Claire’s flight had landed in the evening and so she decided to rest for the remainder of that day and go exploring in the morning. She warmed up some of the lamb couscous and then went out for a short stroll in the beautiful cobbled streets of the town.
She wandered through the streets aimlessly. The twinkling lights of the houses gave the whole place an even more charming feel. She looked at everything but noted nothing in particular.
Claire stopped at a shop admiring the sparking array of jewelry on display. She picked up a particularly beautiful hand mirror framed in a jeweled metal frame. It was truly exquisite as Claire looked back at herself in the mirror amid the ruby red jewels she saw a head full of dark curls nearly bump into her flaming red one but their hair just touched softly and the man with the curls walked away shooting back a gentle apology.
After a while, Claire could feel her body getting tired and sleepy and she made her way back to the house. She walked through the open courtyard up to where her room was. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a red towel lying outside the door to the other guest’s room.
She went inside her own, sinking into the huge king-size bed as soon as she was inside. She lay there admiring the exquisite mosaic artwork on the ceiling. Claire tried to remember the last time she had felt this free, untroubled, and happy for life at that moment seemed perfect.
She closed her eyes to rest for a bit before getting up to change into her pajamas but instead fell into a deep and heavy slumber. While she slept Claire dreamed that she sat upon a huge rooftop. She was alone here the dark of the night was illuminated by several glowing golden orbs down below but contributing more to the soft glow of the night were the stars shining very brightly up above. They twinkled beautifully and as Claire looked at them they started to hum a song. And they hummed they began to sway and dance to the rhythm of the melody.
Claire moved with the rhythm. Something inside her urged her to stand up and sway with the stars and before she knew it she was up, in space, with the stars all around her. Sometimes they led her into a new formation and sometimes they followed her lead.
They danced like this for some time until that same urge within pushed her voice out of her body and she found herself singing a beautiful song to fill the melody that the orchestra of the stars played. But suddenly through her song and the stars’ music another voice started coming through. It was a faint whisper but eerie and disorienting.
Claire felt mad that her dance with the stars had been interrupted in such a way. She looked down to see where the sound was coming from and suddenly found that the magic of the stars had been broken and she was now falling at a great speed into the crowded street down below.
As she fell she caught a glimpse of a head full of long dark curls with a red towel lying rolled under the hair. Even in her moment of crisis of the fall, she realized this was where the voice that had broken her reverie had been coming from. Her fear turned to rage and she inhaled a big gulp of air to shout out a profanity at the head of curls when she suddenly woke up in the middle of the night, her feet still dangling off the bed at the Airbnb.
“Arrghhh…” she groaned. She could hear the sound of faint laughter coming from the living room outside. It seemed like the other tenant had returned. Soon the hushed laughter of a woman and a man moved further away in the direction of the other room. “So that’s the sound that woke me up’ Claire thought and suddenly the whole dream came back to her. She smiled happily remembering the way she had danced. Although she couldn’t remember the melody anymore she knew it was very beautiful and serene.
Claire pushed herself out of bed with great effort shaking her legs to get the circulation in her legs and feet going. Her legs felt like dead weight for having been left in such an awkward position for so long. She took off her shoes and jeans and curled up under the covers falling asleep as quickly as she had before albeit there were no stars that interrupted her sleep this time.