A Big Dream  I'm in Carter Church serving as altar boy for an evening mass with my friend Tim Robbins. Tim's father Kent Robbins is an usher. Tim and I are up by the piano. We walk towards the back of church. We are unsure of where to go or what to do. It is hot. Father Vance Brock is the priest. I see him in the back of church as we walk back. There are very few people in the congregation, probably no more than seven or eight in all. In the back of church are Tim's mother Mary Robbins, and another man who may be an usher. There are some one-gallon apple juice jugs on the floor. They are being rolled around or moved, maybe by my younger neighbors Alan and Ricky Broud. I move swiftly down to the entryway at the base of the stops and place the jugs on a table so they don't break. I hurry to get back up to the entrance aisle because the procession is starting. There are a few young girls carrying things in the procession ahead of us. I hurry to catch up with Tim and then slow to match his pace. We have trouble walking at the same pace: I walk slower than he does. When Tim and I get to the altar I wait for Father Vance to get there before we all genuflect. Tim genuflects as soon as we get there. We get up to our chairs. I am holding the book that Father Vance reads from. I shake and tremble as I hold the book. Father Vance says he has something that will help me with the shaking. I have a white shirt on, which his unbuttoned far and slightly falling off my right shoulder. I feel queasy. I lean and fall over, and then sit. I leave the altar area and go back to the sacristy. My aunt Nisa Redding comes back to see if I am okay. She has two tiny dogs that are less than a foot long. One of the dogs is about _ pound. It has a skinny tail, about four or five inches long. My grade school classmate, Misty Ryan, takes my place serving the mass. I see the back of her head as she slips into the robe and walks out of the sacristy. Father Vance, who seems to be my dad, comes back to the sacristy. He has some sort of incense, which may be the kind that is used in funerals, in a clump, in an incense burner. He, who is my dad at this point, says that my mom died last night. I shiver and freeze as I understand what he is saying. But he is not being literal.