I woke up on the wrong side of my body

I’m unaccustomed to sleeping on my back.

In my dream last night, I was flat on my back inside a brightly lit tube that might have been a tanning bed except that I knew it was an MRI scanner.  Physically paralyzed but comfortably, pleasantly limp, I gazed upward at my reflection in the mirrored metallic cylinder. 

My eyes were, as things tend to be in dreams, unaffected by the glaring white lights that flashed from above my head and at my feet.  Presumably part of the mechanics of whatever test or screening I was in for.

I could see myself dressed in a tank top and underwear and I could see, thought the angle wouldn’t have allowed for it in reality, that my toenails were painted.  I had a pronounced tan line across my thighs. 

I said out loud, “I usually just burn.”  My voice echoed, either reverberating inside the scanner or warbling through layers of subconsciousness.

I hoped the paleness of my skin wouldn’t be exaggerated when the film was developed.

I woke up in bed in just that same position with a pillow stuffed under my knees.  My back has been bothering me.  I could probably use an MRI, I decided.  Maybe the dream was premonitory.  Then I looked down at my bare legs and realized I could probably use a little time in a tanning bed, too.