Certainly, there was another kid in my class who also believed in the scissor monster - so perhaps there are more than one or just a busy one who gets around. I don't know.
Besides remembering my childhood fears I took the creature to be a scissor monster because of its outward appearance - it had a carapace made out of bits of old tin cans, spoons, forks, tin openers, scissors, gardening equipment and other metallic miscellany, some rusty, some shiny, all in layers. I could see that it had also examined the beer cans I'd discarded on my bedroom floor. All that remained of them were fragments, laying there, rejected by the beast.
I'd awoken bleary-eyed and there it was, atop my wardrobe, where the neighbours' cat liked to sit, squatting and looking at me with its sad eyes, half-buried under my laundry pile - winter clothes I can't be bothered to wash. Particularly as hitherto the cat and now the creature like to nest in them. Though for the cat's protection I'd started keeping the bedroom door shut whenever she came in.
A cocktail of fear, curiosity, fatigue and drunkenness kept me pinned to my bed, engaged in a battle of wills with the creature. Us staring at each other across the small space that separated us. My bedroom is very tiny. I was hopelessly outclassed by the creature and eventually chose to define it as some kind of phantasm. I drink extra strong lagers on account of being much set-upon in life and started to worry this creature might be some kind of a pink elephant type alcoholic's delusion.
In the evening I awoke with my clothes, boots and bedroom light on.. No sign remained of the monster atop the wardrobe. Only the torn up cans of lager and my very hazy memory attested to its presence of the the night before. I immediately began drinking from a half full can I'd left by the bed
I'm not making myself very clear am I? The truth is all my memories of this monster are as mangled as those cans were upon my floor. We seem to meet in an opaque, vague place between sleep and waking life where the creature exists, as do I from time to time.
Initially I thought I'd mangled the cans. I imagined I'd done so in some pitiful attempt at machismo. This imagined act being born out frustration at my lot in life - having no girlfriend, nor money and getting beaten up from time to time. Plus, my neighbours really annoy me and it's so boring round here. So a sense of frustration seemed like as good an explanation as any for the torn up cans. It didn't seem at all likely I was sharing my humble abode with a scissor monster. I just thought the torn up cans of reality had intruded into a strange dream, I'd been having a lot of them around that time.
That morning I felt nothing but a sense of embarrassment before myself, and being a big time drunkard there's nothing new in that. Nor in forgetting events, which is also a routine occurrence in the life of a drunk. Like often I don't even remember who attacked me or when. I just wake with the injuries and maybe some missing property.
What I'm saying is that I have pieced together the destruction of the cans twice, once in error, believing I was responsible, and later realising it was really the creature. Around this time I also noticed my cutlery was disappearing and began to hear strange inexplicable noises around the flat. These noises I took variously to be large spiders walking upon the papers and junk mail left on the floor, the immersion heater, or the mad woman upstairs scraping and dawn cleaning as she is disposed to do.
Or is she, maybe the creature came from above? I don't know where it went either. The inexplicable noises from above continue to this day but just how do you broach the subject of a scissor monster with a strange and introverted woman? I imagine her peeking out from behind her door, opened just a crack, with the security chain on as I try to mumble the words - Excuse me, but I was wondering if you have a scissor monster, only I've lost mine. Her perhaps shuddering behind her freshly slammed door and phoning the police on me. She's a great telephoner up of the housing association too.
I hate them, the housing association, for keeping me here. They won't rehouse me unless I get a letter from the police to say I'm in danger. So I'm always telephoning the police and reporting various bits of trivial or half-remembered events and the police already think I'm crank. So an enquiry upstairs after my missing monster is completely out of the question.
It's just not fair! I'm not a crank!
There's normally no light in my room because my wardrobe is placed in front of my only window, me not being as popular as I deserve to be and worried about bricks being hurled through at night. Though on the night of the creature's first appearance I had fallen asleep with the light and my boots on again, on account of my being very drunk and tired the night before. So I could make out the scissor monster quite clearly, at least those bits of him he'd not buried properly beneath my winter garments.
Which, by the way, appeared no more torn when I next inspected than they were when I'd first discarded them there - there being a nail in my friend's armchair and the knees being gone, me not having any chairs I like to use at all and spending a great deal of time using the floor as a bar, desk and dining table.
I really ought to tidy up sometime. I keep meaning to do it but I don't care and almost never entertain visitors.
As I said, around this time I'd begun to have a swarm of strange and vivid dreams. Some of these were scary but mostly I found them quite uplifting. In any case I am so bored and fenced in that I welcomed even the nightmares.
I think I first noticed something odd was going on when I had an erotic dream, since I am unfortunate in that I hardly ever dream about naked women.
If I do it's more of the nature of some creepy guy spying on them and me being aware of and disgusted by the creepy guy. Well, that only happened once, during the dream catcher's era, for that was what the creature would later tell me it is.
I was simultaneously the creepy spying guy and the other guy who beat him up and stopped him, it was sinister and twisted. I am a strange mix of puritan and voyeur, like most guys I guess. I repress myself, even in my sleep. I sometimes think this inner conflict may also be at the root of my drinking.
So, I was definitely best pleased when I dreamt I was an evil Chaplinesque clown with a near identical evil twin. For not only did this dream feature two levels of attractive women but I also had a partner in my mischief, whereas in waking life I am usually condemned to make mischief in solitude and frowned upon by the citizenry.
I refer you to the mysterious injuries I have received lately, well my whole life really. I refuse to be stifled!
However, in this dream I had an associate who participated, my evil twin, plus an audience of beautiful women who watched our merriment on video and validated it to the point of getting turned on and giggling.
At the start of this dream my evil twin and I were touring around some desolate concrete jungle. We were wearing white make up and eye shadow to give us the countenance of Chaplinesque clowns. We were all adorned in black, white and grey, which matched the desolate environment more than somewhat, there being breeze blocks and concrete laying everywhere. Everything was covered in a fine dust of concrete mix and ancient grime, including my evil twin's urban Arctic camouflage jacket.
The two of us reached an abode known to us and exchanged very zealous daffy grins, in silence, for we were Chaplinesque evil clowns. We both wore bowler hats and I was attired in a tatty black jacket and mismatched pinstripe trousers, that were more than a little short and far too baggy. We both wore boots.
My noisy neighbours are always slamming doors and shouting in the hall. My bedroom is right at the front of the flat so the noise goes right through the wall and into my sleep. In this dream my Chaplinesque evil twin and I were climbing in halfway through this poor fellow's windows and banging on his wooden cabinet to alarm him.
Our prank's victim emerged shouting, which was probably also my noisy neighbours in reality. I can't stand them. So we decided to teach him a lesson for shouting at us and went round the block, silly walking in a jubilant quirky manner. How great it was to have a partner in crime. My newfound best mate loved it too, you could tell, it was like looking into a mirror.
I like to think I'm not really alone. That somewhere out there is another me just waiting to be discovered. If we ever meet up watch out world! I think like that about women too, especially after I dream about them. I guess my ideal evil twin is a woman. I think this missing female evil twin may be at the root of my drinking.
In my childhood I was often miserable and always imagined things would be better if I had a twin or a man who would come along and teach me magic. Of course neither ever arrived and I started drinking instead.
Back outside our victim's flat, for our next prank my evil twin and I pulled out a humble looking wooden square. It was magic though, looking through it we saw three tall athletic women, where nothing had existed before, only concrete, dust and debris.
The women were dressed in a variety of sexy fetish clothes. Short pleated skirts and hold up stockings, suspenders and basques, Lacy underwear, you get the idea. I picked out the one in the short blue pleated skirt and made her swap underwear with another at will, for I preferred the navy blue underwear of the other woman to her own, which was white, opaque and lacy. If only I had a woman like that I wouldn't need to drink to forget that I don't. I'd keep my flat tidy and everything then.
Attired thus she would be our drone, the instrument of our prank upon the lonely, shouting recluse. My evil twin and I conceived the idea instantly without needing to vocalise it and shared much mirth as the two women swapped underwear. Our silent manic laughter and sarcastically goofy grins told us that we were in unison.
At this point it emerged that we were actors on a film because I paused the video and found myself laying in front of a wide screen TV with the three actresses who'd played the prospective drones for our prank, two of which had just exchanged underwear, revealing all their important bits. That was bliss - not only did I have a profession as an actor but I had three sexy porn actresses round for a slumber party.
Why can't my life be more like that? I definitely wouldn't need to drink to oblivion if it were.
I took myself off into the kitchen to dance joyously at my new luck. One of the actresses followed me. The one I'd chosen as a drone. We began making some alcoholic drinks, I put my hand round her waist and we kissed passionately. I knew I would have her that day and the others too. I knew that she'd let me have the others but still unquestionably we'd belong to each other. I wish I had a girlfriend like that, who'd let me sleep with her friends if I wanted to.
I had a very sexy girlfriend once, who encouraged me to sleep with other women, because she was sleeping with other older men. When I had her all I wanted was her to myself. I didn't want other women at all. I did warn you there's a lot of inner conflict within me.
That was what it was about, the dream catcher, it said, to show me all the conflicts within myself, the empty dreams and contradictions, to lay them bare to force me not to hide from them. This coming from a monster that hid under my dirty clothes and only came out when I was half-asleep or comatose. What a hypocrite - it didn't even have the courage to say goodbye.
Someone just slammed a door, do you see? How much sense does it take not to slam the door? The woman at the front is worst of all, because she knows it annoys me, her name is Victoria, the upstairs neighbour calls her bitchy. I call her bitchtoria, though not to her face, just in my head. I've only spoken to her about three times in as many years - she bears an irrational hatred toward me that came from nowhere. I can't believe I've been here three years already. Three totally wasted years.
The local pub is full of wankers so I just drink at home.
After my jubilant evil clown dream I had another which illustrates perfectly the nature of the dream catcher's stated purpose - to show me all the contradictions in my life.
I was a guard in a really harsh jail, I might have been a conscripted trustee or an actual guard, I'm not sure which and it doesn't matter at all. What matters is that I was somehow separated and at odds with the other prisoners. Yes, I was definitely a trustee not a proper guard at all, but I was armed with an automatic rifle and pistol. I didn't like some of the other prisoners much and they didn't like me. I didn't like the guards either.
I think this dream might reflect my waking life's endeavours to get a letter for the housing association from the police. It jars with my mind to report all this trivial rubbish, all the attacks and such. Yet somehow I feel I need to create the impression I'm under perpetual siege so I can get out of here. Which is a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy since people don't like being reported to the police, even when nothing comes of it, invariably nothing does. The police think I'm a crank and they never give out letters like that, my lawyer told me. Those bastards in the housing association were just fobbing me off - I hate them!
That's why I was a trustee in this dream at any rate, because of that sense of inner conflict which results from reporting stuff to the police.
Pretty much at the start of my dream there was a massive riot in this awful high-tech jail. See, a door just slammed again. The prisoners were trying to smash in the doors of the block where I was, at first only one or two prisoners. Again the door slamming in reality must have provided these noises to stimulate my dreaming mind. I was on the roof sniping at the prisoners with my rifle and killing the occasional one. Then, once the door was breached, hundreds and hundreds of them began to charge into the building. Realising the odds were hopeless, I decided to head downward into the building to hide.
On one landing I found myself in the middle of a full-blown bloodbath. There were prisoners flying about really fast, everywhere, like mad dervish slaughtering everyone with knives. The guards were shooting as many as they could but there were too many of them, a screaming horde of berserks. I shot a few but basically tried to keep my head down and escape from the carnage.
My plan was to try to disguise myself and mingle among the prisoners so I could escape the prison completely and save my wretched skin. I ended up in a giant hall full of elderly, frail, senile and mental prisoners who seemed beyond recognising me as a trustee or hurting me if they did. They had the air of quaint English holidaymakers from a bygone era of kiss me quick bowler hats, saucy postcards, deck chairs and Punch and Judy shows.
I hid among them in a conveniently huge wicker basket. Beautiful but incredibly spooky music began playing and a bunch of sinister circus types entered into the hall. They were evil clowns, as I and my twin had been before, but attired as keystone cops. They were the most psychopathic prisoners in fancy dress, but in contrast to the rampaging mob they danced slowly and deliberately - a sort of macabre ballet of sniffing me out. I had run out of ammunition for my rifle and now clutched my automatic pistol in my shaking hand.
I vowed that if discovered I would kill as many evil keystone cops as possible and save the last bullet for myself. Then I realised my dilemma, I had no idea how many, if any, bullets remained in the pistol. I was panicking but tried to regulate my breathing and remain absolutely silent, even though the beautiful hypnotic music filled the room.
Another pair entered the hall, an attractive woman and a huge hairy bearded man. Both were dressed in red and gold circus clothes. The woman, though a stranger, somehow resonated an aura of belonging to me. It became clear that the circus act revolved around a very thinly veiled sexual assault upon this woman who was mine.
The old mental holiday-makers were really enjoying the show. Meanwhile I was disgusted by my lack of action and the paralysis of my fear, though still captivated by the music and the ballet of the searching keystone cops. It was clear I'd underestimated the elderly holidaymakers who were by now flocking round my hiding place and making me conspicuous.
Fairly soon I was surrounded by a whole horde of eyes prying in through the holes in my frayed wicker basket, eyes set in the same white painted faces akin to those of my evil twin, with exactly the same sarcastic grimaces.
On waking I was cold and yet covered in seat. Yet with the beautiful tune to which the macabre keystone cops danced still resonating through my head. I felt utterly weak, powerless to protect a woman who was mine. I resented having my evil twins act this way toward to me, to have fled from them and collaborated with the prison regime. The beautiful music soon faded from my consciousness and even now I lament the loss. Though the woman I couldn't protect has faded into insignificant empty, chimerical pseudo-matter.
I realised the dream catcher had shown me another flaw in my waking thoughts, set me up against myself and left me sickened at masquerading as a victim in order to be rehoused.
I can't stand the housing association for forcing me to adopt such bizarre tactics, nor the police for not giving me my letter. I wish my neighbours wouldn't disturb my dreams by slamming doors.