EOTW, Redux

This morning, I was in my daughter's bedroom at about a quarter after four. She had been sneezing and coughing intermittently through the day, and at dinner was uncharacteristically slow moving, staring off into space a lot. We took her temperature, and she was running a bit of a fever, so we let her skip the rest of dinner, gave her some drugs, and put her to bed. About an hour later, my wife looked in on her. She was still awake, which wasn't normal for her. She still had the fever, and said she felt about the same.

I worried about her. I'm a little bit of a worrier, anyway, and seeing articles every so often about Ten Childhood Illnesses That Can Kill and whatnot (which I try not to read) don't help. I didn't think she was dying, but I don't like it when she's sick. So when I found myself awake a little after four, I went in to see how she was. I touched her forehead, and it felt cool. She awoke at my touch, and she told me she felt better -- so immediately I felt better.

And then I went back to bed and had a strange dream. It was again about the end of the world, and it was again unusual.

In this version, I was in a room or hall with a bunch of people. The day had been unusually cloudy, with a mixture of fog and rain, and we had sensed that something unusual was going on. In the room, we were told quietly that this was, in fact, the end of the world, and that it would be shutting down in about five hours. Until then, we were free to walk around, talk with people, do what we wanted. There was no elation, no despair -- just a certain level of acceptance. I went out into the darkened street -- it was a bit chilly, as I recall -- and found myself walking with two women -- one was my cousin, and one was my friend who had died some years ago. We pressed on through the orderly crowds, looking in store windows and whatnot. At one point we stopped into a bank, where the vault was open. Some people were casually taking some of the available cash, but as many were dropping cash off, just dumping it into a bucket. A pile of discarded wallets was on the marble floor. Out in the street again, we saw people walking into a funeral parlor, and we (now just me and my friend, my cousin having darted into a store) went into see what was happening. The staff was characteristically morbid and glum. There were no caskets, no trappings of death. Instead, there were large beds -- king-size, if not larger -- and on each of them someone was either having sex with one or two people or simply lying naked, watching us watching them. It was as remarkable as white clouds on a summer day. On the way out, I passed a very attractive woman, slender, with short blond hair. On an impulse, I kissed her passionately, which surprised her for a moment before she joined in with equal fervor.

And then I woke up.