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And when I was asleep I had one of my favourite dreams. Sometimes I have it 
during the day, but then it's a daydream. But I often have it at night as well.

And in the dream nearly everyone on the earth is dead, because they have caught 
a virus. But it's not like a normal virus. It's like a computer virus. And 
people catch it because of the meaning of something an infected person says and 
the meaning of what they do with their faces when they say it, which means that 
people can also get it from watching an infected person on television, which 
means that it spreads around the word really quickly.

And when people get the virus they just sit on the sofa and do nothing and they 
don't eat or drink and so they die. But sometimes I have different versions of 
the dream, like when you can see two versions of a film, the ordinary one and 
the *Director's Cut*, like *Blade Runner*. And in some versions of the dream 
the virus makes them crash their cars or walk into the sea and drown, or jump 
into rivers, and I think that this version is better because then there aren't 
bodies of dead people eveywhere.

And eventually there is no one left in the world except people who don't look 
at other people's faces and who don't know what these pictures mean

[winking face] [evil face] [uncertain face] [surprised face]

and these people are all special people like me. And they like being on their 
own and I hardly ever see them because they are like Okapi in the jungle in the 
Congo which are a kind of antelope and very shy and rare.

And I can go anywhere in the world and I know that no one is going to talk to 
me or touch me or ask me a question. But if I don't want to go anywhere I don't 
have to, and I can stay at home and eat broccoli and oranges and liquorice 
laces all the time, or I can play computer games for a whole week, or I can 
just sit in the corner of the room and rub a pound coin backwards and forwards 
over the ripple shapes on the surface of the radiator. And I don't have to go 
to France.

And I go out of Father's house and I walk down the street, and it is very quiet 
even though it is the middle of the day and I can't hear any noise except birds 
singing and wind and sometimes buildings falling down in the distance, and if 
I stand very close to traffic lights I can hear a little click as the colours 
change.

And I go into other people's houses and play at being a detective and I can 
break the windows to get in because the people are dead and it doesn't matter. 
And I go into shops and take things I want, like pink biscuits or PJ's 
Raspberry and Mango Smoothie or computer games or books or videos.

And I take a ladder from Father's van and I climb up onto the roof, and when 
I get to the edge of a roof I put the ladder across the gap and I climb to the 
next roof, because in a dream you are allowed to do anything.

And then I find someone's car keys and I get into their car and I drive, and it 
doesn't matter if I bump into things and I drive to the sea, and I park the car 
and I get out and there is rain pouring down. And I take an ice cream from 
a shop and eat it. And then I walk down to the beach. And the beach is covered 
in sand and big rocks and there is a lighthouse on a point but the light is not 
on because the lighthouse keeper is dead.

And I stand in the surf and it comes up and over my shoes. And I don't go 
swimming in case there are sharks. And I stand and look at the horizon and 
I take out my long metal ruler and I hold it up against the line between the 
sea and the sky and I demonstrate that the line is a curve and the earth is 
round. And the way the surf comes up and over my shoes and then goes down again 
is in a rhythm, like music or drumming.

And then I get some dry clothes from the house of a family who are dead. And 
I go home to Father's house, except it's not Father's house any more, it's 
mine. And I make myself some Gobi Aloo Sag with red food colouring in and some 
strawberry milkshake for a drink, and then I watch a video about the Solar 
System and I play some computer games and I go to bed.

And then the dream is finished and I am happy.