​Dawn and Dreams
by Jerry Williams


 Jake Worthington had etched his first meeting of Dawn Black into his mind. She nestled and took a special spot in his mind like a favorite song, a vision of a lost kiss, or the sweet taste of a meal. Jake burned her face in his mind. Her pale blond air, her green eyes, and her rumpled unkempt quasi hippy home made tie died dress. She made him feel tongue tied. Dawn looked like nothing he had ever seen in his dreary hometown. Girls and boys dressed the same, looked the same, and thought the same. Dawn looked like something from another world. Jake's heart beat a little faster and for a brief moment their eyes locked together, and he felt an electricity between them.

 "Who was that?" Jake turned to Jess. If anyone knew who this woman was, it was his friend/rival Jess Waters. He was a student, but he never went to classes. The college experience according to Jess, was drink, get stoned, and get laid once in a while. Because of his passions, Jess knew everything about the college town, where to hook up, where to get upper classman to buy you beer, and where anything off the beaten track could or would be obtained in this town. He dabbled in art and hung out with that crowd. His smile was sharp and toothy, and his dark and piercing.

 "Aw, she's Dawn Black. She's some screwed up hippy chick poet."

 "Come on man, what's the story with her?" Jake could tell when his friend was being evasive.

 "She's some chick who writes poetry high on acid." There was something in his face when he dismissed her.

 "Jess." Jake said his name, but put subtle pressure into it.

 "Dude, she's some wacked out poet hippy chick. She's rooming with my chick Rebecca." Jess admitted.

 "I can't see those two living together." It didn't make sense to Jake. Rebecca was the opposite of this girl. She work black, never left without her black lipstick done just right, and peppered everything in a sarcastic aside with a flick of her clove cigarette. Jake always felt shallow around her, and that his problems were never as bad as what lurked behind her dark eyes. That was a striking contrast, the fairy tale hippy and the sarcastic goth girl.

 "Doesn't make sense does it?” Jess shrugged.

 "What do you mean?"

 "Dude, she's got enough emotional baggage to make a luggage store. You can tell, she ain't all there." Jess paused to light a smoke.

 "Dawn seems normal enough. She seems real”

 “What is real man? What is real?” Jesse semi sneered into his smokes.

 "The most crazy loons always seems normal." Jake shrugged.

 Jake put thoughts of Dawn out of his head, and jumped back into writing that novel. At first it was a noble goal to woo others to his charge but now it was an albatross upon his neck. He had ambitions of writing his generation like Hemingway did with his generation or Kerouac, but all he could think of was flannel clad angels and sarcastic discussions of old television shows. He looked at the blank page and thought of Mellville and the horror of the white empty space. That emptiness thrilled and scared him at the same time. Jake tried to relax, and wrote the first thing that popped up in his head.

 Dawn.

 Jake looked at the single word. Where to go with that next flight of fancy made Jake ponder and pontificate over his image of Dawn Black.

 Dawn is a beautiful morning for a beautiful woman.

 Jake felt a flush of emotions as he thought of her walking into the smoke filled room. Her green eyes were almost otherworldly as they looked at him for the briefest of seconds.

 "Jake!"

 Jake jumped up to see Jess and Rebecca dressed up in matching black. Rebecca had blood red lips that made her constant sneer almost cartoon like, and Jake had to fight a smile looking at her. He suddenly felt vulnerable, and quickly pushed his notebook into his book bag as he walked to them.

 "Whatcha doing?"

 "Nothing tonight. Why?" Jake shrugged.

 "Rebecca and I are going to the coffeehouse tonight. You game?" Jess asked. He paused to light his cigarette.

 "Yeah, getting out would do you some good Jake." Rebecca said in a haughty tone. Already Rebecca was getting under his skin.

 "What do you mean?" Jake replied, refusing to be baited.

 "You know, interact with real people." Rebecca smiled, but it matched her haughty and aloof wods. Jake smiled back a wane smile.

 "You in or out?" Jess pressed.

 "Out."

“Have fun in dreams…we’ll drop by tomorrow.”

That night, Jake wrote of Dawn, and as if by magic he had a dream of her looking at him and giving a smile of a thousand muses. He woke up with a start.


 Jake got to Rebecca's apartment later that morning, and gave Rebecca and Jess time to smoke a bowl of bitter smelling pot. He had been here before when Rebecca and him briefly dated, but that seemed a lifetime ago or a different life all together. As Jess and Rebecca coughed, Jake looked around the apartment.

“Where’s Dawn at?” Jake asked. Both of them gave a blank stare back at him.

“Who?”

 “The girl that lives here…the hippy poet”

Again, the blank stares. Jake started to feel flushed. Was Jess messing with him?

“No one here but us loonies.”

Despite an intense questioning, no one heard of Dawn Black. Was she a dream woman? That night, he dreamed of her again, and then noticed he had written the same line again: Dawn is a beautiful morning for a beautiful woman.

 He started the novel that day to find her again. Real or a dream, she beckoned the writer to follow her.

 THE END


Jerry Williams runs the indie film company goatboyfilms, and is now working on other media and writing projects.

http://www.amazon.com/Jerry-Williams/e/B008UAPU2A
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