About a month ago, I started having really odd dreams. I generally have always been alone in my dreams (except for the occasional vampire and once I had an animated dream starring the Flintstones…okay, that wasodd, but really funny). Anyway, about a month ago, I started having dreams that were full of people that talked to me, whose hands I could touch and feel, who had faces that I could draw, well, if I could draw. They lived in houses and apartments that I could remember when I woke up – the furniture, the smell, the landscape from a window. They had babies whose clothes I could describe, with chubby cheeks I kissed, and small warm bodies I held. Suddenly, my dreams had animals, dogs, cats, whose fur was soft (and didn’t make me sneeze) and who came so close to my face I could feel their warm breath on my lips.

After a couple of weeks, I didn’t have any particularly weird dreams for a while, at least, none that I remember, but everyday life seemed to become a bit less ordinary and a lot more should I get some professional help?A couple of times I was driving and suddenly the asphalt seemed to be buckling and sending up ribbons of road. I panicked and blinked and all was normal. Must have been the wind blowing up debris, I said to myself. Sun glare must have made it look weird…

Little stupid things I chalked up to mid-life hormones addling my brain started happening. I’d wash my hands, turn to dry them on the towel and then hear water, turn around and the faucet was still running. Duh, I’d think, turning off the water. I’d go to my room and after dressing, hear something in the bathroom, go back…and the water was still running. I thought I turned it off, I’d think…turning it off again. Similarly, I’d find the refrigerator door open, a flame blazing on the stove, the front door wide open and unlocked, the car running in the garage. The joys of aging, I’d say to myself, shaking my head as I turned off the flame, shut and locked the door, turned off the ignition…again and again.

The turning point appears to have been yesterday (or was it last week?) when I really could not explain away the moment when I was walking in the supermarket and fell forward into my wagon because someone bumped into my back but when I turned around to accept an apology, I was the only one in the aisle. Clumsy me I said out loud …although there was nothing on the floor and I had not tripped over my own feet.

When I turned back to my cart,I was no longer in the supermarket, but rather walking on the sand towards what appeared to be a hotel, watching sun bathers shift shape so quickly I nearly screamed. I will not scream, I told myself. I will not draw attention to the fissure in my psyche. I am obviously losing my mind. I will figure this out.When I opened the door to the building, I entered my home. I looked behind me, and saw my street.

“Hey, sweetheart,” my husband said, coming to hug me at the door. He stopped at the entrance to the foyer. “Who the hell are you and what are you doing in my house?” he said, walking towards me menacingly.

“What?” I asked…confused until I heard my deep, masculine voice. I turned and ran.

I have been on the street since then. I think. I haven’t slept, or perhaps I have not awakened. I often wonder if I died in my sleep and this is my afterlife. If it is, I’m certain heaven was not my destination. But if it’s hell, it seems almost worse than the fire and brimstone of the stories of my youth. Eternal…what? As the world beneath my feet shifts place – or is it time? – so too everything and everyone around me. I am surrounded by people who have become a multiplicity of beings, their faces ceasing to be recognizable as features are barely visible before they begin to melt into the features of another. It’s the stuff of horror movies or nightmares from which you awaken in a cold sweat, but try as I might, I can’t leave the theatre or pinch myself awake. I asked someone to pinch me not long ago, thinking I had to be dreaming. He did. It hurt.

I grew up with this girl. I admired her for being able to talk and make friends with no problem. She was everything I wasn’t. She was everything I wished I could be.

Later on in life, I found myself missing her. After years of feeling like I was justified in ending our friendship, upon reflection, that justification gradually began to slip away, little by little, and I started to regret how I used to be. I used to push her away constantly. Even then, she still spent time with me. I didn’t even have the courage to tell her face-to-face that I didn’t want to be her friend anymore. I ended our friendship over the internet, back when instant-messaging was still a thing. My brother, who was friends with her brother, told me that she cried after that. I made her cry. Because of my own selfishness.

At one point, I arranged to meet up with her to get closure on shit that didn’t matter and on a whim, I tried to revive that friendship, but to no avail. I have no one to blame but myself. I had convinced myself that we were too different. But that wasn’t true. We played dolls together. We watched movies and TV shows together. We danced together. I just didn’t make the effort to try and connect with her about those interests. Even so, she watched my favorite show Sailor Moon with me. One time, I stood on her porch with a book about the Japanese language and she asked if she could see it, but I denied her, childishly possessive of an interest I wanted to belong to me and only me.

If I could go back in time, I’d know better than to shut her out. I’d know better than to be so selfish. I’d speak with her about American Idol and The Notebook and all of the other stuff we watched. I’d actually make the effort to connect with her. If I could do that, I’d imagine that we’d still be friends now, or maybe more.

Maybe the years of dreams I’ve had of her would be realized. We’d be together, kissing in bed, kissing in the pool. She’d only want to experiment with me at first, not displaying too much emotional interest. Subconsciously, I believe that this is my way of punishing myself for how much I used to take her for granted. I’d have to be there for her and support her over many dreams before she even started having feelings for me. I’d learn that her parents were homophobic. My parents would know that we were together, but they wouldn’t approve because they don’t like her. Against all odds, we’d see each other in secret. We’d grow closer and closer. She’d finally return my feelings and back me up against the wall, kissing me with a passion I’ve been longing for.

The story is bound to continue so long as I still harbor these feelings for her. I know that dreams are born from fear and desire, but I can’t help but wish that these dreams I’m having are bits and pieces of a life I lead in an alternate universe where I never stopped being her friend. That may just be wishful thinking on my part, but I find it to be a comforting thought to know that there’s a me out there in another world who hasn’t made the same mistakes I’ve made.