Two for One

A little after 3AM, I jolted out of a blinding, stone heart puncher of a nightmare.

The Amazing Bob was in hospital and close to his end. At the very same time, I was home with him. He was fine and wonderfully healthy but, while flesh and blood, not actually real. A clone or solid state apparition to keep me company?

TAB was in both places at once.

Clone/Ghost-TAB was showing me some crazy new phone he’d bought. In real life, he despised tinyphones and that was mostly true in Dream World. This telefonino was different though. Not only had he found it all on his own (I 'd always been the tech buyer for us), it had all sorts of cool, easy to grok Star Trekian features.

And then I got two phone calls, one right after the other. In the first, the hospital folk told me that Hospital-TAB was doing much, MUCH better. I shared the news with C/G-TAB. We knew this was a temp reprieve but were, of course, happy for it.

Then the second call chimed. The connection was awful – I could barely hear the nurse as she told me that the center of my universe was gone – over and out. I kept saying:

I can barely hear you. Can you call back? He’d been improving – how could he just be *BOOM* gone? 

There was no one on the other end of the line though. The call, but not the conveyed, devastating reality, had evaporated.

I turned to C/G-TAB and tried to tell him that H-TAB had died but I couldn't get the words out. I collapsed on the floor, choking on the news. C/G-TAB already knew – he was sad but at peace with the news. Would he now vanish?

Before I could see if C/G-TAB would continue to exist, the dream horror cannoned me free, releasing me into heart racing Wakey-Wakey Land.

Right then, Coco zoomed into the room. It was as though, like Lassie and Timmy, she sensed that I’d just come from Horror-Showville, was rockin’ the serious agitata and needed her tranquilizing purrs. Good kitten.

More potential calming action comes in just a little while. At eight, I’ll head to the Y for my first Water Tai Chi class. I don’t rilly know what to expect though I’ve looked at a few youtube vids. Chilling the fuck out, moving slow and easy, not pressuring myself is gonna take some serious magic. The water has it though. I’m pretty damn sure of that.