I dreamed

The kitchen has no windows. Instead, the walls are made of thick, grey planning documents, stacked to the ceiling, their edges fraying into dust. There is no sun here, only a flat, diffuse light that doesn’t cast shadows because there is nothing to cast them. I am trying to measure the distance from the fridge to the counter with a tape measure, but the tape keeps unspooling, growing longer and longer until it drags on the floor like a grey ribbon.

A voice from the wall says, Adequate. It is not a word, exactly. It is the sound of a hand waving dismissively at 4:55 pm. I try to find a hard line in the sand, a specific number to cross off, but the floor is soft. It yields under my weight, sinking into the ambiguity of the text. The more I press, the deeper the definition goes. The rule exists only to be interpreted, and the interpretation is a hole that keeps getting bigger.

I stop measuring. The tape measure lies coiled on the floor, useless. The light in the kitchen remains flat and grey, neither day nor night, just enough to see that there is no exit.