I woke up, immediately knowing that I was asleep. That’s the thing with dreams; you just know things like that. The familiar feeling of Dreaming surrounded me like a blanket; apprehension, curiosity, loneliness. To know that everything around you isn’t real is possibly the most isolated thing you can experience. Knowing that, even in a crowd of a million people, you’re the only real person, and you keep dreaming anyways. Sometimes you forget this along the way of your dream, and wake up with a pit of fear in your stomach. It’s even worse when you don’t remember why you’re scared when you wake up.
I immediately knew that this dream was different. I might not wake up from this one.
I was standing, even though I can’t recall getting up. The carpet under my feet is a mossy green color, squishy under my toes. I look up and gasp. I’m in a hallway with fluttering walls. I blink hard and look closer. What originally looked like peeling paint were butterflies- hundreds upon hundreds of them, nestled on the walls. There’s so many that I can’t tell where one butterfly ends and another begins. A wave of color hits my eyes, and the world is suddenly colorful. Wings of every possible color brush against each other, making soft rasping noises that filled my ears. I looked forwards to see that the hallway seemed infinite. I couldn’t see the end. This didn’t bother me; I was much too busy inspecting a large orange Monarch that was flapping its paper-thin wings. It looked too bright to be real- I brought a hand up to brush a hand against the delicate insect.
Someone grabbed my wrist. “Don’t touch, you’ll kill it.” I look up to see a strangely familiar boy before pulling my hand back. He reminded me of someone, I just… couldn’t remember who. Immediately, I noticed his strange eyes. They reminded me of the butterflies on the wall- countless colors clashed against each other nonsensically like an abstract painting. The next thing I noticed were his arms- I had never seen anything like them. His arms were pale, with brightly hued jewels embedded in the skin.
“I’m Jem,” the strangely familiar boy said. “Let me show you something.” He turned around and gestured to a trapdoor on the floor, which I was positive hadn’t been there before. That didn’t matter though. I lowered myself down into it, climbing down a peeling ladder. Everything went pitch dark, but I could hear Jem breathing ahead of me. My foot unexpectedly hit the bottom of something, and suddenly the ladder disappeared. I stood in a small wooden boat, bobbing gently in the middle of the ocean. The first thing that I noticed was that there were no oars. I turned around to see Jem sitting on the bench behind me, his curiously colored eyes gazing into the water. I followed his gaze and gasped, causing the boat to tip to the side. I sank to my knees and peered into the clear ocean water.
There was a city under our boat.
The tips of stony pillars jutted inches out of the water, bleached from the sun. We bobbed right over the top of an underwater castle, complete with turrets and algae-covered stone bricks. An expanse of tall, oddly-shaped buildings surrounded the castle on all sides. The buildings were covered in coral and clumps of barnacles, with brightly colored fish darting to and fro. Suddenly our boat was moving, and I noticed that we were being pushed. Hands gripped the edge of the boat so tightly the knuckles were white. Dull green tails lashed against water, propelling us forwards. Flashing golden eyes met mine, and I jerked back.
“Where are we?” I ask.
“In your Dream,” he answers. “I thought that would be obvious.”
“But how did we get on this boat? Why is there a city underwater?”
“This is the only safe place to talk. I need to tell you something important.” He trailed off, leaning back in his seat.
I waited a beat. “What’s so important you had to bring me all the way out here? It seems pretty far from where we were before.”
He shook his head, his odd kaleidoscope eyes still unfocused. “This isn’t far at all. Not even a step away from where we were.”
I decided not to ask him what that meant. “What did you mean that this is the only safe place to talk, this is my dream, isn’t it? Why does anything matter?”
“Because,” he said. “This dream is different. Something’s wrong- you’re trapped here.”
“What do you mean?”
“It means you’re not waking up. Well, not until we fix whatever’s wrong in your head. Something’s blocking you, and the only choice you have is to make whatever is wrong right.”
Surprisingly, I didn’t feel panicked at all, which would seem the appropriate response. A wave of calm washed over me, and the only thing I could feel was curiosity. “I can’t do that. Not by myself, anyways. I wouldn’t know where to start.”
Jem nodded. “I’ll be your guide. I know your Dream better than you do. I won’t let anything happen to you, I promise.”
“Thank you.”
We continue on in silence, and I turn my attention to the sky. I’ve never seen so much of it before- it seems to go on forever without a single cloud in sight. I can’t tell what time of day it is- either dawn or twilight, it’s impossible to tell- but I can see stars twinkling, dark blues of night blending with the pink-orange hue of sun. I take a deep breath, but I can’t smell anything. No salt, no wind, no sun-bleached wood.
It seems like hours have passed when Jem speaks. “Look behind you.”
I twist around in my seat, flinching in surprise. Part of the underwater city seems to have risen out of the water, buildings tall as skyscrapers brushing against the sky. We bank on the end of a rotten dock, and Jem helped me step out of the boat. My hand brushed against one of the jewels embedded in his arm. He cried out and snapped his hand away from me, cradling it gingerly.
“I’m sorry,” I say.
“Not your fault. You’re not supposed to touch those- just like you’re not supposed to touch the butterflies. You have to be careful here.”
We made our way down the dock, and with each step I took I prayed the wood wouldn’t collapse under me. The water here was polluted. Oil swirled on the top layer of water, shimmering like butterfly wings.
I followed Jem until we stood in what looked like a giant courtyard in the center of the city, even though I knew this city stretched on for forever. It only took a few minutes to reach, although I can’t remember actually walking to get there. This city was empty of people. Each building was made up of junk- random objects stacked onto eachother to make walls, roofs, and doors. It was colorful, but oddly sad, the same way Jem’s eyes were beautiful, but held a certain kind of dullness, like the tingles you get after your leg falls asleep.
A lonesome howl split the silence of the seemingly empty city. Without warning, canines started to materialize, appearing from behind buildings and under fences. The sky darkened. Three groups of wolves faced one another in the courtyard, teeth bared and hackles raised. They seemed to be grouped by color- one pack consisted entirely of grey wolves, another of white, and the third of black. They all had the same ice-white eyes.
“Jem? Jem, what’s happening?” I asked.
“There are an infinite number of wolves in this city. They usually live in peace, but occasionally they clash. When they do, the only way to resolve the conflict is to fight to the death. That is the only way to see which is best.”
“But that’s horrible!” I protest.
Jem shrugs. “It’s the way things are. Watch.”
I turn my attention to the wolves just as the battle starts. I didn’t see who attacked first, but that didn’t really matter. The courtyard was a whirl of snapping jaws and tearing flesh. It was obvious who was winning- the white wolves were quick to take down their opponents. They went straight for the spine when they bit. In a matter of minutes (might’ve been days, I wasn’t entirely sure) the fighting was over, and silence fell over the junk city once more. The white wolves ran up the side of a tower made of books and glass, and leaped off the top. On the way to the ground, they morphed into white butterflies, and disappeared into the ocean.
I turned to Jem. “Why did that happen?”
“They do that every time. Is it important why?”
“Of course,” I say.
He ignored me, and instead pointed to a round building which I could’ve sworn hadn’t been there before. “Come on, or we’ll be late for our show.”
“We’re in a show?”
“Romeo and Juliet. You and I have the leading roles, isn’t that interesting?”
“I don’t know my lines though.”
He tutted. “Don’t worry about lines. Trust me, it’ll be perfect.”
Jem takes her hand, and suddenly we’re standing behind closed curtains. My costume is pale white, while his is a stunning pattern of clashing colors that match his eyes. We stand center stage. This feels familiar, but I can’t remember why. The curtains are pulled back, and we are revealed to the audience, right in the spotlight. The audience consists of a hundred colorless people, wearing decorative masks and expensive wigs. They are frozen like mannequins, like they had just paused in whatever they had been previously doing. One woman was powdering her nose whilst the man next to her repositioned his wig.
“In the back row. Do you see anything odd?” Jem whispers.
I squint my eyes, trying to see past the spotlight. Indeed, there is something odd in the back row. A dark shadow flickers between the frozen audience members, like fire licking at wood.
“That is the thing trapping you here. You’d better be careful, or it’ll get you. If you follow it, the shadow will lead you where you need to be.”
I don’t hesitate. “Show me.”
A staircase appears to the right of us, which Jem and I climb, audience forgotten. We are enveloped in darkness and, after a few moments, we emerge from the ground. I step onto the soft ground and look behind me to see that the staircase is gone.
“Ah,” Jem sighs. “We’ve found it.”
We stand in a dark forest. The trees are thin, and tangles of barbed wire cover the branches instead of leaves. The moonlight glints off the razor-sharp points.
I feel something stick to my bare foot. I look down to see a dark red stain on my skin. At first I think it’s blood, but when I lean down to get a closer look, I see that it’s actually a butterfly. It’s wings are dull and frayed at the edges, and I know that it’s dead. The floor is covered in them- thousands of dead butterflies littering the forest ground. I look up and see Jem, steadily looking ahead.
“This is the end, isn’t it?” I ask. “I’m going to wake up now.”
Jem nods, not looking at me.
I pause. “Are you upset? Once I wake up, you won’t exist anymore. You’re not real.” I look down at the dead butterflies littering the ground. “I’m sorry.”
Jem finally meets my gaze, his odd eyes sad but still brighter than I have seen them so far. “There’s not just one type of real. We’re both real, just in different ways. I’ll still be here next time, believe me. I said I’d protect you, didn’t I?”
I didn’t have anything to say, so I just nodded.
“Let me do one last thing for you, then. You need to wake up now.” He held out his pale arm, and plucked off one of the jewels embedded in his skin. It was the most beautiful color I’d ever seen. He gently placed it in my hand, and I closed my eyes. The stone was reassuringly heavy, and I cradled it gently.
“Goodbye, Jem. I’ll miss you.”
I opened my eyes to find Jem gone. I opened my hand to look at his final gift, only to find it had transformed. A small butterfly nestled in my palm, fluttering its wings softly. I recognized it as the one I tried to touch earlier in the hallway.
  A tall shadow lumbered over to me, teeth bared. I looked around to see I was surrounded by dark shadows. I held out my hand, and the butterfly took flight.
Then I woke up.

---

My feet were tangled in a soft blanket. Light trickled in through a window, my alarm clock read 5:11. A strange feeling settled in my chest, a smothering feeling of aloneness. I tried to remember what I’d dreamt. It had something to do with a play, or maybe a butterfly? I was certain that it had included a castle. All of a sudden an image popped into her mind- so detailed she was certain that it had to be a memory, because images from dreams were never so clear-
Of sad kaleidoscope eyes.