I enter the dream on the toilet. In the next stall over is Sharon Stone, who's just won an Oscar. I guess she doesn't know the male rule about not talking to your neighbor, because we're having a fine conversation about the role she played to win. I ask her to hand me the statue, and she does, telling me, "This is only the dummy one they hand you while the real one is getting engraved."
That's a relief, because the award she hands me is a piece of crap. It's made of plastic, and while I'm looking at it, Oscar himself snaps loose from the base. Sharon is still talking to me, covering the sound, and I scramble to find a way to repair the thing.
All of a sudden, a head pops up over the door of my stall. It's my dad's office manager (he works alone irl) and tosses me a paperclip, which, somehow, I use to join the two pieces. I ask Sharon if the real award has a base made of marble. She replies, "Are you kidding? That's only done in Australia."
I hand the statue back to her, sliding it under the partition between the stalls.
My dad's office manager then tells me I have to fix the Aptiva, so I'd better hurry up. Then my dad's voice (it's at this point that I realize that the bathroom itself is just sitting open in my dad's office) booms "Oh, sure, right ... he couldn't fix his boyfriend's computer. Why didn't he just take the battery out?"
This enrages me. "Dad! That was seven years ago, why can't you just let it go and let me do my job?" I scream.
I leave the stall and hand my dad a Bic pen. He asks, "What the hell is this for?". I reply, "Your ass, dad ... your ass."
He fires me.
I storm out of the office, and get into my car. I drive to River Oaks Elementary School, where I spent fourth, fifth, and sixth grades in Houston.
It's lunchtime, but all the kids are eating in the main hallway instead of the cafeteria. It's incredibly loud, with some kind of horrid thrash metal music being played.
I sit down at the teacher's table, next to Will Riker, my spanish teacher from high school, and my sixth grade math teacher. I'm shocked by how old she looks.
We try to talk, but the kids drown us out. So, unbeknownst to the other, me and my math teacher both covertly cast a cone of silence spell. Whoops. Since two people cast the spell, we've also muted ourselves.
Since no one can hear anyone else speak anymore, I sigh, and wake up.