Edward's 40 Day Dream in a Heartbeat

"I think I'd been sleeping for forty days in and

yeah, I know I'm sleeping 'cause this dream's too amazing

She got gold doorknobs where her eyes used to be

yeah, one turn and I learned what it really means to see"

Tone deaf, she sang to the lyrics of Alexander Ebert's 40 Day Dream as the record played on her newly purchased second hand Panasonic ghetto blaster SG-J555L. Úna Elfred had bought it as a gift for herself on her father's birthday. Today, she gave herself a day off from going in to her other studio as she just did not felt like it. It was not raining, unlike yesterday, and instead it was a lovely sunny morning as the wind brought back the unbearable London chilliness. It is Tuesday and it was just Monday when she went to bed the night before. Whether it was the dread for the 9 miles of biking, or the awkwardness of slowly losing the one thing that kept her going days before—her muse, or simply not wanting to speak to anyone; she got out of bed but stayed in and away from anyone. Úna Elfred has forgotten what it is like to love someone not like the way she loves her family or her friends and when she does not feel loved, she distances herself away, she was told, and into the little corner behind her ear and occasionally sits between hook of it as she watches the cursor blinking on. Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zeros made her happy. She went on:

"It's the magical mystery kind, must be a lie

Bye bye to the too good to be true kind of love"

Thinking about this 10-persons-band, she admired their passion, talent and collaborative capability. Hippies; they resembled in their ritual-like performances and expressed in the musical arrangements. It is probably the state of trance as Ebert seemingly transcend out off his body through the words he had so cleverly strung together with the music, or perhaps his history of addiction, or simply his long black hair tied back and face hidden behind his locks of beard. Laid back as Úna dreamt of the smell of the ocean under the open sky and charming as is Angus Stone. Mesmerizing is too, the vibes Jade Castrinos put forth each time she gets on with the piece and sings through her the verses that bestow merriment. Her voice heard but she is no longer there where you can see her in person or on screen. She's some place else behind those shut lids on the strike of the tambourine. Somewhere you'd and me'd like to be. The chords arranged and played through the trumpet between the choruses is the cue for the start of your expedition and an applaud for freedom. Úna felt the same lightness in her heart each time she watched a different version of the same song performed live. She'd like too, no fear of death and to see what laid behind those gold doorknobs. She thought hard, real hard, but it was not enough.

Úna's brain works slower than the spiders playing dead from spot to spot in the corner of the tiles of her toilet floor. She does not have the ability to imagine as her brain procrastinates and her seemingly portrayed daydreamings are not exactly the widely defined sort. She sits, unlike a thinker, and never ever a philosopher, and nothing is in her head. An empty vessel, the seconds ticked away and she—waits? She could be having a sociable cigarette or coffee break with her mates, she could be sitting amongst friends at a dinner party but all she could be thinking of was to be some place else other than where she was, some place she could not imagine, except indefinitely elsewhere. When she is writing, she would think about taking a walk and she keeps thinking about taking a walk, yeah go on a walk, and when she takes that walk she thought of the walk she thought of and writes this now, take the trash and slam the door. Damn it, stop slamming the damn door. The walk, cereals, eggs, milk, tobacco, crisps, take the trash, slam the door and take the walk, cereals, eggs, milk, trash, the writing, now go on that walk. Those were the things to be bought. Blakr was right, Úna is a broken record player, one she does not know how to fix. She couldn't have found what she was looking for only because she does not know what to be looking for. Something is missing, something. Mostly, someone—the touch, the warmth, the heartbeats. She thought of a dog, since her mind has such short attention span she has not been able to catch up wooing another who gave her no attention nor desire, obviously. She got used to being alone and a brain that fails to catch up with her heart. She can sit there, yes right there for hours staring in space and not a wee bit of daydreaming. The same words rotating and repeating, otherwise empty. No rush, no push. Maybe too much hair covering her foresight, maybe she's a vegetable in a human form, maybe past her Best Before date, maybe she should have went to medical school but she would have messed up patients' dosages and made wrong diagnoses. Maybe she got too lazy to dream but not exactly running by hiding. She does that all the time. Like when she was five, she pretended to be suffering from a headache so she could get back to bed and skip pre-school. Once she pooped in her pants, could not remember why, probably too lazy to run to the loo. She ran away from the fight between her parents under the sheets hoping David Copperfield would 'twinkle' her out of the water tank to Neverland. She had ran by pretense, away but yet escaped. For the last 10 minutes, she laid her head on her arm against the table as the other hand held this pencil a millimeter above the paper, just staring at the tip of the lead sticking out of the Pilot Shaker—the world went by on buses with tires that screeched the wet road behind the window where she sat. Stop slamming the goddamn door. Úna has a problem—Úna is the problem. She is not running away from someone else nor someplace else. She did not not go into the studio today to run away from her mates nor the lamp on the desk. She stayed away to get away from herself. No questions asked for the day. No requests to be obligated for the day. Running without going anywhere, literally. Rollie after rollies of Golden Virginia on Swan filters and Ribena was not helping. Thinking about distractions by food is not making things any better. Every minute she spent on ridiculous American Soap and Reality Tv, she was not running, she was putting the escape on hold. Every puff she drags from the fag, she was pushing her luck with the escape.Somebody'd better pinch this bitch 'cos she isn't dreaming and it isn't amazing. The lightbulb just flickered. Úna Elfred had been much more creative with her getaways.

Nobody caught her except her. For now, she'd just wanted to be happy, although she strongly believe to not not being happy. Right now, Úna has Edward to lend her a hand for the next 2 mins 40 seconds as the vinyl spins under the needle and takes her on her 3191st escape.