"In dreams I never see my face"

I've been re-reading some of my old stories... some of my dream-based ones. Which is always a weird proposition, since my dreams are just plain strange, and the stories that come out of them usually end up looking like a bizarre cross between Stephen King and David Lynch.

In this particular instance, on this particular evening, I was reading about Martine. Martine is an old favorite of mine, an old friend who has the strange habit of doing things in antiquated or foreign ways for reasons he doesn't know... for reasons I don't even know. He's very elegant and very smooth, but also very brutal and very manipulative... he's a bit of a bastard. Neither of us is sure what his past is or what he's going to do next, but he's highly entertaining to be around.

That she was bleeding was the first thing she noticed. Blood was spattered all over the dirty mirror in front of her, and it caked the rim of the drain in the sink. Her hands were washing themselves, and she didn't remember turning the water on or reaching for the soap. For that matter, she didn't remember coming into the bathroom, or even why she was bleeding. Bad signs, all of them.

Julia looked at herself in the mirror and froze in shock and horror at what she saw. An open gash, from the corner of her right eye down to the right-hand corner of her mouth... someone, somehow had torn her face open so violently that the flaps of skin were hanging slightly. She could almost peel the skin aside and see the muscles of her face underneath. Horror turned her skin cold and her hands to shaking; she could barely turn off the faucet. Her eyes widened till the color could barely be seen in them. She stumbled out the door.

How had she gotten here? Because 'here' was a bar, and not one of the relatively tame ones she knew of, either. As she stood in the bathroom doorway, trying not to look too out of place and frightened, she was regarded all around by unfriendly eyes. She was rudely shoved aside by a woman who reeked of beer and was stained the orange-yellow of too much time on the road, and the action jerked her out of her reverie. She noticed that the bar was silent, that everyone was staring at her, and that there were signs of a fight in the area kitty corner to the bathrooms. The whole front window was broken. She didn't know what had been going on.

She had to get out of there. Julia swallowed, edging nervously away as a man pushed past her again, muttering something that sounded like 'crazy' and a rude name. She didn't stop to hear the rest of it. There was only one person who could get her out of this kind of mess, and as much as she hated to call on him for anything... she was so far out of her depth here that she was drowning.

Thankfully, she had remembered to put phone change in her jacket pocket. She didn't know if she'd brought her purse into the bar, but if it was on the other side of the room she was damn well going to leave it there. Fumbling for the correct change, she dropped the coins into the pay phone and dialed the number she knew by heart, despite all better judgement.

"Martine. Go."

She opened her mouth and, absurdly, burped. It tasted of sweet alcohol and spaghetti. "Martine... it's Julia."

There was a pause. "Julia. And what felicitous event brings you to telephone me?"

She scowled, then winced, then bit back a cry as all the actions made her face hurt even more. "I need your help... I'm in trouble."

Another pause. "Julia, I'm not in the mood for..."

"I'm in a bar."

That shut him up. Even he knew her well enough to know that she hated alcohol and stupid people in any kind of quantity and combination, and bars had plenty of both.

"I'm in trouble... I don't know what happened, I don't even know why I'm in here... but there was this huge fight, it looks like, and my face..."

Now he sounded angry. "Oh, my poor dear, is there a blemish? A bruise? A small sign of battery on that lovely visage of yours...?" Sarcasm practically dripped out of the reciever.

"Dammit, Martine, I have a gash eight inches long and two inches deep in my face and if you don't come down here right now I'm going to faint and die of blood loss and then you'll be sorry!" She said it loud enough that she was sure the people on the other side of the room could hear her, but she was upset. Confused, scared, and upset. She didn't really care what they thought; if they got to her before Martine arrived, she was dead anyway. And Martine was being conspicuously silent. "Martine?"

"I hear you, Julia," he said, more gently than she would have imagined. "I'll be there as soon as I can." He hung up.

Julia took a deep breath and closed her eyes. Help was coming, so that was something, at least. The blood was still running down her face, though... sluggishly and sticky, but it was running. She was already starting to feel faint. "Help..." she murmured, not really expecting anyone to hear. There wasn't anyone around who was going to help her...

I'm not sure what the relation between Martine and Julia is... Julia's the rather sweet young woman who I was playing for the purposes of the dream, or who ... I don't know. It's been a while since the dream... which was a particularly scary one, and left a deep impression on me. And now I've revisited the story, and I've no idea what I want to do with it.

Just food for thought. I'm tired, and not sure what I'm saying anyway.

"Qui est Charlie Croker?"

I adore Eddie Izzard.

I was listening to the other CD of his that my bf has today. There were a lot of funny bits about animals and people in shopping centers and old people and mice and the Italian Job. I didn't realize it was about the Italian Job... the original one, 'cause this is before they made a remake... until I heard him say something about "loading the cheese in the back of the Mini..." and then I remembered the line "You're only supposed to blow the bloody doors off!" I really need to buy a copy of that movie. Both the original and the remake, the remake only because it has Jason Statham in and I love him to pieces. But... yes. That Italian Job skit made my afternoon. I ran squealing down to tell my boyfriend all about it and made him blink.

Also got a good chunk of another chapter and a half or so of Understanding written out. It's so cool. I'm tugging and gently pulling the heartstrings of the readers... I think this is why I'm a writer. Secretly I enjoy being a manipulative little bitch. I throw in a villain, and my reviewers go "Grr. Kill." I throw in a hero or a heroine or a sweet moment and they go "Awww." They're such obedient little fangirls. Mwa ha ha ha ha.

Ahem. Sorry. Inner megalomaniac taking over.

But I was productive today. Mwa ha. I did some productive things, got some stuff written, had fun, puttered around. I need to finish editing the LXG epic, or what I have of it. And I think I need to plot out the next few chapters a little more carefully than I'd originally thought. Meh. This is what happens when I let the story write itself, and it's as big as it is. Oh well. I'll figure something out. If nothing else I'll put up the whole story and then rework it more thoroughly later. I know I keep saying that, but I'll really do it this time. Honest.

I thought about putting in a new journal, for my characters. And then I realized.. wait a minute. I don't even post very often in the one I did that for on DeadJournal. So what's the point? Ugh. So, here. Character stuff.

( A conversation with Laurel )