Disclaimer: Mine are mine, everything else is Vertigo's. No money. No sue.

Maria breathed in the fumes of her cigarette, hands shaking with damp cold. She wrapped her free arm tight against herself to try to retain what feeble warmth her dusty-rose colored trench coat provided and peered in one of the many windows of the spacious restaurant.

"Fuckin' bylaw," she muttered. She inhaled deeply and blew smoke against the sparkling pane in silent rebellion. Her muscles spasmed with cold and her teeth clicked together a few times. She glanced over at the table where her party sat and squinted at them, taking another drag. There was Bob from Accounting, Allen, Alex, Chris whose last name she didn't know, Claire and Jamie - the "nice young couple" from God-knows-where.

She suddenly had the overwhelming desire to know Chris' last name. The intensity of the emotion struck her as hilarious and she chuckled softly to herself, fogging up the window. Her muscles spasmed again and her laughter dissolved into a wracking coughing fit. She doubled over, grabbing onto the railing of the balcony with a numb hand, and pulled her left arm tighter under her ribcage. Her still glowing cigarette slipped out of her fingers and into the black water below. Maria clenched her clacking teeth and hissed a curse, slamming her open palm on the railing; it was her last cigarette.

"That's quite a cough you have there," a voice said.

Maria closed her tired eyes and rubbed the palm of her hand where she'd hit and bruised it.

"No shit Sherlock," she bit off glaring over the balcony and into the thick, black trees across the dark cove.

"There's no need to be vulgar Maria," the voice replied, "here, have a crumpet."

Maria's brow creased, perplexed, as the sound of a plate scraped across her companion's table closer to her. She absently noticed the thick fog lapping like waves across the deck and past her.

"Nasty habit that, you know," the voice said conversationally, "I hear it kills a good many people." A small, ghostly flame sparked into existence amidst the fog and the burning ember of a cigarette eventually formed. Maria frowned at the comment, then she realized who the voice actually belonged to.

"Miss Pole," Maria whispered hoarsely, eyes wide as the windows behind her, "Miss May Pole."

"Would you like some tea?," Miss Pole asked.

"No," Maria answered, "no thank you." She could see the woman's wide-brim hat outlined in the mist.

"Suit yourself." Maria heard the sound of pouring, a slight clatter as the teapot was set back down, then the clink of Miss Pole's tea cup being set back on its saucer.

"Well, are you going to stand there all night and stare at me like a fish?," she asked, slightly irritated.

Maria shook herself out of her stupor and sat down carefully across from Miss Pole, folding her hands in her lap. She watched the glowing halos around the windows of the restaurant and looked at Miss May with her peripheral vision, as that was, she remembered, the only real way to see Miss May properly. You couldn't look directly at dreams or they vanished. She could see the long white gloves that disappeared past Miss May's elbows somewhere and the large, but not gaudy, pearl-drop earrings that swung slightly when she drew the cigarette close.

"Why are you here?," asked Maria while watching a flake of white paint peeling from the window frame.

Miss May's cigarette hand fell back on a limp wrist and Maria got the distinct impression May was looking at her with an incredulous expression on her face. May's hand thumped, almost unceremoniously to the table; the china dishes resting there didn't so much as shiver.

"Oh come on Dear," she said in exasperation, "to watch you of course! Why else?"

Maria turned her head sharply towards Miss Man and the fog around her head feathered like frost on a windowpane.

"Watch me do what?," she asked, suddenly wary.

The ember rose, glowed slightly brighter for a moment, then fell again.

"That's your decision," May answered, "again."

Maria frowned slightly and gently wiped her mouth of the mist that settled there.

"To be or not to be," she whispered against her fingertips remembering the last time they had this conversation; Maria had been in high school and had just been told by the latest of a series of aptitude that she would be bagging groceries for the rest of her life. She was the only person that didn't mind that - it left more time for the really important things in life like counting leaves on a tree or painting badly.

Maria glanced out on the water where a couple danced. The young man spun a woman who could have passed for Audrey Hepburn in an elegant waltz. His blond hair shone with a reality that Maria had never seen before and she had the feeling she was viewing something private that she shouldn't really be. She looked back to the peeling paint and felt exactly like it.

"They're perfectly happy down there," May said with a dismissive wave, "living in their dreams, but then again so are they living their mediocrelives." She pointed with her cigarette to the window. The heavy fog parted just enough to catch a distorted view of her friends laughing at a bad joke.

The fog closed again and May poured herself more tea. The lid of the teapot clinked softly.

"My dear," May said softly, "you have to decide if you're going to exist in the short time you have left or live."

"To be or not to be," Maria closed her eyes and listened to the silent feel of fog on and around her. May chuckled from a great distance and the ashes from her cigarette drifted onto Maria's brown oxfords.

Maria stood up after looking across the table for half an hour and walked away from the restaurant, through the fog, and into the waking world.

<><><>

Lucien nodded to Miss Pole as she strode aristocratically through the library to her favourite section. He had added twelve of Maria's newest books there just that evening.

"Bloody difficult finding good reading some days, hmm Lucian?" May said leaning forward at the waist to examine the most recently added titles.

"Sometimes," he replied. He didn't mention that there was very little in the Dreaming library not worth reading, but then May Pole was a private dream and private dreams were generally a little bit biased.

"I hope she has time to finish that epic she's been working on for the past few years," May said as she selected a slim, blue, leather-bound novella Maria had concocted in a park watching children trying to fish their floundered kite out of a pond, "I'm really looking forward to reading it when it's done."

"As am I," he replied carefully wiping the dust off of a sketchbook by Sandro Botticelli, "Not so brooding and hopeless anymore, is she? She's really brightened up."

"…Yes, she has," replied May. She looked at the ground, contemplating briefly, and fiddled with her earring. She stopped, adjusted her hat and smiled winningly at Lucien.

"Anyway," she said brightly, "I'd best let you get back to work."

"Goodbye May," he said, replacing the sketchbook on its shelf, "I hope you enjoy the novella."

"Thank you Lucien. Goodbye."

Lucien watched her leave out the front entrance and into the foggy brightness that was the dreaming. He smiled and shook his head to himself and cleaned his spectacles. Then he walked over to Maria's section and picked up a small brown book and began to read.