I think little P made an appearance last night in a dream. Well I’m pretty sure she did. I wasn’t sure of what she wanted though. Maybe a hug? Maybe I was scared of her. Maybe I don’t completely buy into the idea of an inner child or children (for myself). Maybe I’m scared of her.
So I wrote the dream. And a secondary question, I wonder why someone who is dead keeps coming back to life in my dreams? He’s not particularly scary in my dreams when it turns out he’s still alive. What bugs me is that she has kept it – his not being dead - secret from me. Secrets drive me potty. There were secrets littering my childhood. Maybe that’s behind the screwy pattern-recognition, the conspiracy theorising (whether for bad or good intentions)? Here’s the dream, (reality in brackets).
I have the keys to my parents’ houses. (In reality I do have this bunch of keys: an old key to my father’s house which is now useless – he changed the locks years ago, and is now selling the house: and a key to my mother’s house which she gave me some years ago, before my step-father died. I don’t know if she has changed the locks since she gave me that key and I have never used the key.)
I’m in a car, alone. I look at the keys and decide to drive to her house. I think she’s not at home. I have a feeling I’m going there to look for things, solve something. As I drive on a country road, a woman in an oncoming car overtakes the car in front of her, forcing me to brake and swerve out of her way. As she passes I see she is laughing, not afraid. This annoys me. I don’t know this woman and she seems a bit barmy.
The house I’m going to is the house where I lived and which they sold soon after I left. (This is not the house I really have the key to. I never had a key to the old house. When I asked for one, he said “what do you need a key for? We’re always here.”)
I’m in the old house. It’s evening. I’m in their bedroom. I hear a car arrive outside. It must be them, this is a remote place. I think “they’ll see my car outside, they’ll know I’m here, where did I put the car?” but then I decide they won’t see it for some reason, what reason I don’t know, but I get the feeling it doesn’t matter. (They don’t see me or anything to do with me?)
I hear the door opening. I decide to hide by getting into their bed, getting into my mother’s side. She comes into the room, putting things down, normal. She doesn’t see me. Then he appears around the door, talking to her as she does things. I get out of bed quickly and stand.
He’s supposed to be dead! She’s shocked to see me. I start getting angry. I ask what’s going on, he’s alive, look, you can’t hide this now, he’s supposed to dead, what happened and why? And why don’t I know? She doesn’t speak, looks shameful, looks down at the floor. I go over to him, he looks sort of embarrassed, I poke his woollen jumper hard on his arm, prod him a few times, feeling the jumper, feeling the arm beneath, it’s real alright. Look I say to her, he’s alive, what’s this all about?
He turns his head, he won’t answer. I turn to her fully and start to fire questions. She’s backing up against the wall, although I don’t touch her. I won’t hurt her. She won’t ever meet my eye. Who knows about this, I want to know. She says that X knows, X saw him when they left hospital and then helped them by giving them a lift home. (X is a possible borderline who used to work for me, nothing to do with my parents.) I’m betrayed and angry and shocked by this. I’m always the last to know?
What else don’t I know, I ask. What other secrets are there? You better tell me now! They don’t speak, but it’s lighter now, light coming through the window. I turn from them towards the window and the door of their wardrobe opens. A small, maybe five years old, girl child steps out onto the carpet and looks at me. Her eyes beam into me. Dark eyes, unhappy eyes. I feel slightly frightened by this little girl’s eyes, which are clouded, watery, indistinct; but I feel very sad for her too. I wake up.
(What time is it? Reality, it’s 3am. I lie awake thinking about the dream. Yet another dream where he’s supposed to dead but he’s alive and I’ve been duped. Why do I keep dreaming he’s alive? Do I think he’s alive in her? Do I really think it was her behind it all and he was her puppet? That’s what my unconscious thinks maybe. I imagine I got in her side of the bed because she would have switched sides. She’d be sleeping on his side now. Like her wearing his ring, as she does. Then the blackbird starts to sing outside, oh no, not the dawn, this will keep me awake. What time is it? 4.10 am. I go to sleep.)