I was completely naked, wrapped in his white duvet and twisted in the corner of his bed. He was sitting in the armchair which was placed at the other side of the bedroom, near the door. The TV was on, playing some weird jokes in English.
Suddenly, his wife came in, staring at me, speechless from rage, and her thin little figure started to tremble. She screamed out and slammed the door heavily behind her.
With the help of the noise, I came back to consciousness and tried to search around for my clothes. I still couldn't remember why I was here, wrapped tightly in his duvet without a piece of clothing. Shamed! There was nothing I could even put on for now, but the white thick duvet. He sat there quietly, with a cigarette in his beautiful fingers. He used to say those fingers would fit very well for playing pianos; however, the only instrument he got access to in childhood was a Chinese ‘erhu’. “What a waste!” Ten years ago, he kept on telling me how he couldn't stop admiring the beauty of his fingers! Which reminded me of the character of Dongfangbubai in the famous novel" Xiaoaojianghu" of master Jinyong.
Now, his long limbs and the small pink armchair matched each other in a quite weird way and, in some way, he looked like an alien in the environment of his own home.
To my surprise, he didn't follow his wife out and even had no desire to explain to her about the reality; after all, he hadn't betrayed his wife and we hadn't done anything at all.
In the dream, I lived in a rural area near his home with my daughter. There was a small river flowing in front of my hut and, in the season of autumn, some birds were flying to the south. When they were tired, they just stopped by and got a bit of grass and water from the river. It seems we were having a holiday there and waiting for my husband to come back and join us from Europe, though he was always busy, yes, very busy. I threw myself into the Chinese way of indulgence and was completely drunk when I had just planned to hang out with some female friends in the local pub. Yes, totally drunk and I started to throw up out everything out from my stomach, including the missing of my partner, my cat, several true friends from Sweden and worries about the uncertainty of the future. Then Roger came into the pub and persuaded my female friends that he would take charge of me as he was an old and reliable friend from our college years.
“Morning!” Roger looked at me and said my clothes would be ready in just a couple of minutes. I said thanks, with a shy and awkward smile on my face. Even though he was the one ten years ago, I still felt very uncomfortable to be totally naked in front of him. He was dear in my remote memories, but quite far away from my real life ten years later. I think that most of the cells in my body would have been completely different from the old days, so scientifically speaking, physically, we were strangers to each other now.
The next day, when I was sleeping, with the sound of the wind and also the twittering of birds in the background, I woke up and heard someone knocking at the door of my holiday home. I opened the door, and it was Roger’s mother who died nine years ago. I am sure, it was her, though I had met her only once when I was still a college girl. When I was still humble and a bit chubby, a completely ugly duck in her eyes. Without much self-confidence, I agreed with her that I was not pretty at all, while her son definitely deserve someone better. Though I did get hint from other boys now and then, it was still not enough to make up my uncertainty about my value. Poor young me! Roger’s mother, the mother of my first boyfriend, was an elegant and beautiful lady, waiting for a perfect girl to match her dearest son. However, I was definitely not the one. At this moment, she was there, in my eyesight, still elegant, but looking much older and paler. She said nothing, just looked into my eyes, and I noticed some kind of anxiety in her eyes, but maybe difficult to express to me. Then her figure became blurred, then totally disappeared into the darkness.
I woke up from the dream, my husband, my cat and my lovely daughter were all sleeping soundly in the bed, and it was only five o’clock am in Swedish time.
In the bathroom, looking into the mirror, I heard some whispering: darling girl, get rid of the cage, even the people, the scars had been part of you and did enrich your life. So what? Chin up! Stop wasting on the parallel track which hardly has any intersection with yours now. Just say goodbye to the past, like whispering to the faded roses on your balcony. By doing so, you can stay calm and at ease with those old yet dearest memories, and then be able to embrace the new lives appear in your real new world with a “hi” instead of a “sigh.”
I washed my face, saw a smile on that young girl and she was radiant in the mirror, like a White Swan breaking from the little 'ugly duck'.
Outside, a new morning sun is shining on the new buds of the roses in the garden. Lives are growing again, on the earth, in my heart...
Beautiful bird 2:10 am Oct 11th, 2017
At corridor B27 of Linköping University
Corrected on March 18th, in Edinburgh
