"O starer!"

The woman whose nose was more like a ship's prow than a scythe stared back at the vocative creature that disturbed her chamber by night.

I knew you'd stare at me first if I didn't start staring, was its ear-tickling reply. This whimsical wraith retained the characteristics of a wingless, yet feathery, bat, as it stared with lips as well as eyelids. The tongue was particularly blatant, a tiny eyeball embedded in the gristle of its sponge tip.

The woman dreamt she dreamt seeing the flittery critter while, in truth, remaining awake and not seeing it.

Only one more dream and you will actually begin to see me with your naked eyes, said a pointed flicker.

But I already dreamed you visiting me yesterday.

But you've forgotten the dream itself.

Yes, yes, yes, real dreams are so easily forgotten.

And the woman closed her tired eyes ... with an attractive wrinkling of a nose which cut through the tides of night.

She sighed: a moment of anguish and love. Did normal people have imaginary dreams while she imagined real ones?

She didn't know which cut deeper. Whispers or wisps.

Published 'Oasis' 1997