The shower was refreshingly hot, it awakened the sleepy parts of my mind and body. I stepped gingerly onto the cold grey tile of the bathroom floor and toweled myself off. Wrapping my hair up in a towel and another around my body, I wander back into the kitchen to grab another cup of hot tea. Sipping it slowly so I wouldn’t scald my tongue, I thought about the dreams I had been having lately. They were really beautiful in color and I could almost feel the textures. I could hear the sounds. It was almost as if I were there, in person. I just have never been to any of these places or seen them anywhere. So vibrant and wonderful, and yet so intense and almost scary.

I set my empty cup in the sink, and went to get dressed for work. After throwing myself into a pair of jeans and a tee shirt, I slipped on a pair of tennis shoes, the bathroom was my next stop to run a brush through my wet hair, and then headed for the door. I grabbed my purse and keys off the counter, I opened the door, and there you were. Standing there, looking at me with those sky blue eyes. I stopped dead in my tracks, this wasn’t possible! You were gone, out of my life for over a year now. How? They said there was no way, you wouldn’t have made it alive. The rain, the waves, the sharks in the area…..

You smiled at me. I felt as though my blood ran cold. I got light headed, my pulse quickened. I had to be dreaming. You just stood there, and stared at me. “Well, aren’t you going to say hello?” The words seemed to hit me like bricks. I sat down right there in the doorway, Buster skitzed, and ran for the bedroom.

“Am I dreaming again? This can’t be real, we had a funeral, they said you would never had made it to shore, not against the currents and the sharks that were drawn to the scene…” The words rushed from my mouth, then my breathing began to speed up, and then I started to cry.

He took my hands, pulled me from the floor, and into a tight embrace. He held me as I sobbed. He walked me over to the couch, and had me sit down.

“I want to tell you everything, but first you need to calm down, call work, tell them you won’t be in. Then we will sit here and have a talk.” He looked at me with those sky blue eyes, and I immediately began to calm down. My sobbing slowed. I grabbed the cell phone out of my pocket and called the boss. Told her that I wasn’t feeling well, and would not be in.

I turned my complete attention to the man beside me on the couch. The man I thought had died a year ago in a ferry crash a lifetime away from where I am now. I had finally gotten past it all. Here it was again to haunt me…this time it wasn’t a dream.

(to be continued)