the game

Date: 1/9/2019

all was fine, i was peacefully sitting on the couch having just woken up in my dream from another dream that was pleasant. i could hear my parents and mad talking in the kitchen. they were reassuring mad about living in LA. Telling her that she needs to be less selfish, less secretive. She needs to talk to her bf. They said something at one point about how they could tell when something has changed in the city bc they’ve lived here for so long, bc they know it so well. i looked at the tv and a building was being lit with a beautiful display of shifting and moving red and orange lights. like liquid fire. it was dark outside and on the tv there was footage now of a grand firework presentation. to celebrate a football game of sort but the stadium was an old romanesque amphitheater. the fireworks were lovely until a huge launch, where for an instant i glanced at my family and felt i should warn them bc there would be a loud explosion, but the fireworks just sizzle in a huge array of sparks. then everything goes wrong. the camera records from above a person running from the theatre as a horrible, awful, blood curdling scream is let out after the initial “oohs-and-aahs” of the shows. two or three people are completely on fire and they try to run, but collapse on the steps. i watch people run for their lives in complete chaos, unable to escape this burning charade. in the center of the stadium, its just horrid. fire and death and tragedy and fear, unable to stop or control anything of whats happening to them. i’m watching from the safety of my living room couch, but for a split second i’m there with them. “BATHROOM! BATHROOM! BATHROOM! BATHROOM!” i can hear myself shouting and dragging along with me someone. a girl i think. a friend? more? a sister? i don’t know. i think that we’ll be safe if we cower in the small structure of a bathroom. less flammable as its mostly ceramics and tile, and its small and it may just be safe enough to hide ourselves in bc theres no chance of escaping like everyone else is trying. i can only smell smoke and i cant breathe and my lungs themselves are engulfed with rage and fear and fire. my family has come in to see whats happened and i cower into my mom’s shoulder unable to watch anymore. i don’t want to imagine this anymore. i hear the announcer narrate in horror whats happened. “the fireworks have all caught fire!! a reported $60 million in fireworks.” “my god!!” cries my mother. i feel like i’m going to throw up and cry. i look up to see a flaming archway fall and almost hit a man running down the steps. it hits two or three people around the man instead that are engulfed immediately. maybe they already were? “i cant watch this”, i repeat over and over in my head. until i wake up.