Ball

I’ve been invited to a great ball, a very, very formal one. I have to walk all the way there – with my ex’s mother and her friend. We walk through a wintry landscape, the snow glitters and the sky is black and full of stars.

On our way we walk past a farmstead, enclosed by a tiny and completely useless fence. A man is out on the land digging, for the purpose of burying some object in the ground. The object is to be used as a big surprise at the ball, an extravagant visual display of sorts – and the thing is, I’m not supposed to know this secret, because the surprise is going to be on me.

We approach the ball, which is being held inside a huge castle. The castle’s architecture is an amazing mix of old russian and ancient egyptian architecture, with heavy domes and colorful brickwork and tiling, and tall hieroglyphic paintings on the exterior. The castle is bathed in the light from a thousand candles.

We go inside. As we walk up a shabby, worn staircase that obviously doesn’t fit the rest of the building at all, ‘mother’ tells me a story about a phonecall she recieved earlier, where some family member or other told her that one of her nieces had been screwed by Kris Kristofferson, and this had left the niece in question totally devastated. I react to this fact with anger, and also I cannot for the life of me understand why she would engage with someone like Kris Kristofferson in the first place, and I say so. I get no response other than a hollow expression on her face.

All around us now are people eating lollipops. The hallways are crammed with people dressed in victorian clothing and those classic victorian wigs. I suddenly discover that I’m very formally dressed too, although I had wished that I could wear something casual.

We have seats on the top gallery. Right across from us is another gallery. A man is sitting there in the most incredible costume; bright, glittering white garments that sometimes reflect a rainbow of colors. His face is painted completely white. It is obvious that this is the man who is both the host and in charge of the party. He is a transsexual, and he’s extremely feminine and every move he makes is exaggerated and theatrical. He welcomes everyone with a thin and somewhat rusty female voice, and he seems to have trouble containing himself – my guess is that he can’t wait for the big surprise.

When he’s done speaking, he makes a gesture towards some guards or whatever behind him. They move forward and operate something behind the seats, and suddenly the whole gallery tilt forward. Everyone falls out of their seats, and for a second I’m panicked – then the great surprise is revealed: everyone can fly. In between all the slowly falling guests I can see ‘mother’, I know it’s her but she has now become Janet Leigh, the actress from ‘Psycho’. She’s falling graciously and slowly towards the floor, all the way laughing an incredibly pure and delightful laugh. Everybody falls in a perfect arc, their backs against the floor. Some of them cry ecstatically, and everyone is smiling and enjoying the moment, the audience and me as well.

I suddenly feel very tired so I decide to close my eyes for a bit. Then I wake up.