a/n this takes place 8 years after our current time

She had fulfilled the dream. She had graduated from school, top of her class. She was offered an incredible job at a paper in Boston when she finished school, and was now one of the top journalists in the country. She had married her high school boyfriend the summer she graduated, and they had just celebrated their third anniversary. Every told her she lead a storybook life: great job, loving husband, supportive family. She knew she what she had was good, great really, but she also knew that no matter what she told others and herself, she wasn't happy. She didn't know why.

She woke up in the every night, in the middle of the night, struggling to breath. She dreamt that she was drowning, but she didn't know why. It was her only dream. She watched other people at the office sometimes, mostly the young ones, who still were on no discernable path. They told her all the time how envious they were of her life, but sometimes when they told her different stories of their lives, she felt envious of their carefree ways. She loved her job, she loved her family, but sometimes she felt like they all expected so much of her, and she had so much responsibility on her shoulders, she felt like she was going to break in half, or down. She felt like she wasn't an individual, more a sum total of random expectations, lumped together to form the being which was her. She felt no sense of herself. Felt no desires, no true goals of her own, had no dreams, but the one of drowning.

She was so young but knew so little of life. she was 25, had had one boyfriend, one career focus. The more she thought about it, the more she saw how little variety of her choosing there was in her life. she had followed almost every rule, did almost everything she was told, followed everyone's expectations of her.

One night after waking up, unable to breath, she went into the spare bedroom of the apartment. She went to the closet and took out one of her boxes. It was filled with old things of hers, papers, cards, journals, things like that. She picked out an old journal of hers from when she was 10. She opened a random page and began reading.

Feb., 13, 1995

Dear journal,

Today I won first prize in an essay contest at school. When I told mom she got so excited. It wasn't that the news was highly unexpected. I've already won lots of writing contests. But mom seems to think that this means I'm destined to write. I know I'm pretty good, but I don't know if it's what I want to do or not. Mom has it in her head that I'm going to go to Harvard and be a world class journalists. I suppose that would be okay.

She closed the journal. She didn't remember that. It was weird to read that. She had thought that she had always wanted to be a journalist. She had always thought it was her idea to go to an ivy league school. It had always been her idea, her dream. Or was it. The thought popped in out of nowhere. She felt a sense of deja vu. She put the journal down and looked through the box some more she found an old card she couldn't remember reading. She read it and suddenly everything all fit into place. All her frustration, all her envy, all her loss of individuality, all her dreams of drowning. The last line of the card was Individuality is freedom lived. Live. That struck her like lighting. She wasn't living, she wasn't free.

With that realization, more conversations poured into her head. She saw more and more times when her dreams were given up for the dream of an other. she cried as she finally saw the web which trapped her, the web that the others had seen, but she ad failed to recognize. She cried and cried as the truth became more evident. Her life was crumbling down on her and there was nothing she could do.

She ran out of the apartment got in her car and drove to her mothers house. When she got there she let her self in and called out for her mother. Her mother came running down the stairs, her husband at her heels. When the mother got down, all she saw was her daughter, standing there in pyjamas, her face red, tears pouring down her cheeks.

-"What's wrong, what happened, is everything okay?" the mother said.-

-"No, nothing's alright. Why did you do this to me." she said

-"Do what?" the mother said.

-"Suffocate me, fill with your dream, never letting me find my own!" she said

-"I don't understand," said the mother "calm down and please explain what you're accusing me of." The husband tactfully decided now would be a good time for a walk.

-"My whole life has been your dream. Everything I've done since I was a child has ben to fulfill your dream. I gave up dreaming for myself to make you happy, and now I'm suffering for that." she said

-"What are you saying?" said the mother

-"I'm saying I'm not happy and it's my fault, because I lived to make you happy, to make everyone else happy, and to live up to everyone's expectations." she said. She fell on to the floor and cried into her arms. The mother sat down beside her, cradling her in her arms, like a baby. She cried into her mothers arms until she fell asleep. The husband came home and carried her into her old bedroom. When she woke up in the morning no one was home. There was fresh coffee brewed though and a note beside the coffee maker.

I know I don't need to ask for your forgiveness. Your heart is so big and you're so loving. I am apologizing though. I never knew. That's the only reason I pushed so hard. You could have come to me. I'm not trying to put the blame on you at all, I take full responsibility. I never wanted you to be unhappy. Everything I hoped for was to make you happy not sad. I dreamed for, I know, and I pulled you into my dream and I was wrong, and I am so sorry for making you feel like you had to live to please me, but if you didn't want something, you should have told me. I would have rather I be unhappy for that moment, than you for the rest of your life. Whatever you want to do from this moment on, I want you to know that you will have my love in support for everything.

Yours etc.

She cried again after reading the note. But they were tears of joy. She felt like a new person when she walked out of the house that morning. For the first time she felt free. She knew that she would have to explain to her husband. She felt sorry about what she knew she would do, but to stay with him would be unfair to both him and herself. When she got home she told him what had happened and then quietly asked him to give her a divorce.

He loved her. Her would give anything to make her happy. When she walked in that morning he saw she had changed. He saw the look in her eyes. For the first time in her life he saw true happiness, something he had been trying to give her since the first time they met. When she asked him for the divorce he knew that to try and keep her would be a trap. He wanted her to be free.

She moved out the next day. Awhile ago she had been given a job offer in New York and she accepted it. She got an apartment and began the process of settling into her new life. Waking up every day was joyful to her, because it meant another day of life, another day of freedom. She now fully understood what it felt like to be free. It was as though a huge weight had been lifted from her shoulders. Her nightmare stopped, and for the first time in a long time she dreamt her own dreams.