Mona shows her badge to the security guard posted at the gate of the Dream Factory, who waves her in. She walks up to her floor and goes into the break room for coffee. Kriti, her colleague and close friend, is at the coffee machine.

“Hey, Kriti. Drinks at the HVAC tomorrow?” Mona asks.

“Mona! Hey! I actually have plans for the weekend. Guess where I’m going?” Kriti says, excited.

“Something to do with a guy, I think” Mona guesses.

Kriti laughs and says, “You know me so well! Yeah, it is a guy.”

“Spill” says Mona.

“Well, it’s Manav from tech. He’s taking me to Ganymede! Can you believe it?” Kriti practically squeals.

“How romantic” Mona says. She knows this will go bust before the end of next week but smiles along. Kriti is a diehard romantic.

Kriti hugs Mona and leaves. Mona grabs a black coffee and goes to her terminal. 

Next to her typewriter is a folder, her assignment for the day. She flops onto the chair and stretches her fingers. The clickety clacks of the typewriters across the floor are soothing to her. She loves her job. 

As a senior dream writer, she gets tricky cases. Nothing makes her happier than to write dreams for humans who have trouble sleeping. She is famous around the factory for writing the most vivid and creative dreams. Her stories are a sedative for the troubled minds of humans.

Mona opens the folder and immediately recognizes the boy in the photo. She had written a dream for Rohan a few months ago but couldn’t end the dream because he woke up in the middle of it. She had felt irritated for days after.

At the factory, rules barred the dream writers from writing more than one dream for a human. There was a strong reason for that rule. Dream writers were at risk of getting personally involved with humans. Mona knew that the right thing to do was to report the error and turn in the case to her manager. But she was tempted to finish the dream.

She silently debates for a minute and decides to not report the case. She enters Rohan’s case details in her system. After a few seconds, a secure connection is made. Rohan is yet to enter the REM cycle of his sleep. She has some time to kill.

She pulls up Rohan’s half-finished dream from her phone. This was another violation of the dream factory rules. No dream writer was permitted to keep a record of the dreams they write. But Mona was far too attached to her dreams to follow that protocol. Dream writing was her whole life.

She zooms in on the transcript of Rohan’s dream.

Rohan is sitting in his history class, zoning in and out of the lesson. He turns his head and looks at Sameer, who is busy taking notes. As he stares at Sameer, Rohan’s stomach does a backflip. I’m probably hungry, he thinks.

His eyes wander to Sameer again. And he gets that feeling in his stomach, yet again. He stares at Sameer’s tight curls and his soft jawline. Rohan wonders how it would feel to kiss him. His stomach does that swooping thing again. Third time’s the charm. It makes him sit up. 

As far as Rohan was aware, he was straight. But at that moment, he couldn’t remember if he’d ever had a crush on any girl. He couldn’t think of anyone. Oh, he thinks. I’m gay. That doesn’t upset him.

The bell rings, and the class empties out of the room. Their next class was gym. Rohan walks towards the swimming pool. He sees Sameer up ahead of him. 

Rohan changes into his swimming trunks. He spends the entire gym class staring at Sameer. A couple of times, Sameer catches his eye.

At the end of the class, Rohan returns to the locker room to change into his school uniform. Before he could open his locker, someone taps him on the shoulder. It was Sameer. 

           That’s where the dream had ended last time. Mona itched to give it a satisfactory ending. Rohan had entered the REM cycle. Mona was ready to continue the dream. But before she could start, she hears a commotion in her manager’s cabin. She was pretty sure it had to do with her breaking the protocol. She had to write this dream fast.

            She begins.

            Sameer looked handsome this close to him. Water was glistening on his flushed face. He begins without any preamble.

            “You’ve been staring at me, Rohan” Sameer says.

            “You know my name” Rohan says, surprised. 

            “Of course. We’ve been in the same class since third grade,” says Sameer.

            “Right, of course” says Rohan, embarrassed.

            “You like me” Sameer says without any hesitation.

            “What?” Rohan asks, blushing from ear to ear.

            “You like me” Sameer repeats.

            “How do you know that?” asks Rohan.

            “In my off time, I’m a detective” Sameer laughs.

            Rohan laughs too. Sameer steps closer to Rohan. Rohan could feel the electricity crackling between them. Sameer leans in. Rohan leans in, too, as if on autopilot. They kiss.

            Rohan wakes up. He touches his lips. The kiss felt real to him. He decides to say ‘hi’ to Sameer at school on Monday.

            Back at the Dream Factory, Mona’s manager reaches Mona’s desk and confiscates her typewriter. Security personnel pull her up and take her to the conference room.

            Her manager asks her “Why did you break the protocol?”

            “I wanted to give him hope” Mona says.

            “We have these rules for a reason, Mona. You’re suspended without pay for month. Hope it was worth it.” her manager says.

            “You have no idea” Mona says with a big smile. 

She is escorted off the premises of the Dream Factory. Walking home, Mona whistles a happy tune.