On a recent podcast, I mentioned I wasn’t a a big fan of the Blue Dream strain. The next day, I received a terse summons from the self-styled Queen of Blue Dream: the legendary Mila Z, YouTube phenomenon and CEO/founder of the ultra-luxe BlueDream dispensaries. She tolerated no one dissing her namesake flower.
Uh-oh. What had I said about Blue Dream on the podcast?
Nothing good, most likely. I prefer my cannabis at one extreme or the other: either energizing euphoria for daytime activity or couch-lock sedation for evening relaxation. Blue Dream isn’t quite either of those. It’s literally dreamy, slow-moving, an underwater experience. Something about it gives me the spins, so I’m not so much high as lost in a vertiginous fog. Blue Dream just brings me a loopy weirdness, every damn time.
In any case, as soon as the podcast dropped, a large man named Johnny Wolf popped up next to me at the local dispensary. He was grinning a scary wolfish smile, but his eyes were unsmiling – not surprising since the right one was made of glass.
“Hey, pal,” he greeted me, draping his meaty hand across my shoulders. “It appears your time has come. SHE wants to see you. Tonight, at her club. I’ll pick you up at 9.” There was no use arguing with him. Scary as Wolf was, I knew he was just a minion for Mila Z.
To be honest, I felt a little thrill pulling up that night in front of her luxe nightclub. It’s the only place in town licensed for music, whiskey and weed, and there’s always a long rope line of young success stories milling outside, hoping to bustle in. Wolf cut through the throng like a knife and suddenly: We’re inside.
The main room, all angles and shadows, pulses with bouncy French techno-pop. Dim blue spotlights reflect off the smoke swirling up toward the high ceiling and through the haze I see Mila Z. She’s at a table by herself in the back, offering a languid hand to some silver-haired old guy in a business suit. He bends low to kiss her ring. “That’s the governor’s Chief of Staff,” grunts Wolf helpfully.
In person, Mila Z is smaller than she looks on YouTube, less the perfectly put-together CEO superhero and more the tiny, slightly harried club owner – the Rick of Rick’s Café. But even across the room, her witchy charisma is mesmerizing. Partly it’s those piercing blue eyes, direct and intense as if sizing up everyone in the room at once. Then there’s the short black hair, chopped up in a gamine cut, like a post-modern performance artist. Tonight she wears a well-cut black blazer over a white tank top, black jeans and a pair of fashionable boots.
Frankly, she terrifies me, but also, I think I want to marry her.
Ms. Z spies me by the bar, crooks a finger, and I stumble over, helped by a hard push in the back from Wolf. You can bet he won’t be invited to the wedding. I take a seat across from her. Between us sits a hookah and a little wrapped box of premium Blue Dream flower.
“At last we meet,” she says, taking my hands in hers. I expect to feel the cold touch of corporate success, but her palms are surprisingly soft and warm. “Tonight,” she announces, “We are going to share the finest Blue Dream from my personal stock. And I will tell you of the true meaning of that magic flower and you will write about it for everyone else.”
Wolf glides silently out of the darkness and hands Mila a perfectly rolled joint. She lights up and takes a hit. I reach for it but she gives a very slight shake of her head – not yet. Then she flips the joint over and puts the lit side in her mouth. Oh no. No, no, no, no.
She leans across the black lacquer table, sliding the hookah aside, motioning with her hand for me to lean in close. Our faces are now inches apart. Up close, I see she’s wearing an iridescent bluish-black lipstick, very Goth and vampiric. I close my eyes and open my lips and take in the blast of smoke she shotguns into my throat. She waits until I finish coughing, then does it again. Her ice-blue eyes stare into my bloodshot peepers until I feel a slow smile spread across my face as the smoke hits my brain. She relaxes back into her seat.
“Blue Dream,” she intones, her voice low and caressing, “Blue Dream is the lover’s fantasy of close embrace, the chemical alchemy that unlocks the most erotic intimacy.” She sits almost hidden in a shroud of smoke and gloom, her face cinematically lit by a single blue pin spotlight. “Blue Dream is the call that cannot be denied. This is the magic you share with partners who get naked together.”
She leans up against my lips again, and this time takes my face in both hands. Again she blasts the smoke into my mouth. Around us, the music transforms into a throbbing dance rhythm, a bass-driven siren call that snakes through the room, impossible to resist. People put down their bongs and hookahs and leap up to dance. Spotlights rove the club and dry-ice smoke filters up from the floor, a cold fog rolling in. I’m losing my bearings – time seems to stutter anew every second, like a strobe light flashing in my head, and there’s a strange mood brewing in the air.
“Now you see it, at last,” says Mila Z, her crystal blue eyes wide and luminescent. “That is the enchantment of the Blue Dream. Come, dance with me.”
I stand and we start moving together. She fits perfectly in my arms as we spin through the room, the blue lights swirling faster and faster. The press of the crowd pushes her tight against me. I’m sweating, my shirt is coming unbuttoned, I don’t know how. I can feel her heart beating against my chest as she spins me into a dark corner. There’s a sudden pause in the music and the room goes dead silent for a moment. A frozen tableau, except for Mila Z. With one hand she strokes my chest. With the other, she puts a finger on my lips.
“You see?” she whispers, and for the second time pulls my face down to hers. Dreamy and light-headed, I lean in, finally, to kiss her. Our lips almost touch as my hands reach for her, and then a spotlight flares directly in my face. I’m blinded. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The drums come pounding up out of nowhere, the music roars back to life and now everyone’s shouting, screaming, laughing. A wave of vertigo spins me around. My balance is failing, my vision going dark, and the last thing I see is Mila stepping back into shadow. And then. . . I remember nothing more.
When I open my eyes again, morning light is slanting through my bedroom blinds. I’m in bed in my own tiny apartment, naked under the sheets, last night’s clothes neatly folded on the bedside table. I have no memory of how I got here. Then I feel something touch my leg beneath the sheets – it’s the gift box of premium Blue Dream from the club. I go into the bathroom and freeze, startled, when I see my reflection in the mirror. I look closer, but there’s no mistake: Someone has left the outline of a perfect kiss on my forehead in vampiric blue-black lipstick.
Blue Dream. Every. Damn. Time.
