So I Had Another Dream About You
So I had another dream about you. I know, I know — predictable, pathetic, and pathological. Isn’t it time you moved on with your life? Isn’t it time for your dreams to transition?
Well evidently the answer is no because there I was, who I am today only in a foggier world of slumber, and there you were. Same smile, same nose, same gait…Jesus Christ I think I could even smell you in my dream.
I was at a party. Or maybe it was a pool at dusk. Who knows. I was sitting there alone, but happy and there you were with the wrong her. In the waking world, your new lover is no friend of mine, but in this world, she was. One of my best friends actually. But our eyes were glued to each other from across the pool (yeah, it was definitely a pool, I remember now) like they used to adhere themselves together so many years ago. You did that thing with the right side of your mouth that showed you were ready for my lips on yours — I remember sitting around a table with my family way back when and seeing you do that out of the corner of my eye and hating you for how badly it made me want you.
I digress.
So there we were, communicating via pupil across the pool, and my friend was just so unaware. So pathetically, blissfully unaware. Like I said, in the dream, I was exactly the me I am today—same life and circumstances. But in this world, you were in my life and I wanted you and that was that. I got up, felt your eyes grace the curls in my hair as I walked away, and knew you would follow me. Even though you were all the way across that pool, I somehow heard you whisper in her ear that you would be right back.
I walked around the house where the pool was (Jesus Christ, it was your best friend’s house, how typical) and heard the grass rustle behind me, harmonizing with the sound of my skirt grazing the blades of green. I felt those old, familiar hands whisper across my right shoulder blade and I stopped. You came up behind me and stood very close to me without actually touching me. So typical. So you. I heard you smile. I closed my eyes and laughed.
“Why are you laughing?”
I turned around.
“Because we are just as fucked up as we’ve always been. I am just as fucked up as I’ve always been.”
He looked at me with his head cocked to the side, as if he were pondering a Pollock or something.
“What is it about you? I don’t get it.”
I paused, laughed again, then quietly,
“I miss you, ya know? But I don’t at the same time. I don’t miss this. I don’t miss how you always fuck things up for me.” He didn’t know what to say to that so he just kissed me. I guess that’s the only way he knew how to respond. That’s the only way he ever knew how to respond.
He raised my chin to meet his lips more closely and I gently placed my hand on the back of his neck. Hot, as if he was blazing from the inside. Just like I remember it.
He pulled away as I removed my hand and that was it. He walked inside his best friend’s house and I walked back to the pool. I sat down in my original spot, looked up, and smiled at my friend, still happy and thinking she knew him.
I laughed again at myself. I laughed again at him. I laughed again at the world now fading around me, finally realizing that this was all a dream. Finally realizing I am still the same person he molded me to be.
I woke up.
I don’t sleep much anymore.