The Nightmare

So ok, here we are, mid January. I feel like "how did we get here, it's the 11th already?" And actually it's way too late tonight to be doing this. It's not really been a good day. I broke one of my alarm clocks last night (I need 2 to get out of bed at the right time for an early shift) and of course, overslept this morning despite all of that "oh God I mustn't oversleep tomorrow" last thing before I dropped off last night.
And then I had a nightmare. I'd actually forgotten about this, until someone said something at work - something totally insignificant - but it brought it all back. It was the wierdest sort of nightmare too, one of those not overtly frightening ones until you wake up and you think oh god what was that all about?
I was in some place that I thought of as home. Yet it was an odd mix of the place where I live now, and places that I've lived in in the past. My cat was with me, sweet little Portia who's long gone now. That was nice, it was like having her back again, curled up next to me. She was always a rather standoff-ish sort of cat, until it came time to curl up at night. Then she would sleep in the crook in my legs. Anyhow, she was there. I don't actually remember seeing her until it came time to leave the living room, but her presence was distinctly registered with me for the whole time.
But of course this is where it gets weird. He was in it, this person from the past of my life, this real presence sitting next to me on the sofa - my old sofa, and he was so nice. He was totally different, not him at all, he was nice and quiet, and being - just different. I can't, and frankly shouldn't explain it here, but he was there.
Then we were going to bed, and he pulled his shirt up and he was covered with these healing cuts on his back. All these scabs, scratches, all over his lower back, buttocks and thighs. I was touching them, and saying how did you get these, and then I saw Portia walking out of the room into the bedroom, and he followed her - I knew she was going out of the window and that he would follow her. And I woke up. Just suddenly wide awake, and creeped out, and thinking God what the hell bought that on, why suddenly to dream of him again, so vividly I could smell him. I could actually smell the scent of him, I have no idea why. I haven't been missing him, and I'm not missing him now. I have no sense of him being missing from my life, without anything other than a pretty strong sense of relief.
But this is where it gets a little strange. We've often in the past had periods when we've been apart, rows arguments and all of that stuff, and we've dreamed of each other and for that reason got in touch because of a sense something is wrong in the other's life. And I do have a slight pull to say you should ring him, check on how he is. But I'm not going to. This is the first time I've had one of these dream events and been sure its right not to check. I cannot go back there now. I will not go back there now. It would be such a negative thing to do. I just rather get the feeling I'm going to be spending the rest of my life experiencing these dreams from time to time, and maybe waking up in the middle of the night with that smell in my head. And yes, I'll be sad, and feel a sense of loss for the things that might have been if my life had been different.
But, but there's a huge but. No sense of loss will ever again be able to overcome the sense that I'm where I'm meant to be, and remove the memory of the incredible struggle it took to reach this place. And that's got to be worth all of the dreams for the entire totality of my life. The dreams are fragmentary, and very, very occasional. The triumph of overcoming that struggle is permanent, and one of the strands of my life that makes me me.