Without Him
Posted on February 12, 2008
Filed Under fiction, milestones, writing, epiphanies |
She used to have sexual dreams of carnal lust and physical satisfactions but now she just dreams of being held. He is taller than her, the man who comes to her in sleep. Her face is always pressed to his chest while he wraps his arms around her. He kisses the top of her head and her stomach aches with the feeling of it - something long wanted finally fulfilled.
She would gladly die like that, there in the stranger’s arms but then she wakes and is very much alive and sick with wanting to slip back into the dream with the faceless man. She can never quite recall the exact words he has spoken, she can’t quite identify the voice that has inspired such a flood of relief. But she imagines he must be saying something like I am here now.
Before sleep, she is never wholly aware of feeling dissatisfied or fragile, but now, at first light, it is all so completely wrong without him. She practically writhes with the indignity of it -this desire for completion - so un-progressive, so solidly antiquated an idea.
She phones her friend Kate to speak of the dream. She feels driven to talk about the mysterious man whose embrace she misses. Kate says, matter of fact and certain, “Well, I’ll be damned. You’ve finally found your own version of God.” And the woman with the dream begins to weep softly with disappointment.
(Painting by Deborah Howard, a website featuring her work can be found here.)
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