The Juliette Society(44)

And for years and years I never knew it was there.

I’d forgotten hearing not only the story but also the sequence of events that lead up to it. And my friend, now she’s just a voice without a face or a name and fleeting half-formed memories are all the proof I have that she even existed.

Except in my dreams.

In my dreams, I remember everything. I remember exactly how she told the story, how it went and how it made me feel.

In my dreams, I run the scenes back and forth, adding new details here and there that make it seem more vivid and believable, discarding others. Keeping some that feel as if they need to be there as a running stitch to stop the fabric of the story from falling apart at the seams.

But the second I wake up, it’s gone. I lose all memory of it. Except for little strands here and there, but never enough that I can put it all together so that it would make any sense to me during my waking hours. Then, at night, it will all come flooding back again and the dream starts over.

Over the years, I think I must have slowly refined and reworked the story into a beautiful and complex patchwork of sexual desire, a catalogue of my wet dreams from puberty all the way into adulthood.

At some point over the last few weeks, something happened, something that brought the dream to light. All of it, every last bit of it has come back, invading my conscious mind. And now the story is as real to me as my own life. And my life, like Séverine’s, is starting to resemble a waking dream.

And I can’t lie, it scares the crap out of me to see what’s been inside for me so long, gestating and growing. But it does explain a lot, at least, about the path I’m on, the things I’ve seen and the places I’ve been. About the reasons I’m drawn to Anna.



In the dream, I’m a little older than I am right now. I live alone in a large city. Jack is not there. He’s not part of the dream and never has been. I haven’t had a boyfriend for years and I loathe going back to my empty apartment after work. So I go for a walk at the same time every day, just as dusk is starting to draw in. More often than not, I keep to my neighborhood and simply take a stroll around the block. At other times, I catch a cab to a nearby park and wander aimlessly along its gentle, rolling avenues lined with stately elm, oak and cyprus trees, past a bandstand high on a hill that looks like a Greek temple.

On this walk, I bask in the beauty of the city and it takes me outside of myself, allowing me to escape my thoughts. And on the clearest of evenings, when the entire city seems lit by an unearthly golden twilight glow, I’m overwhelmed by an incredible sense of well-being that remains with me as I return home, making the long nights that much easier to bear.

But underneath it all I’m desperately unhappy and deeply unfulfilled. A wild passion burns deep inside me and I long for the day when I will find someone to not only share my life but help fill the aching need to satisfy pent-up sexual desires that seem to become more frenzied and extreme as the sexless, loveless years go by.

There is someone, though – a neighbor, who lives in an apartment opposite – but we’ve never met, we’ve never spoken. When he passes me in the hallway, I try to catch his eye and he lowers his to avoid my gaze. But at night, I know he’s watching me. I can feel his eyes upon my body. I can feel his longing and desire and I know he wants me. And so, as I’m getting ready for bed, I’ll walk around in the nude with the lights on and the slats of the blinds on my windows tilted open to give him a good view. And when I’m in bed, I masturbate to the image of him in his apartment, pressed against the window, stroking his cock, watching me. I can see the passion on his face. But it never goes any further than this. Him watching me. Me watching him watching me. A feedback loop of carnal longing that’s never fully consummated.

One particular Fall evening, as I’m about to go out for my walk, my best friend calls. We talk for a while and when I leave my apartment building, it’s almost dark. A cab hurtles past. Without thinking, my arm shoots out to hail it. The vehicle swerves to the curb and squeals to a halt half a block ahead. I dash to catch up to it, bark my destination breathlessly into the driver side window and slump into the passenger seat.

The cab is suffused with a sweet chemical odor, like peppermint, as if it has just been cleaned, and the interior lights are all turned off. I’m so wrapped up in my thoughts it doesn’t even occur to me that I’m sitting in the dark.

I sense a movement off to my side. A gloved hand holding a rag appears in front of my face. I hear myself scream. But too late.

I am being carried in the arms of a great, hulking man. I feel the cool night air brush against my face. And I turn my head to see a large emerald green door looming above me. The door swings open. I see no one and nothing behind it. I’m carried beyond the threshold and enveloped in pitch blackness once again.