I just had a camp dream with non-camp people.  My boyfriends from home had names like Eric, Brian, and Joe.  They’d write me letters saying they loved and missed me.  Could I call them?  When would I be back?  I don’t think I’ve ever dated a Brian.

Phil was my camp boyfriend.  In my dream, his sister was named Wendy, and she had blond hair and wore orange tennis shorts.  Philip and I had some kind of fight.  It’s unclear about what exactly, but then his sister began to physically attack me, while he watched.  He just left the room and let her hit me.  In real life Phil always defends me.  This would never happen. 

Time goes by.  Days I think.  And he hasn’t reached out to fix things.  I know he’s in the wrong, but I miss him and want everything to go back to the way it had been, with him loving me again.  Holding hands.  Laughing.  Kissing, his nervous hands around my waist.  But how can I be the one to apologize?  I’ve done nothing wrong.  So I have to pretend that I’m happy and fine now, act like I don’t care.  Because if I show him I’m hurt and ache for him, he’ll want me less.  That’s what we’re told, and somewhere inside we know it’s right, but it still feels wrong.  I emerge from my cabin, determined to find him, but to act as if I don’t see him.  I just need him to see that I’m happy and fine without him.  I need to act.  This is what I hated most about dating: forcing myself to act exactly counter to how I really felt.  Play it cool.  I’m horrible at playing it cool.  When Phil does it, he’s not playing.  He has a valve and can turn his feelings off.  In real life, even, his sister has said it to me.  She fears that one day, he’ll just cut her out of his life if she does the wrong thing.  He’s capable of it.  This is what I dreamt.

There was a camp-wide apache relay going on.  Since I was a senior counselor, I was able to move throughout campus without a designated post.  I remember clapping for Ruthie as she spun with her head on the handle of a bat.  “Dizzy Lizzy.”  Then she had to run and pass the baton.  I never found Phil, but I knew he didn’t want to see me.  I hadn’t done anything wrong, certainly nothing to warrant his cutting me off completely. 

Next thing I know, we’re no longer at camp.  I’m in Phil’s sister’s apartment, his real sister, not the blond in tennis shorts.  She acts, at first, as if she doesn’t know we’ve split apart.  She’s warm to me, and I know she’ll always be warm to me, no matter what happens.  We talk about her daughter and her health, and then she says she knows.  I want to make her call him, convince him he’s making a mistake.  And in real life I know this feeling.  You’ve broken up, but you’re sure a phone call from your friend, or father, or one of their friends, or their mother, will convince them they’re making a mistake.  You’re sure someone else can talk them into you.  I feel desperate for him, and I hate who I’ve become: this crazed frantic woman who thinks she’ll stop living without him.  But it’s who I am, and even in my head, I know it’s all wrong, but I can’t act my way into believing something else.  They tell you “believing follows behavior.”  It’s why when you force yourself to smile, you’ll eventually feel better.  Your brain will say, “hey I’m smiling (behavior), so I must be happy (belief).”  If I force myself through the motions, I will feel better, in time.  And it all just sucks. 

I tell her he’s cut me off, and she tells me she has warned me he can be like this.  I think of grabbing her cell phone and calling him.  He’d pick up if he saw it was her, especially now that he’s no longer swept up in a relationship.  But it would be me.  What would I say?  “We have twins on the way.  Don’t you love me anymore?”  But in my dream, I realize he’ll still be their father.  He knows this.  He just doesn’t love me anymore, and it’s too late.  He’s turned a switch and won’t go back to loving me. 

I then wake up crying.  Phil comes into the room, after I summon him there, and I ask him for a hug.  “I’ve never seen anyone cry after a dream,” he said.  And I sob, crying into him.  I would hate to ever lose him.