A dream come true

Horrible, horrible dreams last night.

My subconscious isn't subtle. I dreamed of him, and he had his arms around another girl, it was as if I wasn't even there, and I knew it was my instinct telling me to let go.

This is the truth of things now.

I even know why I had the dream. I sent him an email yesterday against my better judgment.

Over the course of a fortnight I crafted it carefully - not heavy, not whiny, not accusative. A little dusting of  humour, a reference to something we used to laugh over. A gentle outstretching of my hand in friendship. I shaped those words fiercely, polished them endlessly, wrote and rewrote and edited and refined until I saw perfection in them.

In it, I said that I hadn't known what to expect afterwards, except that I had hoped we would emerge from it as renewed friends, if nothing else. That we owed each other nothing except the courtesy of having been friends once, if not anymore. 

And that I wondered if, having revived the friendship so briefly, he might have made a decision to punctuate it altogether, instead.

I hoped - powerfully hoped, hoped in spite of myself and that instinct of mine - that he might reply to it. Just something short, an acknowledgment or a recognition, a note to say we are still friends. A note to say, All is not lost, on that front at least.

Twenty-four hours later, my inbox is still hollow with his absence. And I suppose, actually, that not replying says more than any words ever could.