maggie last shown off pictures of her kids? Was it last week or last month? How much time had she lost? When had her hands gotten so bony and dry?
    Her child. It was so strange that a dream about somebody who had never existed should make her feel so awful. But it did. She had abandoned that boy, dream or not. Because of her, he had never learned to speak, never learned to love. He lived in a world of grey.
    Even stranger, she had known who the child’s father was. She hadn’t thought of him in years. He had been beautiful. Not that he could have claimed to be so physically. She was well familiar with his average face, his slight frame. But he was beautiful all the same. Her friends had told her he was no good. She hadn’t listened, but when she told him about it, he said he was no good too. When he left, he had said that circumstances would never permit them to be together. She had agreed, and they had gone their separate ways.
    Somehow, she had always pictured things going differently in her life. As a little girl, it had seemed reasonable to expect that when you meet that man for whom you would give up anything willingly, you were married. Children followed, and all your dreams came true. Somewhere, things had gone quite differently for her. She had often wondered if everyone else felt the same way. Was Maggie really so happy with her children? Had she planned something different growing up? Being an actress, maybe? Had Thomas meant to marry that woman from marketing he met at the Christmas party two years ago?
    What had her dreams been? She closed her eyes and tried to remember. Not working in an office, certainly, but she admitted this job wasn’t as bad as she had pictured. But as for what she had meant to do? She couldn’t recall.
    He had always told her the future was dark. “No,” she told him, “It’s a mud puddle.” It still seemed true to her. You couldn’t say the future was “dark” unless you knew a bit about what was coming. Really, you know nothing about the future. It’s murky, unknown, isn’t it? Could she have predicted ten years ago that she would be working here, still taking the bus, still living in an apartment? Twenty years ago? Could she have predicted he and she would have gone their separate ways?
    It was dark when she left. Even during the summer, she never seemed able to leave before the sun starting dipping past the horizon. The city lights flashed by, shadows of people blinking past her. She wondered if they had achieved their dreams. A young couple stood outside a store, window shopping together. Was their future dark or muddy? Recently all her days had been muddy.
    Her apartment still smelled like flowers. She had bought herself a bouquet for her birthday, and set it proudly on the little wooden table she had bought a few years back from a garage sale. She seated herself at it, rested her chin in her hands, and looked at the flowers. Daffodils and Pansies. Yellow and Purple.
    Daffodils always made her happy. She had always preferred them to roses, and the pansies had come from the little pot garden she kept on the balcony. One of her professors at college had told her they complimented—yellow and purple—and she had always liked purple anyway. She had learned that yellow and purple mixed together turn into mud.

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