"Tellit To Me In My Ear" by James Ijames

One eye at a time, You are coming to the realization that you are inside a play. You smile at this realization because you like plays. Sometimes you looooove plays. Other times you would rather not. You become aware of your breath. Haaaaaaaaaaaa. You are excited. You have been waiting awwwwwwll day to see a friend you hadn’t seen in a very long time. You and your friend have shared a birthday and an intense relationship that spans many years. This meeting… is special. Because you have traveled a great distance to get here. You are now in a city that is completely foreign to you. You arrive at the rendezvous location. Just past the church, arooooooooound the corner from the drugstore and across the street from a BIGOLE TREE that’s both tall and wide. It’s the kind of tree you expect to find in a movie about magic. You look at the tree. From the root to the last leaf on top. “I been here before?” It feel like a memory of something or someone close to you. That sensation of the familiar creeps up from your wrist and tattoos your skin with chill bumps. You’ve been here before. But you don’t remember why or with whom. You just know that you have been in this very spot. You look at your phone to check that you have the right location. That you have arrived at the right place. “That’s the right time too… I did it right.” Yes. You have. A lace like shadow opens and spreads across your face like a setting sun. You look up from the phone, your friend is standing before you. You sit, arrested for a few moments, peppered by the moving dalliance of light filtered through the tree and your friend. They become one thing to you.

YOU: Hello.

FRIEND: I dreamed of you last night.

YOU: Really?

FRIEND: Yoooooou were walking along a bridge in the middle of the day and you were wearing green and I thought you looked so incredibly alive and well and recognizable. Like I could completely see you. You looked utterly vulnerable and I wanted so much to yell out to you: “How do you manage to stay so damn sublime?” But as I thought I might yell this in my dream I realized that I wasn’t just thinking about yelling it, I was, indeed, in the act of yelling at you. And you stopped and turned and looked at me and in the dream, it was as if you teleported me to the space right in front of you. Because suddenly, we were standing face to face and you took my hand and I opened my mouth to speak. And then I woke up. Soooooooooooooooooooo I had cawwwwlled you, to teeeeeeeeell you that I was thinking of you and that… I had hoped you would find some time to come and talk to me and I was awwwwwlso wondering if you could tell me what you were ’bout to say… you know? In my dream?

Oh no. Oh no. You care very much for your friend. And you want to desperately to be able to give them the answer they are desiring You want to be able to tell them something so they can see what you see You take your friend by the hand and pull them in close to you Ear to lips You whisper something benevolent and wise in your friend’s ear Your friend looks at you You worry that you have said the wrong thing Your friend takes a few steps back… from you. “Is this it?” You think.

Your friend, finally, gives you a bewildered nod and walks away. Good talk. You wait as you watch your friend be swallowed up whole by the horizon line. You wonder if you have broken them. You open your mouth to speak when—

One eye at a time, you are coming to the realization that you… have overslept. Shit. (Blackout. That’s It.)