Dream // Van McCann

6. My Own Two Eyes

Next Wednesday

I was nervous about my session with Roman today. I've missed three sessions total because I went on holiday and was hungover last week. It took everything to not offer him up to Bondy again but I knew I had to keep it because I had a very important question to ask him.

His mother-in-law has passed the house numerous times and I wanted to know if she knew anything about the family living there. Surely she's seen someone leave and enter the house or maybe the neighbors know a thing or two. There were so many unknowns I had to figure out and being in Seattle made it difficult.

What didn't help was the silence on the other end. Clara's mum still hasn't replied to me and I started to worry, wondering if my message got stuck in her requests. Maybe I was too late and she had sworn off that godforsaken site. And what about the letter to Clara? Surely it would've arrived by now but it's not the fastest way to reach someone. Flying to Portugal would be a lot faster but I didn't have the time nor money.

For the most part, I'd gotten through my backlog at work save for some minor things which I kept putting off. It was more clerical work which I hate because I need to put together the expenses for 2022 and send it to the sponsor. It's now 2023 and February is almost over so I need to get on it. The sponsor uses this to keep track of his expenses and to make sure he allocates enough money to fund this project.

I finished half the report and figured I'd leave the rest for tomorrow as I really needed to catch up on Roman's past few dreams. Bondy went overboard with the dream analysis as they were several pages long. He was very thorough and there were some new concepts and themes I've never heard about which put my reports to shame.

"Way to make me look bad, Bondy," I complained. Bondy looked up, confused. "Your reports are insane." I began flipping through his reports to prove my point and Bondy chuckled.

"I'm sorry. His dreams are very interesting," he said.

"I can see that."

I sighed and began reading, feeling like I was in school again but the content was more interesting. For the first dream Bondy sat in on, Roman dreamt that his oldest son Gabriel ran away. They had a row the night before but Roman didn't say about what.

Bondy went on to say this dream was the result of a strain in their relationship. What intrigued him was how real it felt to Roman. He was brought to tears and Bondy suspects he suppressed his emotions in his waking life. It makes sense as he must remain strong to reprimand his child, but deep down, the words exchanged must've taken its toll on him. And despite the strain, he still loves his son dearly. You could see it in his desperation to find him.

It's interesting studying the dynamics between father and son. None of us have children so we've never encountered this before. His second and third dreams were more in line with his typical dreams. The reports were interesting but not as interesting as the first one so I'll save you the details.

There was a knock on the door and I opened it to see Roman standing there, smiling.

"I've not seen you in ages," he said, putting his arm around my shoulders and closing the door. "How was your trip?"

"It was good, it—" I stopped myself wondering if I should tell him Clara's alive. As much as I trust him, I don't know if he can keep a secret. What if the excitement gets over him and he tells his mother-in-law? I didn't want to start anything without knowing for sure Clara still lived there and that her parents are still under the impression that she's dead. "It was really good." Roman chuckled at my strange response.

"So will I be going under with you or Bondy today?" he asked.

"It'll be me, sir."

It was strange seeing Roman so relaxed and at ease here. He treated us like we were best mates and I had to fight the urge to call him "sir" which I actually think slipped from my mouth earlier but Roman didn't react to it. He began undoing his tie and draped it over the couch, eager to get started.