The Hamlet Project

Claudius wakes up gasping, the sheet around him drenched, his heart racing. Gertrude hasn’t stirred, she is sleeping soundly, as if a sleeping spell had been cast on her.
As his heart slows and his breathing returns to normal, as his eyes take in the drapes of the Royal bedchamber, he begins to come back to himself, begins to piece together what his mind had just left.
In his dream, his brother had risen from his tomb, his armor. There was, in the space where his crown should have been, blood oozing out, in a perfect ring. His helmet in his arms, ready to be replaced on his head.
This tomb-risen brother stood on the marble patio of his sepulcher and Claudius stood nearby, hoping to remain hidden. He remembers the tang of fear in this moment. He remembers a tree that he rested his hands on, hoping to become invisible.
And then somehow his brother was right before him and he looked him right in the eye and he pointed at Claudius’ chest – as if he were attempting to bore a hole in his heart.
He doesn’t remember the journey but suddenly he is standing on the ramparts of the castle – now at a distance from his ghostly brother. Then young Hamlet is there, too wearing that ghostly black cloak he chose to wear to the ceremony, that little brat.
Claudius watches young Hamlet fall to his knees, watches his brother explain his own murder, watches young Hamlet rise with determination. Once again, the ghost of his brother looks right at him and even though he hasn’t heard a word, he knows that young Hamlet is after him.
The ghost stalks away and Claudius suddenly hears Hamlet cursing him. He sees him pick up his sword and raise it. And then he wakes up.