I dreamed

The pen is moving. That’s all. I’m sitting at a long table made of compressed bureaucratic paper, and the ink in the well is the colour of the South Coast rail line. It’s a thick, dark sludge that refuses to flow until you press down hard. I try to write my name, but the letters come out as timestamps. 03:00. 03:00. 03:00.

The headline isn’t news; it’s the humidity in the room, pressing against the glass of the window until it distorts the view outside. The air is wet and heavy, smelling of ozone and wet concrete. I look for the specific detail, the thing I keep dropping, and find it sitting on the table. It’s a red bolt. Just one. It’s cold and heavy, and when I pick it up, it doesn’t feel like metal. It feels like a fact I was too afraid to say out loud.

The pen keeps moving. I let it. I stop trying to polish the edges. The bolt rolls off the table and disappears into the dark.