
My family had all gathered at our summer residence which, in this dream, was an amalgamation of the apartment on Washtenaw where I lived during my teenage years in Chicago, and the apartment I have lived in for the past eight years in the Netherlands.
The house was occupied by various cousins and my immediate family who, just having arrived for the summer, created quite a commotion, unpacking large suitcases and storing groceries in the kitchen cupboards and pantry.
Just then, my mother came up to me with a worried look of concern and told me that Natalia had just arrived from Israel after being gone for more than a decade and having not been in contact with anyone during her long absence.
I walked into the living room and saw Natalia sitting on the far right side of my grandparent's old sofa and walked up to her smiling as if nothing had happened. I gave her a friendly hug and kiss on the cheek.
She looked at me and smiled and asked if that was how she was to be greeted after so many years, reminding me that she was the love of my life, so I playfully jumped on top of her and took her in my arms like in an old movie; getting the joke, she said, "go on, kiss me for real," and I proceeded to kiss her passionately and then, all at once, I became serious and looked her in the eyes and asked her to marry me. Surprised and bewildered, she smiled and said yes.
Just then, we heard someone coming our way and Natalia got up quickly and told me she was going to unpack and walked towards the back of the house.
In the kitchen (now in my current home), it appeared that someone had misplaced the hummus and we were looking frantically in the fridge and all the cupboards to no avail. I was standing on a small white stool searching the cupboard above the oven.
I went to look around the corner in my old bedroom where Natalia was staying to find she had laid all of her clothes on the bed, but the room was empty so I went looking around the house for her.
Walking through the family room, I heard the sound of Natalia throwing up in my parent's bathroom and suddenly remembered she had been bulimic; I realized at that moment, remembering about her severe mental illnesses, that our marriage could never work.
I walked back into the living room and one of my cousins was there and said she had something for me. She handed me an envelope that contained a letter from Natalia saying that she knew I was in love with someone else and she couldn't live with herself knowing she had come between me and my true love, so she decided to leave.
I couldn't believe that all this had transpired in what seemed to be a matter of minutes, so I ran back to my parent's bathroom and the door was open revealing no one to be inside. I ran to the back of house and saw that my old bedroom was empty and all of Natalia's things were gone.
Back in the kitchen, everyone was still frantically looking for the hummus.
Then I woke up.
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