The Mirrorverse

Maya

“Maya, it was just a dream, all dreamlike and not nice. Bad dream. Nightmare dream. Not real. Come on, hun,” pressed Ellie gently, sucking in air through her teeth as she played with a lock of her curly hair.

It was later that day and Maya was on the phone to her best friend Ellie in London, telling her about her particularly vivid and long lasting dream in the psychiatric unit.

“Yeah. But it wasn’t. It really wasn’t. It was so damned real and went on for so long, like two days long. That’s not a dream. That’s reality.” Maya was a little agitated at hearing Ellie sucking air through her teeth, it meant she was losing patience.

“I know, I have dreams that feel like they last for days too, but it’s all an illusion,” Ellie argued as patiently as she could. She had news she wanted to tell Maya, and they had been ruminating on Maya’s dream for longer than she could hold it in.

“What if this is the illusion? What if this isn’t real? What if they were right, this is all too perfect. What if I’m actually in a coma and this is make believe?”

“But nothing is perfect My, nothing. You work hard at your relationship, and your work, you both do. Thinking like that could send you off the deep end!”

“I know Ell, it just, you know, it was so horrid, being all paralysed and ugh,

yeah whatever. Stupid dream,” Maya qualified eloquently.

“So anyway, this trumpeter,” interjected Ellie quickly, eager to talk about her new acquisition.

“What trumpeter? You didn’t mention anyone with severe flatulence before? Well, not recently anyway...”

“Noooo,” she giggled. “He’s just joined my orchestra, and is drop dead gorgeous!”

“What instrument does he play while gassing you all?”

“Oh Maya,” she scolded, feigning exasperation. “Don’t you want to hear about my new man?”

“Of course of course, who is he what does he look like and does he have a nice trumpet?” said Maya, all in one go.

“He’s absolutely gorgeous!” gushed Ellie. “He’s got long brown hair and a manly face, he works out, oh he’s so lush, his biceps were bulging through his t-shirt in rehearsals, he made me miss my cue and get shouted at by the conductor!”

“Don’t blow his trumpet too much, he might follow through!”

“That’s my Maya, always with the toilet humour,” Ellie teased. “Hmm, a trumpeter from Greenwich, who’d have thought it,” she mused idly.

“Yeah, not my cup of tea. I still fancy that actor guy,” Maya remarked offhandedly, making Ellie laugh.

“What, that famous one from the movies, what’s his name?” she teased. “Hey, I saw his mug on the side of a bus the other day, nearly made me spill my coffee!”

“I see his mug every day, but I don’t spill my coffee. Well, not because of him anyway,” Maya added.

“You don’t need an excuse to spill your coffee, you are the least co-ordinated person I’ve ever met. How you play the piano, I don’t know,” Ellie remarked playfully.

“Oh, he’s home,” Maya giggled. “I’ll tell him about the bus.”

“Thanks,” replied Ellie in as disgruntled a tone as she could muster. “Catcha later missus, say hi to California for me.”