3. Chapter Three
CHAPTER THREE
MAVEN
Venice. That’s where I’ve ended up tonight.
Not the Venice of selfie sticks and tourist crowds, but the one of my imagination—caressed by dawn, the lagoon water still as glass.
Buildings rise from the mist in shades of faded terracotta and sun-bleached yellow, their reflections steady beneath stone bridges that arch over unused canals.
This is how my dreams always start now. A place I’ve never been but always wanted to see—places I’ve pinned on apps, images I scroll through when my mind becomes too heavy.
Last night it was the Scottish Highlands; before that, a deserted beach in Thailand with limestone cliffs rising from impossibly turquoise water.
I shift to stroll across an empty piazza before noticing the dress draped over my body.
Pink like the sky, long with its arms wrapped around my neck as it hangs low across my back.
This is one thing that never changes in my dreams: the dress.
It’s not something I would have chosen for myself, but it makes me feel almost pretty.
Like the fabric was stitched together with my image in mind; like the one who chose it wanted to be sure that every dip and curve of the dress would worship each line of my body.
This is the moment when it always shifts; the moment I realize these dreams aren’t truly me, but the me as seen from another’s eyes.
I bet if I peered into a mirror, my hair would be luscious and full, not dull and flat.
My eyes would brighten the surroundings, encapsulating a beauty they’ve never possessed.
Whoever creates these dreams—whoever he is—sees me as someone worthy.
A beautiful entity who should be dressed in pretty things and taken to pretty places.
And now I’m…heavy. Lonely? Sad? Whatever it is creeps in like thick fog, rolling off the water to wrap around my ankles, climbing higher until it fills my lungs and swirls through my skull.
It’s a familiar feeling, this hollow, yet dense, ache—the same one I’ve carried for the last twenty-seven years of my life.
At least it’s duller in my dreams, less concentrated, as if the man that brings me here wants to spare me from the worst of my existence.
It’s strange how much I hate this feeling when I spend most of my waking hours avoiding people. I don’t want company, or the arduous dance of connection, yet the absence of companionship, or something, claws at me.
Maybe that’s why I move from big city to big city. Places where I’m surrounded by humanity without having to engage with it.
I learned young that loneliness doesn’t require physical solitude; you can be plenty lonely in a crowd, but at least in the midst of people you can pretend you’re making a choice to be alone rather than facing the truth: that something about you repels others as much as it does yourself.
As the air thickens, I know what comes next. My heart beats faster, torn between wanting it and fearing it.
What is wrong with me? Eager for an illusion?
Something behind me stirs. Condenses. There’s a presence at my back, as tangible as the stone beneath my bare feet. I don’t turn around yet. No, I wait, the moment stretching as I savor the burden of being perceived.
When I finally adjust my direction, he’s there. Standing at the edge of the piazza, a dark silhouette against the pale Venetian stone. Each time I dream, his form is a little more clear and defined. As if he’s slowly emerging from fog, gaining substance with each visit.
Strange that my mind won’t allow me to see all of him yet. Is he some metaphor for the crazy spreading through my head? Not able to show himself in full until I’ve well and truly lost my mind? Or maybe this is the dissociation Dr. Voss spoke of…
Today, I can make out that he’s tall—taller than I am by at least a head—with broad shoulders that taper to a narrow waist. He wears a long black coat, the kind with lapels and a fitted waist that reminds me of the early 1900s.
His arms rest at his sides, fingers long and elegant.
Those things belong in leather gloves holding a cigar.
His posture is perfect: spine straight, shoulders squared.
And he possesses a stillness about him that no human being could maintain.
But his face…I still cannot see his face.
It’s covered by a white fabric that drapes from his head down over a shoulder, hiding his features completely.
Like a funeral shroud or a veil worn backward.
The fabric remains stiff in the breeze that stirs loose strands of my hair, hanging in the way I imagine beautifully carved marble would.
We stand in our respective spaces, facing each other across the empty square.
Neither moving. Neither speaking. Just watching.
Assessing. In the waking world, this kind of prolonged eye contact—or whatever you’d call this faceless staring contest—would make my skin crawl.
I’d be scanning for the nearest exit, calculating how quickly I could escape.
But in this version of my reality, I feel no urge to run. The itch of liberation is nowhere to be found.
The silence between us isn’t awkward or threatening, either. It’s comfortable…companionable, even. Like we’re sharing something precious without needing words to label it.
How many nights has he visited me now? I’m unsure, but each time is the same—a beautiful place, the creeping loneliness, his appearance, the silent communion. I’ve never tried to speak to him before. Never dared to break the contented spell with questions.
Tonight is different somehow. The air between us is charged and expectant. As if the dream itself is waiting for something to change.
I take one step. He doesn’t move or give any indication that he notices my approach, but I feel his attention sharpen through the heat on my skin, focus narrowing until I’m the only thing in his field of vision.
“Who are you?” The tenor of my voice is breathy, a dreamy quality that carries undertones and inflections I do not use in reality. Another way I’m portrayed as better here.
No answer. Not even a gesture to acknowledge I’ve spoken. Just that steady, faceless regard.
Two steps closer. Now only ten feet separate us. Why is the prospect of speaking to my dream manifestation scarier than the idea that I’m having strange hallucinations? “Are you the one leaving the flowers?” I snatch my bottom lip between aching teeth, searching for any signs of life.
Perhaps he is marble, because still no word or nod.
Then something shifts in his posture—a subtle tensing of both shoulders.
“Why do you keep coming back?” I ask, moving closer still. “What do you want from me?”
This time he does react, and I almost jolt. His head tilts the slightest amount. The white fabric shifts with this movement, though reveals nothing beneath.
Emboldened by this small response, I continue. “Are you…are you even real? Or just something my mind made up?”
I almost scream when he doesn’t answer.
A last step and I’m close enough now that I could touch him with little effort. I don’t. Something warns me that crossing that final boundary would change things in ways I’m not prepared for.
“Why won’t you speak to me?” I whisper, a soft plea in the words.
He shifts, and for a moment I think he might actually answer. The pounding in my blood grows with endless anticipation.
Then—
I wake with a gasp, bolting upright in bed. My heart hammers as it was in the dream, like its begging to escape, and sweat dries in beads along my forehead despite the chill of my apartment.
“It’s not real. It’s not real,” I repeat, doing what I can to ground my trembling limbs in reality.
My body doesn’t believe me, however. Because as my neck cranks my eyes to the nightstand, I’m forced to acknowledge that it is, in fact, real.
There, resting against the base of my lamp, is today’s offering.
A single red rose, its petals dried and curling in on themselves.
This one had been pressed and preserved at the exact moment of its fullest bloom.
It retains its deep ruby color, so dark it absorbs light rather than reflects it.
Like all others, the stem is missing, leaving just the blossom itself, perfect in its state. It’s almost poetic.
If he is real—if he can cross the barrier of my dreams to leave these tokens—then why me? What does he want? And why the dead flowers?
These questions plague my mind until sleep tugs at me once more. But the only question left as I drift away is whether he would visit twice in one night.