A Dream

I had a dream last night. I dreamt that I entered a room: my room, I believe. I walked into it with a sense of certainty and familiarity, knew where everything was, where everything was supposed to be. I could feel the comfort you get in a space that belongs to you and you alone. I set the keys that I do not own on a desk that I have not seen in my waking hours, felt my toes brush against an unfamiliar carpet, and took steps into a strange space that knew as if I had lived there long enough to memorize every step; however, there was one thing out of place. There was a woman in my bed, a woman whom I had known, but no longer belonged there, one who rested at ease as if this space in my own mind was hers, and I was just the visitor.

We shall call her… Rae. Those who know me will know who she is, for she occupied a quarter of my life with her presence and even more with her memory. This was a woman I once loved and believed I would make my wife. Years ago, she walked away. Tonight she was back, and I didn’t know, nor care, why. What I did know was that she, like everything else in that space, was right where she belonged.

“What are you reading?” She asked.

As if it had just appeared, the book in my hand surprised me with its presence. I lifted it and leafed through the blank pages, confused, unable to process the information that was not there.

“I don’t know.”

I set the book next to my keys on the desk, peeled off my socks, and sauntered to the bed in which those sky-blue eyes and perfectly-flawed smile waited for me on a freckled, porcelain face. When I climbed in next to her, I noticed the walls for the first time. One moment, they were solid and a dark blue with a hint of grey that reminded me of a starless night sky; the next, they were clear as glass, letting through the fading light of the setting sun that looked as if it was being chased away by the moonlight. I couldn’t help but be drawn in by the beauty of it all.

“What are you reading?” The forgotten voice whispered in my ear, bringing me back to the surface of depths into which my focus was sinking and anchoring me to the false reality in which I momentarily existed.

“I don’t know.”

Then She kissed me. Her lips were everything I had remembered and I wanted to get lost in that feeling. I leaned into it and allowed the moment to swallow me whole, brushing my hand first through her hair then around her back. I pulled her closer to me and let my lips begin to wander toward the rest of her body. I savored the scent of her neck and softness of her shoulders, and as I shifted her onto her back and leaned over her, feet itching to dance a dance they had long forgotten, four words broke my will, arrested my desire…

“What are you reading?”

“I don’t know.”

I lay back in the bed that was both mine and not mine and Rae rested her head on my shoulder, and soft hand on my chest.

“I love you, but I need to know. What are you reading?”

“I don’t know!” I nearly shouted, my frustration rising. “I don’t… fucking… know!”

“Then I have to go” she said, but she never moved.

We lay there in silence, watching the stars dance across the sky, swirling around a moon that slowly eased toward a far horizon. I could feel her breathing, could hear her heart beating, and when I had finally ceased attempting to make sense of it all, I heard those four words again.

“What are you reading?”

The voice was no longer hers. It had dropped and gained a sensual rasp, yet I was not caught off guard. It was as if, in this reality, I had expected it. I looked down, and the face I thought I had expected to see what not there. In its place was something even better. Her angles were sharper, a certain strength and femininity there that I can not put into words. Her hair had darkened into a palette of black on black with the sheen of a raven’s feathers. Her skin a light brown, as if her ancestors were blessed by the sun gods. Her eyes… Shone. It was as if the stars in the night sky had not retreated with the waning sun but instead relocated into a bed of espresso and found a new home in my existence.

“I am sorry.” I said. “I don’t know.”

“Breathe.” She whispered. “Do not think. Don’t remember. Let it all go, and be with me. Do not tell me, breathe life into the words. What are you reading.”

“Stories.” I finally admitted. “I am reading lives and experiences. I am reading realities that never existed and knowledge never gained. I am reading.”

Then she kissed me, and as our lips parted, I could feel the words she spoke. “Tell me more.”

So I did.

I told her about the warded man and his journey through loss and betrayal into the core. I told her about Locke Lamora and his crew, and when I got to Jean Tannen and his pain, she shed my tears. We laughed together at the follies of Mat and shared concern and relief as Rand found his purpose. We gushed over the words of artists like Rothfuss and Brett and Dumas and Poe, rolled our eyes at pages and pages of Tolkein’s trees while losing ourselves in the admiration of the world that he created, and when we were done talking, she lay her head back on my chest, her heartbeat mirroring my own.

I had found my peace. I could breathe once more. Nothing could ruin this moment. Well… nothing but four simple words.

“What are you writing?” She whispered.

“I don’t know.”

“Then you have to go.”

There was no fading out, no flash of light or jolt, no sharp noise. I just woke up. I could hear the rain beyond the fan in my window behind me. My walls were solid once again, and my room was dark. Through the windows, the stars once again took their rightful place in the night sky, and it all seemed so underwhelming. I stuck out my arm, and felt my laptop in the space in my bed that now seemed so empty. It was only 4:00 AM, but I knew I was not going to go back to sleep.

“What AM I writing?” I asked myself. It was time to pick up the metaphorical pen once again, time for me to find the words that I had been neglecting in the dark recesses of my mind.

Page 1, Paragraph 1…. I had a dream last night…