Twyla stirs on the verge of seeing the irascible witch groaning around the viscous dark. Slick, boggy, eel-like reeds slither over her naked flesh. Kicking and wriggling from their grasp, she bobs to the surface, gasping for air. Thick, cloying tendrils tighten and tug, dragging her to watery chambers. Just as she succumbs, a woeful scream resonates, “Pilan!” rippling the surface, jolting her awake to a wintry scene.
Alarmed, she gasps and leans into the floor-to-ceiling dormer window, steadying her body. The vertiginous view retreats in the distance, carrying her backward from oblivion behind the panes of her bedroom window. Her heart and mind race with aquatic images, a dream she hasn’t dreamt since she was 12, before her sleepwalking ended 11 years ago.
The century-old Victorian creak
