Past

Last night I had one of my 'Soap Opera' dreams. The kind where you wake up several times, then go back to sleep, and the story continues with a new episode of an endless story.

In the dream, I'm a teenager at college. Hundreds of students are gathered in a large audatorium, for some kind of 'talent night'. One of the acts is a young fellow singing to backing tapes.

He's singing one of my songs. It's 'Let It Be', which I wrote for and about D. I generally say it's the only sincere song I've ever written - about being completely in love while knowing the relationship can't work. It's a disco/rave version of my ballad.

I meet a boy in the crowd. He's probably sightly younger than me. He's small and frail looking, bitter and resentful about being bullied by his peers.

Although I'm not much more sorted in my mind that he is in his, I take him under my wing. All I can do is listen, give what little advice I can drag from my limited experience, and hug him close.

I get to know his family. They're a crowded group of ground-down working class folk - decent but weary. They guardedly accept me as friend and awkward mentor for the boy.

Then I lose him. After carrying him back from somewhere to his family, carrying him like a sleeping child, I find that what I've been carrying home isn't him at all. It's a collection of small mysterious objects.

Years later, we meet again by accident, but somehow we're the same age as before. We renew our friendship. Again, the only things I can do to make his life more bearable are listen, talk, and hold him.

Then, while randomly reading other people's weblogs, I find one from his boyfriend. He never mentioned that he had one. It describes him as shallow, manipulative and a liar. I'm shocked and don't know whether to confront my nameless friend with what I found.

Then I woke up, and couldn't get back to sleep.