021109 Not My Idea Of A Murder Mystery

Last night, I experienced a rare yet discernible dream, a first I think, and very eerie; that in which involved a nuance of puzzles and semiotic relevance to a murder mystery i.e. Clue. Now, when it comes to dreams, I do not recall them in their entirety but rather in fragments or scenes as I'm sure a lot of you do as well. Now the irony in such "dream absentmindedness" is damn near palpable, in respect to this current dream I had about the motif of murders (as I like to consider it). Trying to recollect particular scenes of a dream about deciphering a murder scene seems pretty ironic to me. So lets get to it (caution: this dream isn't scary but may be to readers, it is truly the most eeriest I've experienced, so read carefully...and no, nothing is going to jump onto your screen).

In the corner of an empty small wooden-wall furnished bedroom sits an old theatre teacher of mine from college, and certified genius in my defense, Craig Fleming. There is a single strung light dangling from the ceiling in the center of the room (the kind you would see illuminating a black bagged/hooded victim as they sit in the interrogation/torture seat on a Friday night). I sit at the opposing corner, left of him, behind a white small square table. On it, a newspaper which I haven't looked at yet, I just know through my peripheral and the aroma the uncoated groundwood paper tagged by mineral oil ink gives off.

He tells me to look at the crossword puzzle inside it. I open it up only to find a giant crossword puzzle on the center of the right page that was started but not finished. 17 across catches my eye because it is subtly illuminated, glowing almost. It's 9 letters long, 9 boxes long that is. After the first 2 boxes, 4 of the boxes are traced by a rectangle, as if it were a clue; a word within a word if you will. So it came to my attention that there is a 4 letter word within this 9 letter word but why? I look on the left page for corresponding clues for the empty boxes, nothing but one clue and it was for 17 across, that read "There has been a murder." I look at Craig and ask him if he knows the word. He replies, "You have to figure it out. Not me" So I began to assume that this 9 letter word is the answer to the murder.

Here's where it gets creepy. On the left page above the corresponding clue for 17 across, was a picture of a white bed the murder took place on drawn with blood. It was fresh, not yet settled in fully into the fabric or stained or saturated. I use the word drawn because, the pattern of the blood on the bed was the same exact pattern (but on a larger scale; the bed) of the crossword puzzle, just slightly messier. The extension of lines and the variety of length or sizes of the blood "stain" was almost proportional to that of the crossword puzzle despite the size differential (like a bloody crossword if you will). My eyes kept rallying back and forth from left page to right page as I kept trying to think of the 4 letter word and the 9 letter word. I lowered the newspaper back on the table, and in the room, before my eyes, was the bed from the picture. We stared at it. I got up to examine it, and what was written in the ruddy stained crossword puzzle, on the bed, in 17 across, in 9 red stained boxes, I'll never know, because I woke up.

Fin.