The boy in my dreams

I dream of a boy frequently.

At least once a week, I see his light brown skin, the chocolate pools of his eyes, the loose curls of his hair, hanging down near his face. I see his hands, big and strong, the hands of a boy who will soon be a man.

He is a teenager with the build and bone structure of a grown man, but the mischievous spark of a child in his eyes.

I see a slideshow of pictures from the time he was a little boy to a teenager. There he is in front of a birthday cake with candles illuminating his face, or clothed in a camouflage hoodie, holding a buck from a hunting trip.

I see home movies of him walking and I can hear him laughing as a child.

I dream of him sitting by the cool, blue water of a swimming pool wearing a white tank top and blue swim trunks, his hair braided in cornrows. His body is half turned in his chair, looking back at me, asking a question. I can feel the thick air, twisting spring into summer, and the hot sun shining down as it threatens to burn my skin.

Sometimes, in the rare event that he speaks, I can hear his voice, just recently changed from the sweet soprano of a child to the deep treble of a man.

When I'm lucky enough to hear him, it's only a chuckle or a "Yeah."

One night, as I slept like the dead, he came to me. We were outside my childhood home, a maroon and tan F-150 sat in the driveway.

As the house towered behind us in the black of night, he stood there in white, looking at me. He wore his hair down, his curls framing his head like a halo. He smiled at me, but only just slightly.

I've never, awake nor asleep, seen anyone so peaceful. He looked to be the embodiment of contentment, or at least, contentment as I imagine it to be.

I walked up close to him and stood, his head nearly a foot higher than me at 5-foot-4-inches.

"I love you. I miss you. I'm so sorry," I said.

I buried my face in his chest and wrapped my arms around his larger than life body.

He never said anything, but he put his arms around me.

Then I woke up.

One night, I got in my bed and let the darkness of the room and the night envelope me. I needed rest. But as I drifted off, I found myself in a crowded room.

The lights were low, and I noticed teenage kids were all around me. Popular music was playing, but I didn't recognize the song. The girls wore beautiful gowns of silk material and different colors. They wore their hair and makeup as they would if they were going to a Hollywood awards show. The boys were in tuxedos and finely pressed suits. Everyone looked his and her best.

And there, in the very back of the crowd was the boy, standing there, looking at me.

He stood tall and wore a black tuxedo with red silk underneath. His curls cascaded down as if they were placed by the angels themselves.

We never spoke.

And then I woke up.

I didn't dream of him for two or more weeks after that. He was gone as quickly as he came, like a ghost in the night, vanishing at the tiniest hint of morning light.

Nights came and went without the visitor I came to expect, and one Sunday afternoon, I found myself driving alone down a U.S. highway. The clouds were crying slow and steady tears from the gray sky above them.

I continued down the quiet four-lane, my windshield wipers pulsing, a metronome that my heartbeat should have followed.

Instead, the further west I went, the faster my heart beat. I knew where I was going, or at least, I thought I did.

I drove close to a median, nearly letting my finger hit my turn signal. I could turn around right then and go back to what I knew. I could go back to the familiar.

But then I didn't.

I kept going.

I slowed down and turned right. I crept slowly up the steep asphalt hill that led to a church I had been to less than a handful of times.

My heart beat out of my chest. My breath came fast.

Did I know where I was going?

My car crawled around the back of the church, pulling me forward whether I wanted to move ahead or not.

My foot stayed on the brake, letting rubber lead me to a place I wasn't sure my mind was ready to go.

As the blacktop ran out, gravel crunched under my car.

Eventually, I stopped and I got out.

That's when I saw him. The boy from my dreams.

He was looking at me with a smirk on his face. His curls hanging loose. His eyes smiled and he had a dimple at the bottom of his left cheek.

I stared at him and slowly, slowly walked toward him.

When I got to the solid, ebony stone that stood between us, I studied the words written on it.

I looked at his name, the dash between two dates I remembered so vividly. I touched the cold black rock, felt the rough indention of each letter and number on my finger tip.

Then I laid down a single flower on the base of his headstone and walked away.

16 years earlier...

My mother laid on the ultrasound table, her shirt pulled up, exposing her belly that was shiny with gel. The technician slid a wand across my mother's stomach and looked from the computer screen to me.

"What do you want? A boy or a girl?" She asked, smiling.

"I want a brother!" I said, giddy with anticipation, and feeling special that I got to be there.

My mother laughed and said, "She already has two younger sisters."

I looked between the technician and the screen, trying my best to figure out what the blob in front of me was.

She continued to slide the wand over my mother's stomach, snapping pictures on the black and white screen in front of her.

"It's a boy!"