And then I met him, the love of my life, my soulmate, but it was too late.
I was a nurse at the local hospital, working hours on end. After each shift I fell onto my bed exhausted, but unfortunately I suffered from insomnia, so sleep deprivation didn't even begin to explain my life - my eyes were circled with blueish-grey rings, I was constantly fatigued and irritable, my mind was a mist-filled maze, and my motivation zero. After another few shifts I was encouraged to see a psychiatrist to overcome my insomnia as my work performance started to suffer the consequences.
With much hesitation but no excuse, I made an appointment with a psychiatrist who prescribed me sleeping pills. The medication worked wonderfully at first, but eventually I dreamt the most peculiar things - lifetimes that felt like a reality on its own. I finally slept, so I wrote it off as a mere side effect of the medication.
One night as I climbed into bed, my eye caught the time that flashed in bold red on my digital alarm clock. It was 11:11pm. I drank my medication and slowly watched how my room started to fade away. I jumped waking up, and soon discovered I was still dreaming. A wooden door, big and withered by time stood before me. Its handle was made of pure gold, and carved in the center of the door a large sigil glowed an illuminating white. My body shook at the thought of opening the door, but for some reason, before I could catch myself, my right hand felt heavy on the golden handle...
I entered - wallpaper with wooden slats in the shape of squares surrounded the room, a grand piano with ivory keys glimmered in the whisper of morning sunlight that pierced through the window, oatmeal colored curtains hung heavy framing each window, vases stood on a wooden accent table filled with wildflowers that scented the room. It was a lovely sight, but nothing like I had known. Out of curiosity I glanced out of the window and saw women dressed in long summer dresses strolling along the brick road with a mix of horse driven carriages and vintage cars driving by.
I looked down and noticed that my clothes have changed - the dress wrong for morning, it was silk instead of cotton its waist dropped low on my hips, beads were sewn densely so much so that they caught even the dimmest light. The fringe traveled with my breath. No modern seam, no familiar cut.
I was dreaming of life in the 1920's.
Curious, I exit the room, no one in sight. I found the front door and made my way to the streets of the past. The dream was a contradiction to the imagination. It wasn't in black and white as the movies portrayed it to be, it was vibrant - vibrant with life, with color, with ambition and potential. I lost myself in awe. As I continued walking I saw a magnificent sunset glimmering orange in the sky. As I realized the time in my dream, I quickly headed back to the place where the dream originated, but something was different...
A beautiful, luscious green archway caught my eye that wasn't there before. I walked through the arch to find a garden with roses of all colors, a few wooden benches, hedge mazes, and a fountain made of cement proudly displaying its waterworks.
I sat down at the nearest bench when I was joined by a dashing young man.
"I must be dreaming to encounter such beauty," the man said, a warm smile radiating from his face.
I looked at him, feeling my pale cheeks turn a shade of pink.
"My name is Edward Day, wonderful to make your acquaintance Miss?" the man introduced himself waiting for me to do the same.
"Ms. Trent, Skye Trent," I said holding my right hand as he kissed it.
"Such strange name, but it aligns with the beauty of the heavens above," Edward said his eyes soft.
I couldn't help but to fall helplessly in love with Edward from that first encounter. We spent hours talking where he told me his wife had passed away and that he had a son. He seemed like such a wonder person with a big heart and a pure soul.
Suddenly I woke up. I looked at my digital alarm clock to see that I was almost late for my shift. That day I couldn't wait to get back home to dream again. To dream of that garden, to dream of Edward.
And so it happened. Each night in my dreams for about a year we met at the garden. A romance blossomed between us as our time together grew more. It was the type of romance one would only read about in fairytales, until my fairytale dream turned into a nightmare...
One night I drank my medication as usual, feeling excited to return to Edward's warm embrace. As I faded into sleep, I dreamt...
Nothing.
It was as if my dreams were erased, replaced by an endless void of blackness, of stillness. Each night I tried to return but couldn't. The void haunted me, echoing loss in my heart.
Each morning I woke up with a heart of longing, wanting to see Edward's face again.
I therefore decided to do some research and discovered that the medication I was taking for my insomnia had the side effect of vivid dreams, but was only temporary for a few. I dug further due to my longing for Edward and typed his name into the search bar.
As the keyboard clicked with the letters spelling out his name, a full article appeared of him being a war hero in the second world war. My body was ridden with goosebumps. Edward Day wasn't just a dream he was real.
I searched for his family and found that his great-granddaughter lived just a few block from me. I scraped the courage together to visit her the next day.
I knocked on her door taking a deep breath, uncertain of what I would find. As she opened the door, she immediately turned pale. With a shaky voice she invited me into her home where she showed me a sketchbook of Edward. The book was filled with sketches of my face, each to exact detail, along with my name scribbled at the bottom of the portraits.
"Edward always told me stories of this woman. He said that she was the love of his life, but she disappeared without a trace. He died in that war not of wounds to the flesh, but with a wound to the heart," she said.
I couldn't hear anything else as Edward's great-granddaughter's voice was drowned by a ringing in my ears. I rushed to the cemetery where he was buried as the article mentioned, and then I met him, the love of my life, my soulmate, but it was too late.
It was never a dream. I went through a poral back to the 1920's where I met my anchor, my one true love.
In that garden, the garden of dawn, Edward's voice will always echo and our love will always bloom.
We will always be dreams apart...
