A Recurring Dream

Anna’s Obsession

Last night I revisited an ancient mansion again. In my chain of dreams, I moved into this mansion. At first, it was only the front door, a dining room, a kitchen, and another big room off the living room that had been used to rent beds, I guess – there were like six or more beds in this room. There were also two regular bedrooms, a small bathroom and a back porch off the kitchen. 

In that bed renting room, there was another door to another section of the house, but it was locked. I could go out a sliding glass door, walk through a big flowerbed, and see into that other section. That sliding glass door was locked too.

At some point, I must have found a key to that door because I had to go upstairs to rescue a girl who went after some doll up there but didn’t come down. 

In another installment, a guy decided he wanted to live in one of those rooms upstairs, but then he just vanished. I don’t know what happened to him. He either left or the house ate him. 

Last night, apparently, I’d civilized the first and second floor, and now there were two boys, maybe four and five, or somewhere close. There was also a boyfriend. I got no sense that he was anything closer than that. 

I was cleaning this long narrow bathroom and I thought a little shelf under that window on that end would be perfect. I had this enormous house to explore, so I thought I go up and see what was in the offing. At the door to the next floor, the lights didn’t work, and the youngest boy got scared. It was still day, so there was plenty of light, but there was lots of shadows and mysterious shapes. As I made my way up to the next floor up, I noticed that the other boy had followed me. I chewed him out for leaving his brother alone and probably scared, so I sent him back.

I assume they went on back down to their normal parts of the house and came across the boyfriend – maybe he was their father – I don’t know. 

In the meantime, I found this perfect little cabinet. I’d pictured a small bookshelf, but this had drawers, and it was the perfect size. It had a smaller cabinet on top of it, rather like a buffet, but much smaller. The topper had small drawers too. As I went through those drawers, I discovered that this cabinet had been someone’s sewing cabinet. That unknown woman from away back had probably been rich, considering the house, she was. These sewing things were exotic, top of the line, things, and some of them I couldn’t even identify. I was carefully emptying those drawers, placing most of the things on a bed and the liquid items on the bedside table. I didn’t want to risk something leaking and staining that spread. The smaller part, I’d already set aside. The left-behind dust mark was obvious, but it would wash away easily. 

The boyfriend found me as I was unloading the stuff. “What are you doing up here? I want you back downstairs right now.”

“Okay,” I said. “I’m almost done. I’ll be down in a few.”

He pulled the cabinet out of my reach and looked in a drawer. “What is all this junk?”

“Sewing things. This is so cool. I’m going to put this in the long bathroom.”

“How are you going to move this by yourself?” He pulled a drawer all the way out, I was afraid he’d break it, but he just dropped it on the floor. Some contents bounced out.

“It’s not that heavy,” I said. I didn’t think it would be very hard at all to get it down the stairs. One step at a time. I hadn’t planned on getting any help and didn’t think I needed any. 

“I want you down stairs now,” he said and left.

“I’ll be down in a few minutes,” I said to his back. 

Now this is where my dream ended, but it left me thinking that I’d be booting a certain turd from my house. It was my house, and had been for years. Yeah, I wouldn’t put up with that. 

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