While walking down a theater aisle, I spotted TB for the first time in months. As I passed by, I quoted a line from a play in the voice or intonation of Orson Welles — or I hoped I did. That should have gotten his attention. Immediately I wondered if I also looked like Welles and what I had been thinking — that he would fall for the same kind of talent and abilities I do? In these dreams, I try to impress him and others with what I like.

I was wearing a light cotton housecoat when I realized I was standing in the middle of a road at night, and a car was coming. I ducked into my closet, which was right up against the narrow, shoulderless road, and tried to pull the housecoat around me and shut the door, but the coat wouldn’t fit around my breasts. The car passed within inches of me, and I felt shaken by nearly being hit and seen.

I heard a former boss from PwC come along with someone. They talked about moving some files in the closet on the other side. There was nowhere for me to go.

I went back to the hospital for a third procedure/second surgery and ran into T. F. F. while waiting. I felt ambivalent about this, but when he tried to be apologetically affectionate, perhaps even sexy, I didn’t like it. I left to find a bathroom, but everything was strange, with no doors or distinct toilets.

After passing through the corridors, I came upon a plaza of quaint stores like those in Wheaton, Long Grove, and Geneva. Now I was confused. I went back the way I thought I had come, but I was lost. Finally, I saw someone to ask for directions, but when I followed them I ended up in what appeared to be a fancy drawing room with no other exit. It was nothing like a hospital.

By now, I was panicking that I’d been called for surgery while I had been wandering, and a little worried that T. F. F. would think I had run off. I was anxious because I believed this surgery was critical to my survival, and that I’d walked out on my last chance for life (surgery) as well as a renewed friendship that I no longer had much interest in. All I could think was, “It’s complicated,” but I did not want to explain why.