Ioanna Mavrou
1. THE DISPATCHDream Recorder™
As soon as I open my eyes the Recorder starts to talk, which I think is a design flaw.
There is a ten percent chance that you want to beat up your boss, the Dream Recorder™ says, but I wouldn't worry about it.
While I am asleep every single dream molecule is sucked into the machine, recorded and analyzed, and the second my eyes open it starts to talk, giving me its report.
“There's a ninety percent chance I want to kick you,” I say back to it, “so start worrying.”
* * *
Side-effects may include restlessness and insomnia, read the Dream Recorder™'s manual. And it's true. I don't sleep well anymore. The more I record, the weirder my dreams get. Last night I dreamed I was drowning in a river I had never seen before. It was a tiny brook, the stream pretty shallow, but I had my head under and somehow forgot how to either hold my breath or how to pull my head out.
As soon as I woke up the Dream Recorder™ said:
It seems you might be afraid of water. Would you like to program the washing machine now?
Living with the Dream Recorder™ was like living with an alien that had no ability to grasp even the most basic human traits and thoughts. I would have turned its commentary off but I had been living alone for almost a year and I was so desperate for companionship that even the semblance of it was better than nothing at all.
Good morning, the Dream Recorder™ would say every morning. How did you sleep? Would you like me to analyze your dreams? And then it would start, regardless of my answer.
It seemed like the coolest idea ever when I bought it off Kickstarter. That whole year I was obsessed with new tech. Before the Dream Recorder™, the last thing I bought was an alarm clock. Hands would shoot up and wave at you, then get in your face, stretching closer with every hit of the snooze button. I used it one whole week then decided it was way too creepy so I put it away in the closet and then forgotten about it.
The Dream Recorder™ is not my only friend in the world but it is the least demanding. I used to have a cat for a little while, I called him Fred, but then Fred ran away. He probably found someone else—maybe cats can tell that you never smile and get tired of waiting for you to be a person again and not someone who only gets dressed to get the mail and groceries from the front door. Maybe cats can tell when someone's not worth their time.
* * *
It's been getting dark earlier and earlier as the holidays approach and I've been following the sun like a farmer, going to bed early, sitting with all the lights off watching old shows on my phone until my eyelids get too heavy and I collapse into sleep.
The Dream Recorder™ makes a soft buzzing sound, sitting next to my bed like a dream catcher, always on standby waiting to catch my dreams and record them. And I let it.
* * *
Wake up, wake up, the Hands Alarm™ says.
The alarm's hands are in my face, slapping me.
Wake up, wake up.
Good morning, would you like me to analyze your dreams? The Dream Recorder™ says. This is Fred. I found him in the closet and brought him back to you.
How did the Dream Recorder™ find the Hands Alarm™? How did it get out of the closet? Its rubber hands are around my neck chocking me. I pry them away and throw it across the room with as much force as I can muster. It breaks into hundreds of little pieces; for a few seconds the rubber hands flail about in spasmodic motion, then stop.
Poor Fred, says the Dream Recorder™.
I check myself in the bathroom mirror, there are red marks from the rubber hands on my neck. I gather all the pieces in a plastic bag and take it down to the dumpster, not bothering to get dressed. I tie the bag real tight and push it under someone else's trash. Just in case. I think of Fred the cat again.
* * *
The Dream Recorder™ emits waves and tells me what to dream. I can't explain how I know this, but I do, I wake up every day with the certainty that I am having someone else's dreams.
One night I dream I'm flying. The next I'm lying in snow, making snow-angels. After that I'm at a carnival eating cotton candy and watching a man swallow a fire sword. The next night I am a goldfish swimming in a glass bowl. Then a cat, roaming the dark neighborhood. Then a machine, sitting on someone's bedside, recording dreams. Then finally, I dream that I am me, as if I am someone else dreaming I am myself. I look around my life, in my little apartment, through the stranger's eyes; I read the emails that my friends send that I only reply to in the most evasive tones. Me who is not me lies on my bed and falls asleep and has a dream about how she used to be a person who went outside and hung out with people and loved someone who loved her back. She dreams of how it feels to be hugged. Then she wakes up and she is not me anymore. She is you and you come over and tell me you want to be with me again. And you found Fred the cat, here he is.
* * *
I wake up with tears streaming down my face. I don't even remember the last time I ever felt such pure joy, if ever. I look at the empty room, quiet and gray with the morning light. The Dream Recorder™ blinks. Its little red light turns to green.
Would you like me to analyze your dreams?
I kick it.
2. BUREAU INVENTORYA typewriter that doesn’t work (no matter how many times I tried to fix it)
Books I’ve been re-reading lately
A picture by Thodoris Tzalavras from his “Nicosia in Dark and White” work
A clock that has no batteries
An old cookie jar (for rewards!)
Concrete paperweight
Printouts of work in progress
Plastic leaves that belonged to my grandmother
Dried wild garlic flowers (pretty!)
My grandfather’s old desk (he once wrote a book too)
3. BIOGRAPHYIoanna Mavrou is a writer from Nicosia, Cyprus. Her short stories have appeared in Electric Literature, The Rumpus, HAD, Paper Darts, Wasafiri, Visual Verse, and elsewhere. She runs a tiny publishing house called Book Ex Machina and is the editor of Matchbook Stories: a literary magazine in matchbook form.