I had a dream. Sometimes they come true. It used to scare me, but never again. After all, I have experienced you, and I never withdrew. I don’t shrink and shrivel. It’s just what I do. Maybe I should have, would have saved me from the ghost I once claimed I knew.
In the dream we lived in a dormitory by each other, you were just down the hall, but every time you were supposed to meet me, there’d be these shiny mirrored walls between us. I had two minions, no three. They were like the Graeae, always informing me of your whereabouts. I kept seeing cracked mirrors, strewn about.
Every now and then I’d yell your name for naught. So I’d get louder, more like a shout. In this darkness, I just needed to find you and get out. I fear the darkness. I fear sleeping alone. My friends all know this, so I don’t. Someone is always home for me. Actually, no that’s not true. All of my friends showed up for me, except the ghost of you.
They all showed up. And I wondered, “Why was I fighting to show up for you?”
I came upon this mountain of rubble, all mirrors UNcracked. The Graeae said for me to climb and they pointed, “He’s just beyond that.”
I began to climb and cried a single tear and wiped it on my dress. I remember thinking, "My eyeliner has bled, I don’t want him to see me looking like this.” It never occurred to me to go back.
But then I was too tired, so I started punching the mirrors, crack by lightening crack. I could see blood crawling from my hands. But it was going the wrong way. It was running away and never coming back. I needed it to follow me, to surmount this with me. I begged the blood to stay. I would pass out without it, there’d be no other way.
I could see my blood’s reflection as it tried to run away, but it stopped and looked at me in the saddest of ways. “Oh sweet girl, we need to tell you this, but we don’t know how to say it?
Look at what you are smashing. No sight of him, but we see YOU. Why are your hurting yourself, for someone you have never seen? Are you even sure you KNEW him? Everything you are tearing to bits, it’s all you. Can you point this man out? So we can have proof? Because as far as we can see, it's just YOU hurting YOU!?”
I stopped.
Then looked at my sad expression...
I knew.
You never existed. There was never a you. If I have earned one "thing" in a decade it is that simple truth. You never were. There is a gift in there, somewhere.
I started to climb down the mirrored mountain. The three minions with one eye withdrew. The swamp that I never noticed, started to disappear and flowers began to bloom.
And my stomach started to swell, to about six months. With love. I went back to my room. Holding on to my growing belly, the darkness felt peaceful and whatever was there, was truth. I was so focused now on what was inside me, and not engrossed in an external search for something untrue.
And my door slowly opened, as I lie in bed. My true love came in and lied beside me, worried and said. "I was looking for you in the dark, I could hear you crying."
I promised him, “No love, no. That was one single tear and it’s done. Give me your hand, hold it right here, I am swollen with your son.”
I remember smiling and I wasn’t afraid. I was so grateful for true love and this moment in space. Something about the night, with true love, makes you never want to see the day. But the day always comes. It is patient and we are prey... unless we have faith. My love and I are eternal in that light.
He wrapped his arms around me. He wasn’t letting go. And then I opened my eyes, as the breeze came through our bedroom window. It was four in the morning, and birds of spring, that little choir outside was singing from a nest that was close, and just below, where we lay.
And his arm was still around me. I woke to true love. We made it to DAY light. There was no more fear of dark or light. Day or night, we were real. I slipped under his arm and climbed out of bed.
I walk to my office a floor below, thinking of his arms wrapped around me and the birds and the window. Just before I approached the office to open the door..."Wait I had a dream, why the heck was I climbing mirrors and chasing ghosts that never were?”
I could see, in the hallway mirror, my morning reflection, and before I turned the door nob, I came to this conclusion, sometimes life doesn’t want us to be happy, so it throws us a digression.
Don’t be fooled. True love doesn’t leave, it emits warmth and feeds. There is no prerequisite for bloodletting, true love doesn't want you to bleed. Love leads the way with its light. It shines. My apologies to the truth. It was so far out of my sight. Don’t get caught up in the cesspool and the drama of the night. Hold on tightly to that arm that holds you tight.
And if you can, say a prayer for love and truth, before you close your eyes tonight.
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