And that night, Bea dreamed she was holding Dan’s hand, leading him. She saw an enormous snake ahead of them. She looked at it and thought how funny it was to dream something so obvious and Freudian as a snake. Commenting on it she felt safe, but the snake was in front of them on the road. It was standing upright, as tall as a tree, with many body parts, but it was still a snake. It’s like a tree but not like a tree, she thought. She looked down, for Dan’s hand, but it wasn’t in hers. Her hand was severed at the wrist. The paralysis of a nightmare crept over her body. She tried to search for Dan, holding the stump of her wrist in front of her. The snake was huge and tall above her. There was bark on its body, which clicked and creaked as it swayed. Dan was looking down at her from the branches now, saying, Stop, and she was hanging from the tree, choking. She felt the weight of her body, swinging.

‘Stop it!’ said Dan.

She opened her eyes. The snake was towering behind him. He couldn’t see it. She woke up. His hand was clamped over her mouth like a kidnapping. She struggled, crushed under his body. He took his hand away.

‘You were yelling,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry.’

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