The Moon on a Frozen Lake

2: In Dreams

As if time finally bowed its unwavering boughs,

She rose from the ashes, then flew to the willow tree by the stream.

Just as she kissed me and from sleep I rouse,

She scattered like cherry blossoms; it was but a dream.

-- J., 2016

There he was again, haunting her dreams.

This time, he was sitting next to her, his arm cushioning his head as he slumped over her bed. He was so close, if she wished, she could run her fingers through his hair. Yet seeing how his body was relaxed in slumber, she waited, content to simply take him all in, from the tiny mole right beneath his right eye to the barely-there ridge at the tip of his nose.

For a moment, she wondered how such detail existed in her memory. After all, she'd only seen him once in person. But then again, there was no counting the number of times she had looked at his photo so perhaps, without her knowing, her mind had cataloged his features into her subconscious. Anyway, she had long given up trying to understand why or how this came to be.

It all started when her friend posted a news article on Wechat. There was a portrait of him in it captioned as the company's new country manager. Yingyue didn't know exactly what it was that drew her attention, but when she saw him, she couldn't look away. For the first time since she had lost her parents, something other than numbness stirred in her chest. The emotion caught her so much by surprise, she found herself sending a message asking about him. Her friend, Yiwen, quickly responded and by the end of that conversation, she had agreed to be introduced to Kang Jihoon.

That night, he had started inhabiting her dreams. At first, his presence was fleeting-- a small smile, a brief touch, a figure in the distance. Yet as the day of their meeting drew closer, his smile had transformed into a smirk, his touch into a thorough exploration, and the distance between them grew nonexistent. Sometimes, she'd wake up with an ache between her thighs.

Yingyue had always been a passionate creature. Before this--- this self-imprisonment? Hiatus from society? --- no, this crippling phobia that kept her from going out of her house, she had indulged in a few no-strings-attached affairs whenever work got too stressful.

Which was often, her brain quipped.

Well... yeah, and that led her to the point she was trying to make. These dreams were the result of her prolonged celibacy.

Probably.

More than likely.

Besides, she couldn't control what she dreamed about. There was definitely no reason to be embarrassed. And, she was definitely not a weird person.

Yet, when she finally saw him standing outside her gate, dozens of heated images had assailed her. There, in the flesh, was the man who'd whispered naughty things against her thighs while he ravaged her. It didn't help that he looked a hundred times better in person. He was smooth silk, intoxicating wine, and decadent chocolate personified. She wanted to gobble him up and luxuriate in the feel of his body against hers. It took everything she had to keep a straight a face and control her ragged breathing. Before he could question her strange reaction, she shut the door in his face.

She couldn't face him after all.

Not when she was acting like a sex-deprived nymphomaniac. Not when he so easily stirred up her emotions.

Pleasure and pain were two sides of the same coin. Jihoon was dangerous, especially when she was floating in this limbo, desperately seeking for a purpose to living. Any sort of relationship with him was bound to lead her farther astray.