Ruth was dreaming, or at least this reality could only be a dream. Vivid experiences inside her head at sleep found her waking with a start to be drawn into the horror of a forgotten memory from yesterday, fresh shots of regret, of dues unpaid, of monsters barely outrun. But then her consciousness would break in with derision and a softly softly reassurance, exposing the lie, and she would breathe again.

Yet some days, that uponwakening moment lay in her mind and was pondered over, like the discovery of a pleasingly shaped stone. It would sit in her pocket, waiting to be touched and stared at until her eyes blurred and she almost lost balance, in the daily grind bus queue or the crammed repetitive lift to the fifth floor office.

Shadows of the known and felt present had been with her last night, they now stared over her shoulder, giant in their believed recreation, a mix of memory and fear presented in a familiar yet foreign image. She waited for the usual routine annoyances to occur, to prove to her mind that this experience was separate from the comatose film reel playing relentlessly inside her head.

She had seen a green and black bruised face glared from behind a curtain, grey eyes glinting in the sunlight streaming through the window. And she sensed a feeling of imminent recognition crept into the back of her mind, waiting for a recollection, for her to know exactly who this was. Although Ruth could not see much, she sensed violence and dirt ' unwashed dishes and gathering dust givng an excuse for thumps and kicks where they would not show.

But not today, this woman, one eye swollen closed on a face made out of fear, could not leave. Neighbours with more talk than sense would not see the marks of possession; she would wait for him to kiss her better later. Just before she woke, Ruth, for all her proximity, suddenly felt the gulf of experience between herself and the lost, beaten woman before her.

It was that ingredient of the known in that grotesque from the recess of sleep which made her shiver and pinch herself wishing to believe in the present, thinking for a moment that this was the only way to salvation.

The unease continued; its grasp of her conscious time refused to let up. She could not fully see or feel the sepulchral mood which seeped into her mid-morning coffee; which provided a silent diversion during a meeting come midday. Her deep 3 o'clock Wednesday sigh did little to remove the gloom.

Later on, walking through evening damp to the crowded bus stop she saw the usual beggar woman in a shop doorway, clinging onto the edge of life with a grimy blanket and matted hair hanging in drips from her bent head. As she passed, the woman looked up, a familiarity pierced into Ruth's eyes, then relief in realisation as she recognised dream and reality in one moment.

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