l'enfer, c'est les autres

When I dream, I dream of architecture, and houses that go on forever. Mostly it's different, though sometimes I see the houses in my waking life, but there's one that I used to go back to all the time. It was very beautiful and very strange. I haven't dreamed of it for years but I remember it perfectly.

I've been seeing this girl for the past couple weeks, and last night she invited me back to her house to watch some movies and maybe start a fire in the fireplace in the last few weeks of winter. And it turns out she lives in that house.

I'd never seen it from the outside so I just got that weird deja vu you get when you see something you dream about at first. Then we got inside and I recognized it, but I didn't say anything, though she could tell something was wrong. She held my hand tight as we sat down to watch.

The thing about the dream house is there was no exit. It just went on forever. If there were windows they wouldn't open, or they'd just open onto a courtyard that was surrounded by the house. Some of them were paintings. And we watched some French animated film and had a fire and some wine, and fell asleep on the couch.

In the morning I kissed her on the cheek and said I should head home, and she nodded sleepily, and I made my way to where the front door was. It was gone. It just opened out onto an impossible hallway--something that should have stretched out onto the street.

I ran back to tell her. She didn't seem frightened like she should have been. She was worried and maybe it was just the morning, but she didn't seem to be afraid because of what this meant. She led me by the hand through the rooms of the house, hoping that maybe I'd taken a wrong turn or that she could find an exit.

We couldn't, but she kept leading me through the rooms until we found another living room, a fire burning there, too. We sat down next to each other and didn't say anything for a long time. Then, "Well, do you want to roast marshmallows?"

"Sure. I guess I'm not going anywhere."

I don't know if this will last forever. I don't know if it will be beautiful or terrible, or both. But we might as well do something with it while we can.