She sits curled in the arms of the man she loves. He's unconventional, not someone you might presume to love, but never the less she does….strange how that feeling seems to her to be so positive and certain at that moment. It is a hazy feeling but strong and right. Yes, it just feels right to her as she lies there warm and safe in the arms of that man with the rest of the world in a blurry haze around them. Love, nothing else fills her head, no other feeling is felt but love in that moment, that warm blissful moment.
She speaks but no sound is made from her lips, this doesn't bother her though because she knows he has heard her anyway.
"Do you love me?" she asks.
"What is the one thing you hate most in the world?" he replies.
She replies instantly. "Liars."
"Then don't ask me that question again."
"Why?"
"Because, I will only lie to you."
She turns to look at him but he is faceless, his features are there but for some reason her eyes cannot see them. He is the one. The one she must have to complete herself, the one that she needs to continue living, the one who can never love her back. As his face comes into focus the world around her starts slipping away as a bright, harsh light fights through the warm cocoon of her dream-world and forces her to face the real one. As Catherine wakes she fells the dream slipping away, she tries desperately to cling onto those last precious moments of it but it is already too late.
She opens her eyes as the last waves of euphoric love wash over her; a deep, primal and desperate feeling as her brain tries feverishly to recall all the particulars of the dream. But all too soon she realises she is in bed, the curtains of room are opened slightly letting in that odious morning light and that the dream, once so vivid and real is slipping away, quietly disappearing for another night.
Her busy life style was so often a problem. She never seemed to have time to think or breathe. Moving out of London had been a mistake, she realised this now. The US was so vastly different from England. Everything was bigger, bolder…she hated its insincerity. She hadn't felt as though she had lived in the city, more like time had simply slipped away from her over the past 2 years.
She emerged from the subway car and joined the throngs of people shuffling slowly to the street exit. She walked with her head held down as she always did. She hated the dim strip lighting and the musty smell of the station. She hated how the exit seemed to glow with daylight; it burned the back of her eyes, made them ache. She had taken this same journey everyday for the past two years, she knew exactly what to expect, so much so that she had stopped looking around her. But today there was something different.
She had woken this morning with that feeling again, the intense, overwhelming feeling of love. It was hard to describe. She wished she could recall what she had been dreaming about that had elicited such a penetrating emotional response from her but the more she tried to think about it the more the details slipped away. This was not the first time she had woken to such extreme emotions, however, today the feeling stayed with her. Usually it had been forgotten before she had left the house or finished her morning coffee but today it was with her as she walked, with her as she crossed the street, with her as she entered the subway station.
It was there now, as intense as when she had first awakened this morning. The feeling she had was strong, almost palpable, it increased as she had descended the stairs and was almost tangible when she stepped into the station proper. She felt as though she could lift her hand and touch that feeling, feel it under her fingers, grasp it and never let go. Something about the monotony had changed, or perhaps was about to change. She stopped walking, she stood at the bottom of the station stairs- at the gateway between the living world and the under-world. She lifted her eyes from the station floor and looked straight ahead into the bustling crowd of the underground. That's when she saw him.