She dreamed about him twice—this man she had met three times—and only in brief, transactional passing. Both dreams were so real and vivid that upon waking, she willed herself back into the dream, reaching out her hand like the girl in that iconic ’80s music video—the one where the boy pulls her into the comic book.
She went about her life, the dreams fading into the tapestry of her days, and soon, she had completely forgotten about the dreams (and the man).
Until he showed up in the dark of night again. In this dream, he walked into her office—looking shaggy and unkempt—playing the role of an IT support person. She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror above her desk and was troubled that she, too, looked shaggy and unkempt. He entered her cubicle (being a family therapist, she had never worked in a cubicle) and took her keyboard against her will and protests. She recognized him instantly but felt no compulsion to reach for his hand and jump into a comic book.
In the next scene, she and her colleagues (none of whom she had ever worked with) were beering it up in a musty tavern, sitting on uncomfortable benches at a twelve-foot-long reclaimed wood table. The man—still shaggy, but less unkempt, and still wearing his IT support emblazoned shirt—squeezed onto the bench between Morris and Hank (whoever they were) and leaned around Hank (the man’s shaggy hair skirting the top of Hank’s pint glass) so that he could look into her eyes and profess his love.
She was horrified that her husband might see the lovelorn, smitten stupidity in the man’s eyes. Then she remembered that she didn’t have a husband in real life. In fact, she never had a husband and didn’t really want one. All she wanted was her keyboard.